The brutal massacre of the Harford family at Potwoolstan Hall in Devon in 1985 shocked the country and passed into local folklore. When a journalist researching the case is murdered 20 years later, the horror is reawakened. Sixteenth-century Potwoolstan Hall, now a New Age healing centre, is reputed to...
When a woman is burned to death in Grandal Field in Devon, it seems like a case of mistaken identity. Until DI Wesley Peterson learns of a legend involving a French woman who burned to death there in the thirteenth century. And when he discovers that records of a previous excavation on the site have vanished...
Alistair Cooke's biographer introduces a selection of archive recordings, including radio and television interviews and extracts from Letter From America, in a fascinating in-depth look at the career of the veteran journalist.
A twisted murder mirrors a dark legend . . . When the body of Pauline Brent is found hanging from a yew tree in a local graveyard, DS Wesley Peterson immediately suspects foul play. Then history provides him with a clue. Wesley's archaeologist friend, Neil Watson, has excavated a corpse at his nearby dig...
Peter Diamond, the Bath detective brilliant at rooting out murder, is peeved at being diverted to Professional Standards to enquire into a police car accident. Arriving late at the scene, he discovers an extra victim thrown onto an embankment - unconscious and unnoticed. Diamond administers CPR, but no one...
Peter Diamond investigates a mystery of the past in the seventeenth case for the brilliant Bath detective. A wrecking ball crashes through the roof of a terraced cottage in Bath and exposes a skeleton in eighteenth-century clothes. Can these possibly be the remains of Beau Nash, the so-called King of Bath, whose body is said to have...
At 6'7'and just under 300 lbs, Clay Blaisdell is one big mother, but his capers were just small-time until he met George Rackley. George introduced him to a hundred cons and one big idea: kidnapping the child of rich parents. The Gerards are filthy rich, and the last twig on the family tree could be worth millions. There's only one problem...
The year is 1855, and on the LNWR train to London, a criminal is being escorted to his appointment with the hangman. But the wily Jeremy Oxley, conman, thief and murderer, has one last ace up his sleeve: a beautiful and ruthless accomplice willing to do anything to save her lover, including committing ...
The compelling and heartwarming story of a young nurse's life and work in 1950s England from the SUNDAY TIMES bestselling author. "Three small children peep out, their eyes watching me from beneath tousled but clean hair. Their clothes seem to have been put on their bodies to cover them rather than to fit...
When Tommy and Tuppence visit an elderly aunt in her gothic nursing home, they think nothing of her mistrust of the doctors; after all, Ada is a very difficult old lady. But when Mrs Lockett mentions a poisoned mushroom stew, and Mrs Lancaster talks about "something behind the fireplace", Tommy and...
From one of Granta's Best of Young American Novelists comes Certain American States,whose insightful and lonely stories beg you to discover the emotional universes hiding at their cores. The winner of a Whiting Award, Catherine Lacey brings her narrative mastery to Certain American States, her first collection...
On 27 CD's. Six Charles Dickens' classic novels as lively full-cast BBC Radio dramas! This handsome box set includes: Bleak House; A Tale of Two Cities; Great Expectations; Oliver Twist; Hard Times; Little Dorrit.
For Judith Dunbar, her first glimpse of Nancherrow, her friend Loveday's beautiful family estate on the Cornish coast, is love at first sight - after the rigours of boarding school it spells luxury. She falls in love, too, with all Loveday's family. They treat Judith as one of them.
Get me some ghosts,' said Fulton Snoddle-Brittle. 'Frightful and dangerous ghosts!' Fulton has gone to the Dial A Ghost agency with an evil plan. He wants to hire some truly terrifying ghosts to scare his nephew Oliver to death. But Oliver likes ghosts. And the peculiar ones he meets at Helton Hall decide at once...
Peter Diamond, ex-CID and notoriously difficult to work with, is sacked from his latest job as a security guard in Harrods. Doggedly he turns his sleuthing skills to unravelling the mystery of a little Japanese girl abandoned in London. Naomi, as she is known, exhibits the classic symptoms of an autistic child.
The complete BBC Radio collection bringing together two full-cast dramatisations of Douglas Adams' Dirk Gently novels. In Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency Dirk Gently has an unshakable belief in the interconnectedness of all things, but his Holistic Detective Agency mainly succeeds in tracking down...
