Showing results by publisher "Penguin Audio" in Historical

Throughout the Roman Army, the brutal XIIth Legion is notorious for its ill fortune. For one young man, Demalion of Macedon, joining it will be a baptism of fire. And yet, amid all of the violence and savagery of his life as a legionary, he will come to love the Twelfth and the bloody-minded, dark-hearted soldiers he calls his brothers. But during the punishing Judaean campaign, the Hebrew army inflict a catastrophic defeat upon the legion - not only decimating their ranks, but taking away their soul - the eagle.

It is the summer of 1961, and the brutal Cold War between East and West is becoming ever more perilous. Two young prodigies from either side of the Iron Curtain, Yulia and Michael, meet at a chess tournament in London. They don't know it, but they are about to compete in the deadliest game ever played. Shadowing them is Greta, a ruthless resistance fighter who grew up the hard way in the forests of Lithuania, but who is now hunting down some of the most dangerous men in the world.

Early in life Belle Sorensen discovers the world is made only for men. They own everything: jobs, property, wives. But Belle understands what few others do: where women are concerned, men are weak. A woman unhampered by scruples can take from them what she wants. And so Belle sets out to prove to the world that a woman can be just as ruthless, black-hearted and single-minded as any man. Starting with her long suffering husband, Mads, Belle embarks on a killing spree the like of which has never been seen before nor since.

It is April 1943, and Marine aviator Cletus Frade, Army demolition's wizard Anthony Pelosi, and communications expert David Ettinger are thrust again into the lethal nest of intrigue that is wartime Buenos Aires. A clandestine German vessel sets sail to resupply submarines in the South Atlantic...as a massive shipment of money earmarked for postwar Reich makes its way to South America...and a coup designed to topple the government reaches critical mass. In the midst of it all, the German-ordered assassination of Cletus Frade's father demands only one response: revenge.

New York, 1933: America is in its second decade of Prohibition, and its citizens have never been thirstier. Lydia Gardiner is the infamous queenpin of a criminal empire. From her penthouse in New York City’s ritzy Plaza Hotel, Lydia deals in all the city’s favorite vices—illegal liquor, drugs, women—ruling with an iron fist, a cold heart, and a knack for beating her coarse male counterparts at their own game.

Munich, 1936. All eyes are on the Bavarian capital for the upcoming Olympic games. As athletes fight for gold and the Nazis fight for power, Detective Sebastian Wolff faces a battle of his own. A famous actress has disappeared and Wolff has been ordered to find her, fast. But Elena Lang is no ordinary film-star: she is the mistress of Joseph Goebbels - Hitler's right-hand-man in the party that Wolff despises. But corruption runs deep in Munich and Elena is just the first to go missing.

It is 1909 in Spokane, Washington. The Dolan brothers live by their wits, jumping freight trains and lining up for day work at crooked job agencies. While 16-year-old Rye yearns for a steady job and a home, his dashing older brother, Gig, dreams of a better world, fighting alongside other union men for fair pay and decent treatment. When Rye finds himself drawn to suffragette Elizabeth Gurley Flynn, her passion sweeps him into the world of protest and dirty business. But a storm is coming, threatening to overwhelm them all....

Forcibly seduced by George Villiers, duke of Buckingham and the king's favourite, doctor's daughter Hester was cast aside to raise her illegitimate son, Rafe, alone and in secret. She hopes never to see his father again. Melis's visions cause disquiet and talk. She sees what others can't - and what has yet to be. She'd be denounced as a witch if Hester wasn't so carefully protective. Young Hope's beauty marks her out, drawing unwelcome attention to the family. Yet she cannot always resist others' advances. And her sisters cannot always be on their guard.

Margaret Kerr of Perth is living in Edinburgh with her uncle Murdoch during the summer of 1297. She'd come to search for her long-absent husband who is in the service of Robert the Bruce. Margaret herself is still loyal to the deposed King John Balliol. Then terrifying raids and a brutal murder on the Kerr property bring the wrath of the English down on the heads of Margaret and her uncle.

In 1920s Toronto, best friends Lily di Marco and Mae Thebault used to be inseparable. They lived under the same roof and cared for each other's children—in a world where men held all the power, they looked out for one another. But then the Great Depression hits, changing their relationship forever, as both women are forced to make impossible decisions to save themselves—and their families—from ruin.

