Showing results by narrator "Richard Attlee" in All Categories

Following the death of her mother, Corinna Ormesby has lived a quiet life in the countryside with her cantankerous Cousin Agnes. Her father's identity has been a tantalising mystery, but now at nineteen Corinna knows that finding him may be her only way to avoid marriage to the odious Mr Beech. Deciding to head to London, Corinna dons a male disguise. Travelling alone as a young woman risks scandal and danger, but when, masquerading as a youth, she is befriended by three dashing blades, Corinna now has access to the male-only world of Regency England.

At Prebbles Flying Circus, the daring Eliza Gray captivates audiences with her breathtaking feats on horseback. Yet beyond the applause, she harbours a longing to find the family she lost as a child and discover who she truly is. Fate, however, takes an unexpected turn when Eliza is unceremoniously knocked down by a curricle driven recklessly by Raven, Earl Purfoy. Dazed but intrigued, she cannot help but notice Purfoy’s commanding presence.

Packed with fresh and surprising stories, 1945: The Reckoning takes listeners on a spectacular journey from the deadly jungles of Burma through hospital ships on Indian rivers and copper mines in Formosa to the 'lost trains' of the Belsen concentration camp. As the fate of the world is decided so too is that of the British Empire and in India millions of men and women struggle to decide whether to support 'the Raj' or fight alongside the Japanese.

First published in 1927 and newly translated here, Franz Kafka's Amerika is a gripping and humorous tale of a young exile searching for new opportunities while navigating hope and disillusionment in his pursuit of belonging.

Europe's internal borders have rarely been 'natural'; they have more often been created by accident or force. Successive powers have redrawn the map of our continent, with varying degrees of success: the fingerprints of Napoleon, Alexander I, Castlereagh, Napoleon III and Bismarck are all there, but the present shape of Europe is mostly the work of the Allies in 1919 and Stalin in 1945. In Borderlines, writer and political historian Lewis Baston journeys along and across key borders from west to east Europe, to explore their history.

Nigel Farage is arguably one of the most influential British politicians of the 21st century. His campaign to take the UK out of the EU began as a minority and extreme point of view, but in June 2016 it became the official policy of the nation after a divisive referendum. In Michael Crick's brilliant new biography, One Party After Another, we find out how he did it despite never once managing to get elected to Parliament.

HRH The Duke of Kent has been at the heart of the British Royal Family throughout his life. As a working member of the Royal Family, he has supported his cousin, The Queen, representing her at home and abroad. His royal duties began when, in 1952, at the age of 16, he walked in the procession behind King George VI's coffin, later paying homage to The Queen at her coronation in 1953. Since then, he has witnessed and participated in key royal occasions. A Royal Life is a unique account based on a series of conversations between the duke and acclaimed royal historian Hugo Vickers.

1603. Former ship's surgeon Gabriel Taverner is attempting to re-establish himself as a physician in rural Devon but it's not easy to gain the locals' trust and a series of disturbing incidents convinces him that at least one person does not welcome his presence. Called out to examine a partially decomposed body found beside the river, Gabriel discovers he has a personal connection to the dead man.

1941. Rupert and Adelaide Stride are raising their two daughters, Clare and Rosa, in the midst of war. When Rupert is called to fight, he dies on the beaches of Dunkirk, leaving his family to fend for themselves. 2023. Decades later, Clare and Rosa have retreated to the annex, trapped in the place where they were raised: Yew Tree House. When the rooms are put up for rent, Jack Harmon sees the perfect spot for a family holiday with his twins and detective Stella Darnell. But then the children discover a skeleton with a hole in its skull hidden in the brambles of a decommissioned WWII pill box.

An imposing castle looms over a village and no one seems to be allowed inside...not even K., the Land Surveyor whose livelihood depends on getting inside. Though never completed due to Kafka's untimely death, The Castle paints a striking image of absurdity and the nature of existence itself.