Alan Bennett reads three enchanting Doctor Dolittle stories Doctor Dolittle has an extraordinary talent – he can talk to the animals! Taught by his parrot, Polynesia, he is soon able to chat to every kind of creature – and his skill leads him into all sorts of adventures. In The Story of Doctor Dolittle, the Doctor...
A nightmare discovery in the boot of a stolen BMW plunges car thief Danny Stapleton into the worst trouble of his life. What links his misfortune to the mysterious disappearance of an art teacher at a private school for girls in Chichester? Orders from above push Peter Diamond of Bath CID into...
Read the USA Today bestseller from the author of Roses, a "sumptuous, full-bodied, and emotional" novel about five young spies embedded among the highest Nazi ranks in occupied Paris (Adriana Trigiani, New York Times bestselling author of Tony's Wife). At the height of World War II, a handful of idealistic...
From 1927 to 1934 Dirk Bogarde lived in a remote cottage in the Sussex Downs with his sister, Elizabeth, and their devoted but strict nanny, Lally. This was a time of the gleaning at the end of the summer, of harvests and harvest mice, of oil lamps, of wells, and of incredible childhood adventures. Seen through...
A gloriously witty novel from Sebastian Faulks using P.G. Wodehouse’s much-loved characters, Jeeves and Wooster, fully authorised by the Wodehouse estate. Bertie Wooster, recently returned from a very pleasurable soujourn in Cannes, finds himself at the stately home of Sir Henry Hackwood in Dorset. Bertie is...
This is a BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatization starring Michael Hordern as Jeeves and Richard Briers as Wooster. Steeple Bumphleigh is the sort of picturesque place where you can't throw a brick without hitting a honeysuckled cottage or beaning an apple-cheeked villager. But for Bertie Wooster, it is a place to be...
Joyce Grenfell's irresistible collection of poetry and writings gathered together by her friend and biographer Janie Hampton. My Kind of Magic' is a charming collection of articles and poems from the celebrated English writer and entertainer, Joyce Grenfell. This is a sparkling compilation of writings of every kind...
This is the best production of King Lear I have for sale. Kenneth Branagh, in celebration of John Guilgud's 90th Birthday, pulled together the greatest Shakespearean acting talent alive at that time and, thank goodness for us, had it recorded in audio format. There are recordings that, if you have an ...
A collection of 12 Alistair Cooke broadcasts from between 1946 and 1968. He offers his opinions and reflections on topics which range from the decisions of presidents and prime ministers to sporting triumphs, cultural changes, and the mores of society world-wide.
A collection of 12 Alistair Cooke broadcasts from between 1946 and 1968. He offers his opinions and reflections on topics which range from the decisions of presidents and prime ministers to sporting triumphs, cultural changes, and the mores of society world-wide.
Poirot had been present when Jane bragged of her plan to ‘get rid of’ her estranged husband. Now the monstrous man was dead. And yet the great Belgian detective couldn’t help feeling that he was being taken for a ride. After all, how could Jane have stabbed Lord Edgware to death in his library at exactly the...
This collection of Larry Niven’s classic works includes “Inconstant Moon” (soon to be a major motion picture), “Becalmed in Hell”, “Passerby”, “The Jigsaw Man”, “Not Long Before the End” and others, as well as essays on teleportation and time travel. First published as ALL THE MYRIAD WAYS (1971), this new volume also contains...
A beautiful gift pack featuring one of Agatha Christie’s most famous creations: Miss Marple. Aimed at the Christmas market it contains The Thirteen Problems and Miss Marple’s Final Cases, gathering together all the Miss Marple short stories. Described by her friend Dolly Bantry as ‘the typical old maid of fiction’,
King Arthur as you've never seen her! This bold, sizzling YA novel reimagines the Once and Future King as a teenage girl determined to save the universe from an evil curse. My name is Ari Helix. I have a magic sword, a cranky wizard, and a revolution to start. I've been chased my whole life. As a fugitive refugee in...
Imagine, if you can, the world in the year 2100. In Physics of the Future, Michio Kaku the New York Times bestselling author of Physics of the Impossible, gives us a stunning, provocative, and exhilarating vision of the coming century based on interviews with over three hundred of the world's top scientists who are...