Archangel tells the story of four days in the life of Fluke Kelso, a dissipated, middle-aged former Oxford historian who is in Moscow to attend a conference on newly opened Soviet archives. One night Kelso is visited in his hotel room by an old NKVD officer, a former bodyguard of the secret police chief, Lavrentii Beria. The old man claims to have been at Stalin's dacha on the night Stalin had his fatal stroke, and to have helped Beria steal the dictator's private papers, among them a notebook.

Run, run, girl. In the name of God, run.It's 1141 and freezing cold. Gwil, a battle-hardened mercenary, watches in horror as a little girl with red hair is dragged away by his own men. Caught in the middle of the fight for England she is just one more victim in a winter of atrocities.But a strange twist of fate brings them together again. Gwil finds the girl close to death, clutching a sliver of parchment - and he knows what he must do. He will bring her back to life.

"I could not fathom they were going to kill the queen. Nor could I bear to witness Anne Boleyn’s beheading…." As a favour to a doomed queen, Kat Ashley agrees to become governess and confidante to the young Elizabeth Tudor. Together they suffer bitter exile, assassination attempts, and imprisonment, barely escaping with their reputations and their lives intact. But when Elizabeth is eventually crowned, Kat continues to serve her, faithfully guarding all of the queen's secrets, even the one that could bring down the monarchy….

In modern-day London, architectural historian and recovering alcoholic Annie Kendall hopes to turn her life around and restart her career by locating several long-missing pieces of ancient Judaica. Geoff Harris, an investigative reporter, is soon drawn into her quest, both by romantic interest and suspicions about the head of the Shalom Foundation, the organization sponsoring her work. He's also a dead ringer for the ghost of a monk Annie believes she has seen at the flat she is subletting in Bristol House.

The year is 1921, and "Nobody" Alice James has just arrived in Oregon with a bullet wound, a lifetime's experience battling the New York Mafia, and 50,000 dollars in illicit cash. She befriends Max, a Black Pullman porter who reminds her achingly of home and who saves Alice by leading her to the Paragon Hotel. But her unlikely sanctuary turns out to be an all-Black hotel in a Jim Crow city, and its lodgers seem unduly terrified of a White woman on the premises. She understands their dread. The Ku Klux Klan has arrived in Portland in fearful numbers.

At first the townspeople of Cherryvale welcome the rising medium Kate Bender and her family. Kate's messages from the Beyond give their tedious dreams hope and her mother's potions cure their little ills—for a price. No one knows about their other business, the shortcut to a better life. And why shouldn't their family prosper? They're careful. It's only from those who are marked, those who travel alone and can easily disappear, that the Benders demand their pound of flesh. But even a gifted seer like Kate can make a misstep.

In a remote castle high up in the Tuscan hills secrets are simmering among its glamorous English residents: The ailing gentleman art-dealer. His dazzling niece. Her handsome Fascist husband. Their neglected young daughter. The housekeeper who knows everything and Connie, the English widow working for them. Every night, Connie hears sinister noises and a terrible wailing inside the walls. Is she losing her grip on reality? Or does someone in the castle want her gone?

On the eve of the Globe's production of Hamlet, Shakespeare scholar and theater director Kate Stanley's eccentric mentor Rosalind Howard gives her a mysterious box, claiming to have made a groundbreaking discovery. But before she can reveal it to Kate, the Globe burns to the ground and Roz is found dead...murdered precisely in the manner of Hamlet's father. Inside the box Kate finds the first piece in a Shakespearean puzzle, setting her on a deadly, high-stakes treasure hunt.

Three intrepid princesses find themselves targets in a deadly plot against the crown - until their uncle devises a brilliant plan to keep them safe.... Of all her sisters, Princess Stefanie is by far the least amenable to law and order, which is why she’s appalled to find herself masquerading as an unbearably drab clerk for the most honorable barrister in England. But her dull disguise turns out to have its privileges: namely, the opportunity to consort unchaperoned with her employer’s exceedingly handsome nephew, James Lambert, the Marquess of Hatherfield.

November, 1943. Weary of his deskbound status in the Royal Navy, intelligence officer Ian Fleming spends his spare time spinning stories in his head that are much more exciting than his own life - until the critical Tehran Conference, when Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt, and Josef Stalin meet to finalize the D-Day invasion.