Showing results by publisher "Hodder Headline Limited" in Literature & Fiction

Chief Inspector Banks is back - in an original tale that makes up part of a new crime collection of seven short stories by Peter Robinson, never published in the UK before. With settings ranging from the Pacific Northwest in the Sixties to the Yorkshire of the Second World War and present-day Toronto to Eastvale at Christmas, these stories feature hippies, policemen and models, little girls dancing ballet, PIs and soldiers.

Regarded by many as the world's greatest novel, this is the classic story of Anna Karenina, "grande dame of Petersburg society", who forsakes everything ¿ her marriage, her son, and her position in society ¿ for the dashing Count Vronsky, with tragic consequences.

Here are classic tales of terror to chill your blood, brilliantly read by the late, great Michael Williams. Enjoy these seven outstanding ghost stories from the masters of the genre: "The Signalman" by Charles Dickens; "The Watcher" by Robert Benson; "The Moonlit Road" by Ambrose Bierce; "Dog or Demon" by Theo Gift; "The Mystery of the Semi-Detatched" by E. Nesbit; "The Judge's House" by Bram Stoker"; and "Haunted" by an anonymous author.

Tom Jones is widely regarded as Fielding's greatest novel, a wonderful, picaresque adventure that takes Tom, a foundling, on a hilarious and by turns scandalous journey, rife with amorous encounters that often incur the wrath of those around him.

Here is Thomas Hardy's timeless novel, read by Julie Christie. Far from the Madding Crowd is perhaps the best-known of Hardy's works. The story centres around the beautiful and wilful Bathsheba Everdene, mistress of Weatherbury Upper Farm, and the three men who love her. Hardy combines outstanding description of West Country rural life with a deep sense of romantic passion.

One call will change her life, and will start a war. She is an Italian accountancy student in London, and her boyfriend is Eddie who teaches at a language school. But the prime reason Immacolata Borelli came to Britain was to look after her gangster brother, wanted for multiple murders back home in Naples.

As Eiji Miyake's 20th birthday nears, he sets out for the seething metropolis of Tokyo to find the father he has never met. There, he begins a thrilling, whirlwind journey where dreams, memories, and reality collide then diverge as Eiji is caught up in a feverish succession of encounters by turn bizarre, hilarious, and shockingly dangerous. But until Eiji has fallen in love and exorcised his childhood demons, the belonging he craves will remain, tantalizingly, just beyond his grasp.

In September 2007 an invited audience enjoyed a special performance by John Julius Norwich of a selection from his Christmas Crackers at the Jermyn Street Theatre in London to benefit the Venice in Peril Fund. Listeners to this audiobook can share the delight of the live audience as John Julius entertains us with a compilation of anecdote, prose, poetry and even song that is as charmingly conceived as it is delightfully performed.

Michael Pennington reads the much-loved classic by Thomas Hardy. Hardy called this story "a deadly war waged between flesh and spirit". It is a tale of doomed love and unfulfilled promise that revolves around Jude Fawley, an ambitious and intelligent young man, his cousin Sue Bridehead, and his academic mentor Phillotson.

It seems a long time ago that Fitz and Gabby were together, back when his work on extinct species was about to make him world famous. Now, it's his career that is almost extinct. Suddenly, though, the beautiful Gabby reappears in his life. She wants his help in tracing the history of "the Mysterious Bird of Ulieta", a creature once owned by the great 18th-century naturalist Joseph Banks.

Through the immortal characters of Oliver, Nancy, Bill Sikes, Fagin, the Artful Dodger and Mr. Bumble, Dickens mercilessly sends up the hypocrisy of 19th century life: the high-minded reformism of the intellectuals and the snobbery of those in power.

In A Christmas Carol, we meet some of Dickens' most famous creations in the characters of Scrooge, the three ghosts of Christmas, and of course, Tiny Tim. The story of how the extraordinary events of Christmas Eve change the miserly Scrooge forever have made A Christmas Carol one of the greatest of all Christmas stories.

Emily Brontë tells of the passion between Cathy Earnshaw and the wild Heathcliff with such vivid intensity that her tragic tale of love now has the classic status of ancient tragedy.

Charles Dickens' classic novel of mystery, read by Alex Jennings. A body is found in the River Thames and is identified as John Harmon. He was due to inherit a great fortune on the condition that he marry a young woman called Bella Wilfer. And so the story begins and unravels and we are introduced to the mysterious John Rokesmith, Our Mutual Friend.

For three generations the family-run auction houses of the Dashwoods and the Kings have been fierce rivals. The grandparents Henry Dashwood and Edward King were once best friends, despite their different backgrounds. Best friends until they fell for the same girl Eleanor Faraday eventually picked Henry but the seeds had been sown for a bitter feud that flourished between the two clans for over six decades.

Climb aboard Stationary Bike, a streamlined fever dream of a tale, in which an ordinary household object assumes otherworldly powers and a familiar journey takes a terrifying twist. When commercial artist Richard Sifkitz finally gets around to having that physical he'd been putting off for years, and his cholesterol comes back dangerously high, he does what so many 30-something, junk food-eating couch potatoes have done before him: he buys a stationary bike, and vows to ride it regularly.