Ted Wallace is an old, sour, womanising, cantankerous, whisky-sodden beast of a failed poet and drama critic, but he has his faults too. Fired from his newspaper, months behind on his alimony payments and disgusted with a world that undervalues him, Ted seeks a few months repose and free drink at Swafford Hall, the country mansion of his old friend Lord Logan. But strange things have been going on at Swafford....

For Ned, 1980 seems a blissful year. Handsome, charming, popular and talented, his life is progressing smoothly, effortlessly, happily. And when he meets the lovely Portia Fendeman his personal jigsaw appears complete. But timing is everything in life, and his life is about to change for ever. Things are going to get very bad indeed for innocent young Ned. A promise made to a dying teacher and a spiteful trick played by fellow pupils will rocket Ned from cricket captain to solitary confinement, from head boy to hell.

This dazzling memoir promises to be a courageously frank, honest and poignant read. It will detail some of Fry's most turbulent and least-well-known years, with writing that will excite you, make you laugh uproariously, move you, inform you, and, above all, surprise you.

a) A fatuous, wasted, degenerate and wholly useless existence captured in delicate, lyrical and exquisitely realised prose. b) Lightly amusing anecdotes and tender reminiscences of the great men and women encountered during a rich, varied and rewarding lifetime, fondly remembered in the tranquil evening of a career of public service. c) The autobiography of a dizzying life fuelled by the lust for power and the search for ever more degrading downward paths of repulsive sexual adventuring.

Britain's best-loved comic genius Stephen Fry turns his celebrated wit and insight to unearthing the real America as he travels across the continent in his black taxicab. Stephen's account of his adventures is filled with his unique humour, insight and warmth in this audiobook that accompanies his journey for the BBC1 series.

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Heroes, written and read by Stephen Fry. There are heroes - and then there are Greek heroes. Few mere mortals have ever embarked on such bold and heart-stirring adventures, overcome myriad monstrous perils or outwitted scheming vengeful gods quite as stylishly and triumphantly as Greek heroes. In this companion to his best-selling Mythos, Stephen Fry brilliantly retells these dramatic, funny, tragic and timeless tales.

Fleeing across a roof on a dark night in Victorian London, a thief crashes through a glass skylight to almost certain death. But an ambitious young doctor revives and reconstructs his shattered body, proudly showing off his handiwork at the Scientific Society where the city's intelligentsia meet. It is there that the robber picks up the key to a new existence, and on his release from prison begins to lead a double life.

Here is a collection of the Oscar Wilde's famous fairy tales, read by a cast of leading British actors. Additional narrators include Geoffrey Palmer O.B.E., Sir Donald Sinden, and Elaine Stritch. Music: 'Reverie De Sebastian' by Steve Davies.

Stephen Fry and John Bird star in all four series of the BBC Radio 4 satirical comedy, plus the 2006 special episode. Set in the Machiavellian world of modern PR, Absolute Power introduces us to London-based 'government-media relations consultancy' Prentiss McCabe, whose partners Charles Prentiss and Martin McCabe are frequently embroiled in the machinations of the British political system.

A hilarious collection of the many articles written by Stephen Fry for magazines, newspapers, and radio. It includes selected wireless essays of Donald Trefusis, the ageing professor of philology brought to life in Fry's novel The Liar, and the best of Fry's weekly column for the Daily Telegraph.

A BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation of Evelyn Waugh's stunning, tragi-comic novel of the lives, loves, and mores of the English aristocracy. The action moves between 1923 and 1944, to tell the story of Charles Ryder and his infatuation with the decadent Sebastian Flyte.

Still in the formative years of his career, Hercule Poirot faces a most taxing case: who killed Lord Cronshaw? Was Coco Courtenay's death on the same night a mere coincidence? And did she deliberately take an overdose of cocaine?

1885: Five years after his release from prison, Montmorency is working undercover for the government. But his life, and national security, are threatened by his addiction to drugs. Can his friends restore his health in time to discover who is bombing London, and why, on the Scottish island of Tarimond, a whole generation of children has died?

Why is every film or tv programme a sequel or a remake? Why are people so f***ing hung up about swearing? Why do the asterisks in that sentence make it okay? Why do so many people want to stop other people doing things, and how can they be stopped from stopping them? These and many other questions trouble David Mitchell. Join him on a tour of the absurdities of modern life - from Ryanair to Richard III, Downton Abbey to phone etiquette, UKIP to hot dogs made of cats. 

Dirk Gently has an unshakeable belief in the interconnectedness of all things, but his Holistic Detective Agency mainly succeeds in tracking down missing cats for old ladies. Then Dirk stumbles upon an old friend behaving bizarrely - and he's drawn into a four-billion-year-old mystery that must be solved if the human race is to avoid immediate extinction.