This work features the complete first series of the hilarious gardening comedy starring Pam Ayres and Geoffrey Whitehead. Pam and Gordon Grant are a couple at odds running a rural garden centre. While Pam still feels young and is determined to avoid the slippery slope into middle-age, Gordon seems keen...
Late in the 26th century, the human race has advanced enough to accidentally trigger the Inhibitors---alien-killing machines designed to detect intelligent life and destroy it. The only hope for humanity lies in the recovery of a secret cache of doomsday weapons---and a renegade named Clavain who is determined...
Michael Hordern stars as Jeeves with Richard Briers as Bertie in a BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation. Mayhem has broken out at Brinkley Court and there would seem to be a desperate need for Jeeves. But Bertie is fed up with the assumption that he is merely an addendum to his personal attendant.
As spring comes to Scotland and the hills burst into life, a dance is planned for September. The invitations summon home the group of people Violet Aird has cared for most in her long life.
Liverpool late 1950s. This is a story of three people: a suppressed mother; a father, projectionist at the local cinema which has seen better days; and their daughter Martha. It is a time of many escapes: Nureyev defects in London; Gagarin escapes the earth's atmosphere to be the first man in space; the Beatles...
The Ultimate Classic Collection is drawn from our extensive back catalogue of over 300 short stories and showcases some of the finest examples of the genre: from romance to horror, detective and crime stories to the best of women's writing. The stories in this superb collection are as follows: The Girl from Arles...
A Genius Performance by Michael Jayston! The young woman of Nightingale House are there to learn to nurse and comfort the suffering. But when one of the students plays patient in a demonstration of nursing skills, she is horribly, brutally killed. Another student dies equally mysteriously and it is up to Adam...
Sir Bobby Charlton is widely acknowledged as the greatest player ever to wear an England shirt. He won a record number of caps and scored a record number of goals. Here, in the second volume of his bestselling autobiography, Sir Bobby talks in detail about his phenomenal career with England.
Born Maurice Micklewhite, son of a Billingsgate fish porter and a charlady, Michael Caine's life has been an extraordinary rollercoaster: from washing dishes and fighting on National Service, to winning two Oscars and being knighted by the Queen. With more than eighty films to his name, he has starred in some of the classics of...
What is it like to be old? Diana Athill, born in 1917, made her reputation as a writer with the candour of her memoirs. In SOMEWHERE TOWARDS THE END she reflects frankly on the losses and occasionally the gains that old age brings, and on the wisdom and fortitude required to face death.
A Bertie and Jeeves classic, featuring an Alpine hat, a black amber statuette, and the dreaded Totleigh Towers. In Stiff Upper Lip, Jeeves, Bertie's newt-breeding friend Gussie Fink-Nottle must marry Madeline Bassett or Bertie will be obliged to take his place.
Ian McEwan’s mastery dazzles us in this superbly deft and witty audiobook of betrayal and intrigue, love, and the invented self. Serena Frome, the beautiful daughter of an Anglican bishop, has a brief affair with an older man during her final year at Cambridge, and finds herself being groomed for the intelligence...
GOLD WINNER at the 2001 SPOKEN WORD AWARDS! Due to the unrepentant playing of his banjolele, Bertie parts company with Jeeves, who finds employment with Bertie's old mate Chuffy. Chuffy and Pauline Stoker (previously engaged to the Wooster chap) have fallen in love, but Chuffy is reluctant...
Archaeologist Neil Watson did not expect to find the body of American veteran Norman Openheim in the ruins of the old chantry chapel. He turns to his old student friend, Detective Sergeant Wesley Peterson, for help. Ironically, both men are looking at an invading force - Wes the WWII Yanks and Neil a group of..
A breathtaking collection of sea-faring tales. For the first time ever Patrick O'Brian's famous and much-loved Aubrey-Maturin novels will be available on audio CD - as omnibus editions and split into seven volumes. Follow the adventures of Jack Aubrey and his ship's surgeon Stephen Maturin. Theirs is one of the...