When Yaz and her dog Herc find a dead man on a bench along the canal with chicken bones lying around him, she immediately calls Louise – and the police. The case is odd: a chicken bone has been forcibly rammed down the victim’s throat, and the last person to see him was their friend – and Pack-mate – Claire. When the police take Claire into custody, the Pack mobilize, determined to find the real killer.

When friends Louise and Irina find a dead body in the local park whilst walking their dogs, they are soon drawn into the mystery of who murdered local entrepreneur Phil Creasey. Phil used to be a member of their dog walking community – nicknamed The Pack – until the death of his cockapoo, and The Pack feel they owe it to Phil to investigate his death. With Louise and Irina leading the charge, they soon come up against local drug dealers, stolen cars and a disturbing incident of poisoned dog biscuits.

London, 1956. A generation of British Spies are haunted by the ghost of friends turned traitors. Henry Bone, a Mandarin spymaster, is convinced that a man code-named Butterfly is an aristocratic pervert whose political tastes are as ugly as his sexual preferences. Worst of all, Butterfly has the ability to identify each traitor!

After five years' silence, a British intelligence asset has made contact from Moscow. Claiming to possess explosive information, he wishes to defect to the West. But the operation goes catastrophically wrong; the would-be defector betrayed by a rogue element at the highest level of US government. As a result, MI6's Margo Lane is ordered to deliver a message the White House won't forget. Margo's mission will take her to the violent heart of contemporary Russia, the edge of the civil war in Syria - and to a terrifying decision she had hoped she would never have to make.

In this compelling investigation, Michael Smith explores the critical moment in a spy's life: that split-second decision to embrace a double life.

June 1604. When the emaciated body of a vagrant is found on the edge of the moor, physician Gabriel Taverner's verdict is death from natural causes. But is all as it seems? Who was the dead man, and why had he come to the small West Country village of Tavy St Luke's to die cold, sick and alone? Then a discovery found buried in a nearby field throws a strange new light on the case...and as they search for answers, Gabriel Taverner and Coroner Theophilus Davey unearth a series of shocking secrets stretching back more than 14 years.

Everything will be fine. That is what Mary and John promise when they tell their two children that they are getting a divorce. But while the end of their marriage offers them both freedom from their dissatisfaction, it brings to the fore the pain and resentments that have always percolated in their relationship and throws into stark relief their shortcomings as partners and as parents.

Catesby is a spy with an antiestablishment chip on his shoulder. Loathed by the Americans and trusted by the Russians, he is sent to Havana and Washington to make clandestine contacts. London has authorised Catesby to offer Moscow a secret deal to break the Cuban Missile Crisis deadlock. But then Catesby meets the Midnight Swimmer, who has a chilling message for Washington.... Merging fact and fiction, sleaze and high politics, this white-knuckle thriller sees a superpower standoff played out against a backdrop of honey-trap blackmail, Mafia contracts, assassination and Vatican scandal.

Bremen, 1951. An MI6 officer, haunted by an SS atrocity, kills a Nazi war criminal in the ruins of a U-boat bunker. The German turns out to be a CIA asset being rat-lined to South America. Britain, 1947. A young cabinet minister negotiates a deal with Moscow trading Rolls-Royce jet engines for cattle fodder and wood. The fates of the two men become entwined as one rises through MI6 and the other to Downing Street where, in the mid-1970s, a secret plot unfolds on both sides of the Atlantic to overthrow the prime minister. Can MI6 officers Catesby and Bone prevent it?

London, 1940. A woman lies dead in a bombed-out house. It looks like she's another tragic casualty of the Blitz, until police pathologist Aleck Northcote proves she was strangled and placed at the scene. But Northcote himself has something to hide. And when his past catches up with him, he, too, is murdered. Tewkesbury, 2020. Beneath the vast stone arches of Tewkesbury Abbey, a man has been fatally stabbed. He is Roddy March, an investigative journalist for a podcast series uncovering miscarriages of justice.