Showing results by narrator "Dan Bottomley" in All Categories

After the year Aidan and I have had, we needed some respite. My husband is overworked, whilst I'm anxious about the past, so renting a night at this converted barn house in the countryside seems like the perfect place for the pair of us to relax and unwind. It might be situated at the bottom of a large garden, but it's private enough that we don't have to mingle with the homeowners who live nearby. Or at least that's what I thought...

Join Stella Starflake Pearl and her three fellow explorers as they trek across the snowy Icelands and come face-to-face with frost fairies, snow queens, outlaw hideouts, unicorns, pygmy dinosaurs and carnivorous cabbages.... When Stella and three other junior explorers get separated from their expedition, will they be able to cross the frozen wilderness and live to tell the tale?

Beyond Happy explores how evolution has wired us to keep happiness just out of reach, leaving us perpetually stuck on a happiness treadmill. Instead of striving to escape it, the book argues, we should focus on making the treadmill a place we want to be. Finding this wellbeing begins with listening to our emotions, discovering intrinsic motivation and pursuing our authentic values. Fabian coaches you through this process of self-actualisation. Wellbeing, however, is not solely an individual pursuit–it is something we cultivate together.

Podkin is now Keeper of the Gifts—which is a tremendously important job and just a tiny bit boring. It doesn't help that there are still three gifts missing—Podkin can't stop himself from thinking about that. So when the Godseye Mirror begins to shimmer and shift revealing a motley crew of travellers is approaching, Podkin sees it as a sign that his world is about to be upended all over again . . .

DI Thomas Ridpath was on the up in the Manchester CID: a promising detective who captured a notorious serial killer. But 10 years later, he’s recovering from a serious illness and on the brink of being forced out of the police. Then people start dying, in an uncanny echo of his first case.

Podkin is the son of a warrior chieftain. He knows that one day it will be up to him to lead his warren and guard it in times of danger. But for now, he's quite happy to laze around. Then Podkin's home is brutally attacked, and the young rabbits are forced to flee. With danger all around them, Podkin must protect his family and attempt to defeat the most horrifying enemy rabbitkind has ever known.

Two desiccated bodies are found in each other's arms in the bricked up room of a derelict Victorian warehouse. After six months of work, the police have nothing and Ridpath is finally called in to investigate. Dubbed the Romeo and Juliet murders by the press, so many questions remain unanswered. Who are they? Why were they there? Who killed them? And why was the coroner so keen for him to work on this particular case? Ridpath is plunged into his most difficult investigation yet, in a race against time to discover the truth.

After claiming the Singing Spear, Podkin heads to the sea to search out the last gift of all—the anvil of Magmarok—which is hidden inside a mysterious labyrinth. He must brave Ancient sea monsters and pirates to arrive at the city that houses the anvil before Scramashank and his Gorm. But what will it take to defeat the labyrinth and win the anvil? And what will happen when the Gifts finally gather in one place?

Landfill has lived his whole life as a scavenger, running with wooflers, swimming with turtles and feasting on fresh gull. Old Babagoo has always looked after him, on one condition - follow his rules. Never come looking outside. Never rise above the wall. But despite the dangers, Landfill longs to see Outside. And some rules are made to be broken.

Podkin and his sister and baby brother, Paz and Pook, struggle to keep their ragtag clan of refugees safe from enemies who are destroying the forest in an effort to find them. When they are separated from their clan, the siblings encounter the mysterious and mystical creatures who are the heart of the forest itself. As the fate of all rabbitkind hangs in the balance, the youngsters must recruit these new allies and convince feuding clans to come together in a desperate final battle to defeat the diabolical Gorm.

One chance encounter, one murder, will change everything. DI Thomas Ridpath is in the process of getting his life back together when everything goes wrong. Caught in a gruesome motorway incident, one question remains: why did nobody else see what happened? Ridpath's investigations soon pulls the police force itself into question, and hints at something even more sinister. With Manchester on the brink of violence unlike anything seen in decades, Ridpath must battle this unprecedented conflict alongside his own demons...

Play with fire, and you're going to get burned. The unputdownable new Ridpath crime thriller. In Manchester, a block of flats is burning. The only victim is a middle-aged man, sat watching TV. Are the fire and the man's death an accident or is something more frightening at work? Meanwhile, DI Ridpath is back with his wife and enjoying work at the Coroner's Office, his myeloma still in remission. But the quiet life is soon shattered by a new threat.

Ice princess Stella Starflake and her father Felix are in trouble: President Fogg has expelled them from the Polar Bear Explorers' Club and banned them from going on any further expeditions. Stella's not going to be put off by rules and regulations, though. She knows her friend Shay is in danger of turning into a witch wolf himself, since receiving a deadly bite on their last adventure. It's vital that Stella and her friends set out to find the spellbook that could save his life, even if it means travelling over the cursed Black Ice Bridge.

Podkin and his fellow rabbits have been sheltering in Dark Hollow after their battle with Scramashank. Paz tends to the rabbits with sleeping sickness; Crom meets with the war council...Podkin has nothing to do! Frustrated, Podkin goes exploring and discovers an abandoned underground chamber. Armed with the Gift of Dark Hollow, Podkin learns to moonstride, and Paz is rewarded with a magical gift of her own.

An astonishing finale that brings this nine book series to a close. Podkin and his crew have brought all the gifts together—and the gifts melt and morph before their eyes, transforming into a suit of armour—that will only fit a rabbit with one ear!

The controversial science that claims to have revolutionised economics. For centuries, economics was dominated by the idea that we are rational individuals who optimise our own ‘utility’. Then, in the 1970s, psychologists demonstrated that the reality is a lot messier. We don’t really know what our utility is, and we care about people other than ourselves. We are susceptible to external nudges. And far from being perfectly rational, we are prone to ‘cognitive biases’ with complex effects on decision-making, such as forgetting to prepare for retirement.

Stella Starflake Pearl is eagerly anticipating her next expedition. Suddenly disaster strikes when Stella's father, Felix, is snatched by a fearsome witch. Stella must bring her magic ice princess tiara to Witch Mountain or she will never see Felix again! But no one ever returns from Witch Mountain.... Stella, Ethan, Shay, Beanie and reluctant Jungle Cat explorer Percival set off into the unknown. They will face terrifying bat caves, poisonous apple groves, outraged vultures, argumentative mushrooms and deranged broomsticks in their quest to rescue Felix.

Ursula knew the submarine wasn't designed to go this deep, but what choice did they have? No one wanted to get swallowed up by a colossal sneezing jellyfish! In a distant watery corner of the Explorers Kingdom, a submarine engineer, Ursula, is determined to become an explorer. Unfortunately, she hides an extraordinary secret, which makes her the sworn enemy of the Ocean Squid Explorers' Club were they ever to find out.

A boy lives in a remote, snow-bound village with his elderly grandmother. Their traditional way of life is threatened by the changing snow and ice: it melts faster every year. When the sea-ice collapses while he is out hunting, he only just escapes with his life and is left stranded in the Arctic tundra. Meanwhile a girl is trying to adapt to another new school. Her father promises his new job at an oil company will mean they never have to move again, but not long after he starts, his behaviour becomes odd and secretive.

Exploring the mysterious tunnels under their grandfather's house on Hoarder Hill, Hedy and Spencer discover the Fantastikhana, an underground tournament of magic. Here they find a group of powerful magicians called the Sleight and a mysterious living map, which tattoos itself onto Hedy's skin and seems to be directing her further underground. And so an extraordinary treasure hunt begins.