As thousands of Brits are fighting on the Front Line, a new breed of women emerges to hold the Home Front together. Fiercely independent and fiery-spirited, these women are a raucous group of munition workers. One group of "canaries", so-called because of their chemically-stained yellow faces ...
Never has DI Wesley Peterson witnessed such a bizarre crime scene. A man has been brutally murdered by two precise wounds to his neck and his body drained of blood. It seems that the victim, Charles Marrick, was not a popular man in the Devon area and Wesley doesn't have a shortage of suspects.
An excavation at the lost gardens of Earlsacre Hall is halted when a skeleton is discovered beneath a 300-year-old stone plinth - the remains of a woman who was buried alive. But even when more skeletons are found in the walled garden, DS Wesley Peterson has more pressing matters on his hands. A man has...
Shortlisted for Audiobook of the Year at the British Book Awards 2020. Winner of Best Solo Narration at the New York Festival Radio Awards 2020 It is 20 years since the events of La Belle Sauvage: The Book of Dust Volume One unfolded and saw the baby Lyra Belacqua begin her life-changing journey.
When the decaying body of a murdered woman is discovered following an anonymous tip off, DI Wesley Peterson has problems establishing her identity. But as he digs deeper, he has another more disturbing case to investigate – the naked bodies of two teenagers have been found with shotgun wounds at the...
When widowed parcel-force worker Bob Naylor plucks up the courage to join a writers' circle, he discovers a motley collection of wannabe authors whom he would rather avoid at all costs. But when a publisher is found murdered, after recently addressing the group, Bob feels compelled to stay. Investigating Officer Hen Mallin...
When DI Wesley Peterson is summoned to investigate a killing, he assumes that it is a routine case. But soon dark secrets start to emerge from the victim's past.... Meanwhile archaeologist Neil Watson is pulled from the historic Paradise Court to a ruined village from World War One. Even with the help of the...
When Dr James Dalcott is shot dead it looks very much like an execution. And as DI Wesley Peterson begins piecing together his life, he finds that the well-liked doctor has been harbouring dramatic family secrets. Meanwhile, archaeologist Neil Watson has discovered a number of skeletons in nearby Tailors...
When a skeleton is discovered on a Devon smallholding, DS Wesley Peterson, a keen amateur archaeologist, is intrigued by the possibility that it is a Viking corpse buried in keeping with ancient traditions. But he has a rather more urgent crime to solve, when a Danish tourist is reported missing. Wesley finds...
Murder mystery, family saga, love story, and financial intrigue combine into one satisfyingly complex and entertainingly atmospheric novel. Harriet Vanger, a scion of one of Sweden's wealthiest families disappeared over forty years ago. All these years later, her aged uncle continues to seek the truth.
The second case for DCI Hen Mallin, introduced in The House Sitter. When widowed parcel-force worker Bob Naylor plucks up the courage to join a writers' circle, he discovers a motley collection of wannabe authors whom he would rather avoid at all costs. But when a publisher is found murdered, after recently addressing the...
A BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation starring Michael Hordern as Jeeves and Richard Briers as Bertie Wooster. Typical and just when Bertie thinks that God's in his heaven and all's right with the world, things start to go wrong again...
When a teenage girl is strangled and left for dead by an attacker she describes has having the head of a dog, the police are baffled. But when the body of another young woman is found mutilated and wrapped in a white linen sheet, DI Wesley Peterson suspects that the killer is performing an ancient ritual...
THE LAND OF PAINTED CAVES concludes the story of Ayla, her mate Jondalar, and their little daughter, Jonayla, taking readers on a journey of discovery and adventure as Ayla struggles to find a balance between her duties as a new mother and her training to become a Zelandoni
Detective Superintendent Peter Diamond is the last detective: a genuine gumshoe, committed to door stopping and deduction rather than fancy computer gadgetry. So when the naked body of a woman is found floating in the weeds in a lake near Bath with no one willing to identify her, no marks and no murder weapon, his sleuthing...
When Kirsten Harbourn is found strangled on her wedding day, DI Wesley Peterson makes some alarming discoveries. Kirsten was being pursued by a stalker, and she had dark secrets her fiancé knew nothing about. But Kirsten's wasn't the only wedding planned to take place that day. At Morbay register office...
DS Wesley Peterson, newly arrived in the West Country town of Tradmouth, has his hands full when a child goes missing and a young woman is brutally murdered on a lonely cliff path. Then his old friend, archaeologist Neil Watson, unearths the skeletons of a strangled woman and a newborn baby in the...
The premiere of the play "The Merry Devils", written by two of the company’s actors, gives the players, as well as the audience, quite a shock. Instead of the allotted two devils appearing during a crucial scene, three enter, one looking disturbingly real. Then, in defiance, manager Lawrence Firethorne agrees to...
With impeccable timing Hercule Poirot, the renowned Belgian detective, makes his dramatic entrance on to the English crime stage. Recently, there had been some strange goings on at Styles St Mary. Evelyn, constant companion to old Mrs Inglethorp, had stormed out of the house muttering something about...
This hugely engaging story of murder, superstition, religious politics and drama in a medieval monastery was one of the most striking novels to appear in the 1980s. The Name of the Rose is a thrilling story enriched with period detail and laced with tongue-in-cheek allusions to fictional characters the most striking...
It is 1852, and Inspector Robert Colbeck and his assistant Sergeant Victor Leeming are faced with their most complex and difficult case to date. As a train speeds over the Sankey Viaduct, a man is hurled from a carriage and plummets into the canal below. It later transpires that he has been stabbed to death.
Family, that slippery word, a star to every wandering bark, and everyone sailing under a different sky. A
fter his mother's death, Richard, a newly remarried hospital consultant, decides to build bridges with his estranged sister, inviting Angela and her family for a week in a rented house on the Welsh border. Four adults and four children, a single family and all of them strangers.
Bath detective Peter Diamond is having woman trouble. His boss wants him to find the missing daughter of one of her friends. He is not enthusiastic. A woman calling herself his Secret Admirer wants to arrange a date in a pub. He tries ignoring her. And his colleague, sexy Ingeborg Smith, distracts the...
Little Marcus Fallbrook was kidnapped in 1976, and when he never returned home, his grieving family assumed the worst. Thirty years later, teenage singing star Leah Wakefield disappears and DI Wesley Peterson has reason to suspect that the same kidnapper is responsible.
A year on from the mysterious disappearance of Jenny Bercival, DI Wesley Peterson is called in when the body of a strangled woman is found. The discovery mars the festivities of the Palkin Festival, held each year to celebrate the life of John Palkin, a 14th-century mayor of Tradmouth who made his fortune from...
When workmen converting former girls' boarding school Chadleigh Hall into a luxury hotel discover a skeleton in a sealed room, DI Wesley Peterson and his boss, Gerry Heffernan, are called in to investigate. But within minutes they have a second suspicious death on their hands: a team of marine archaeologists...
Longfellow's great narrative poem has been unjustly neglected in recent years though it gives a sympathetic portrait especially of Hiawatha, reared by Nokomis, daughter of the Moon, and his bride Minehaha. It is famously underpinned by its hypnotic rhythm, which makes it ideal listening.
Bernard Shaw was one of the most celebrated English-language writers of the 20th century and a very prominent figure in the early years of radio in Britain. Fuelled by his determination to use radio to promote some of his more controversial views, Shaw made regular broadcasts over a period of almost 25 years.
This CD makes available for the first time all the surviving BBC radio broadcasts of H.G. Wells. The earliest dates from 1931, by which time Wells was already in his sixties and a renowned public figure, recognised not only for his science fiction, but also his far sighted commentary on social and political affairs.
Winner of the Crime Writers Association Silver Dagger and shortlisted for the Edgar Award. The summons comes at night. Two policemen collect Peter Diamond from his West London flat and drive him to Bath. Once head of the murder squad there, he is now out of touch in his retirement, unaware of an...
When a severed hand from the vault of Bath Abbey Churchyard arrives on Peter Diamond's desk, he is delighted to hear that, far from being a medieval relic, it is from the 1980s. But the vault is part of the house where Mary Shelley's Frankenstein was written, and a fanatical American professor is thwarting their...
Britain had the biggest empire the world has ever known. At one time, a quarter of the global land mass was British. Over a third of the world was insured at Lloyds. At his coronation, more than 400 million people saluted George V. Truly, the sun never set on this historical phenomenon. Whatever the day...
Covering the period from 1087 to 1327, this is part of a major Radio 4 series telling the history of Britain from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria. Narrated by Anna Massey, the series draws on Churchill's "A History of the English-speaking Peoples", with extracts read by Paul Eddington.
Covering the period from 1327 to 1547, this is part of a major Radio 4 series telling the history of Britain from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria. Narrated by Anna Massey, the series draws on Churchill's "A History of the English-speaking Peoples", with extracts read by Paul Eddington.
Covering the period from 1547 to 1660, this is part of a major Radio 4 series telling the history of Britain from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria. It includes extracts from Churchill's "A History of the English-speaking Peoples", read by Paul Eddington and Peter Jeffrey.
Covering the period from 1660 to 1702, this is part of a major Radio 4 series telling the history of Britain from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria. It includes extracts from Churchill's "A History of the English-speaking Peoples", read by Peter Jeffrey.
Covering the reigns of Anne and George II, this is part of a major Radio 4 series telling the history of Britain from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria. It includes extracts from Churchill's "A History of the English-speaking Peoples", read by Peter Jeffrey.
Covering the period from 1760 to 1792, this is part of a major Radio 4 series telling the history of Britain from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria. It includes extracts from Churchill's "A History of the English-speaking Peoples", read by Peter Jeffrey.
Covering the age of Nelson, Wellington and Napoleon, this is part of a major Radio 4 series telling the history of Britain from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria. It includes extracts from Churchill's "A History of the English-speaking Peoples", read by Peter Jeffrey.
Covering the period from 1815 to 1837, this is part of a major Radio 4 series telling the history of Britain from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria. It includes extracts from Churchill's "A History of the English-speaking Peoples", read by Peter Jeffrey.
Covering the reign of Queen Victoria, this is part of a major Radio 4 series telling the history of Britain from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria. It includes extracts from Churchill's "A History of the English-speaking Peoples", read by Peter Jeffrey.
A Genius Performance by Anna Massey and Robert Powell! This volume, covering the years 1919-1939, looks at a Britain ravaged by war and at the unrest leading to millions of striking workers. It also takes in the lighter side of life in the 1920s and 1930s.
Covering the period up to 1087, this is part of a major Radio 4 series telling the history of Britain from the Roman invasion to the death of Victoria. Narrated by Anna Massey, the series draws on Churchill's "A History of the English-speaking Peoples", with extracts read by Paul Eddington.
The third part of a series detailing the story of Britain from 1901 to 1999. This volume covers 1939-1959, including Churchill's time as Prime Minister, London during the Blitz, the bombing of Hiroshima, Gandhi, Marilyn Monroe and Elvis Presley.
The fifth part of a series detailing the story of Britain from 1901 to 1999. This volume covers 1979-1999, including Mrs Thatcher's time in office, Charles and Diana's wedding, the Falklands War, the end of the Cold War, and the building of the Millennium Dome.
Under the Greenwood Tree is an affectionate and youthful portrait of a world Hardy knew well village life in 'Wessex' in which a romantic tale is set against changing circumstances. The traditional feature of local music making performed by the village band and choir is challenged by the modern innovation of...
In Clare Balding's family, walking just took too long - she galloped through the countryside and she galloped through life. Then, in 1999, Clare took a call from a BBC producer looking for a presenter for a new radio series. 'Do you walk?' she asked. 'Well, I walk the dog . . .'
Waverley by Sir Walter Scott is an enthralling tale of love, war and divided loyalties. Taking place during the Jacobite Rebellion of 1745, the novel tells the story of proud English officer Edward Waverley. After being posted to Dundee, Edward eventually befriends chieftain of the Highland Clan Mac-Ivor, and falls in...
A collaboration between two of the youngest professors in the UK, Why Does E=MC2? promises to be one of the most exciting and accessible explanations of the theory of relativity in recent years. In one of the most exciting and accessible explanations of The Theory of Relativity in recent years, Professors...
Written in History - Letters that Changed the World celebrates the letter in world history and personal life. Acclaimed historian Simon Sebag Montefiore selects letters that have changed the course of global events or touched a timeless emotion - whether passion, rage, humour - from ancient...