Showing results by narrator "Sean Barrett" in All Categories

AD 1316. Ireland has been drawn into the bitter war between Scotland and England. Richard Savage thought he had left the war behind, but arch enemy Edward Bruce won't let him just walk away. Savage stole something from him, and there are no depths to which he will not descend to get it back. To force Savage's return, Bruce takes what is most dear to him: his daughter Galiene. To rescue her, Savage must voyage back to an Ireland devastated by war and decimated by famine, where Scottish invaders ravage the countryside.

After the tragic death of his lover, Helen Flemming, Eisenmenger throws himself back into his work as a forensic pathologist. The newly promoted Chief Inspector Beverley Wharton brings him in to help on the grisly discovery of a severed head in a local farmyard. When a headless – but female – body then turns up in a dustbin, they must acknowledge that this shows all the signs of the work of a serial killer.

October, 1975. When Dr Lance Elliot receives a call from his elderly father to say he has been arrested for arson, he can hardly believe it. Especially when he discovers that the intended victim was his father’s neighbour, Oliver Lightoller, with whom his father has a long-running feud. But things quickly take a dark turn when Lance stumbles across Lightoller’s body, which has been pinned by an old sword to an office chair in the dead man’s South London antiques shop.

July, 1977. Lance’s eccentric father, the retired Dr Benjamin Elliott, has been running a Horticultural Club at local Bensham Manor School, a good deed he decided to take on to impress Ada Clarke, the head dinner lady at the school. One summer’s evening, Lance and his girlfriend Max turn up for the school’s parents evening to show their support of the elder Dr Elliott’s efforts.

Arthur Meadows has just returned home in his HGV from a long trip to southwest Europe, supposedly bringing back a consignment of cloth, yet is actually bringing back something far more deadly. Meanwhile, a young Asian couple are murdered in their small house in the middle of Gloucester, the killings done with ruthless efficiency. Beverley Wharton, now Chief Inspector, does not relish the investigation of the murders because she does not get on with her new sergeant, and because the pathologist Charles Sydenham would not have been her first choice.

For the background to this historical novel, a tale of mystery, suspense and unsolved murder, Dickens chose the anti-Catholic Gordon Riots of 1780. Mayhem reigns in the streets of London, vividly described by Dickens, and the innocent Barnaby Rudge is drawn into the thick of it.

When a polar bear is sighted in a sleepy Icelandic fishing village, then shot dead by local policeman Constable Halldór, it triggers a debate in the local community. Was Halldór a hero for killing the bear, or should the animal have been protected? Animal rights activists in the area see the constable as a villain, and when, days later, the dead body of Halldór is discovered at a remote beauty spot, the activists are immediately under suspicion.

At Police Scotland HQ, Grace Macallan has pitched up in Counter Corruption. But the demons of her past are never far behind. Meanwhile, Edinburgh's gangland is in turmoil, with territory battles causing serious havoc. Into the war steps DI Janet Hadden. An ambitious risk-taker, she knows how to throw opponents off balance. When she's thwarted, Hadden seeks help from a notorious underworld fixer - only for Grace to start an investigation that threatens to uncover all Hadden's secrets.

Forced to flee England and live in America during the 1890s, Professor James Moriarty - arch-enemy of Sherlock Holmes - returns to London in 1900 to find that his huge criminal empire has been infiltrated and plundered by the coming crime boss, Idle Jack Idell. As if this was not enough, he has evidence that one of his closest lieutenants, a member of the self-styled Praetorian Guard, is betraying him.

Charlo Torp has problems. He’s grieving for his late wife, he’s lost his job, and gambling debts have alienated him from his teenage daughter. Desperate, his solution is to rob an elderly woman of her money and silverware. But Harriet Krohn fights back, and Charlo loses control. Wracked with guilt, Charlo attempts to rebuild his life. But the police are catching up with him, and Inspector Konrad Sejer has never lost a case yet.

A lavish and riveting thriller from one of Norway's foremost crime writers. A frozen body, a murdered biker and a lawyer with nothing left to lose. In the depths of the Norwegian winter, a woman's frozen corpse is discovered in the garden of a notorious ex-lawyer, Vilhelm Thygesen. She has been stabbed to death. A young biker, a member of a gang once represented by the lawyer, is found dead in suspicious circumstances. Thygesen starts receiving anonymous threats....

It was Adam Smith (1723 - 1790) who first established economics as a separate branch of knowledge, and many would say his work has never been surpassed. The Wealth of Nations, which appeared in 1776, is the definitive text for all who believe that economic decisions are best left to markets, not governments. At the heart of Smith’s doctrine is an optimistic view of the effects of self-interest.

Iceland, midwinter: the days are fleeting, the nights endless and Sergeant Magnus Jonson has been sent to an isolated fishing village in the West Fjords to investigate the possible homicide of a road construction worker. Ringed by steep mountains, this bleak village is cut off from the rest of Iceland and from the modern world. The locals are adamant that Iceland's legendary huldufólk - hidden people - had a hand in the death.

The long, drawn-out case of Jarndyce versus Jarndyce provides the background to this novel, which takes us into Dickens' world of impoverished people on the street, lovers fallen on hard times, and the grand riches of the upper classes. It is read movingly by Sean Barrett.

The office of Poet Laureate goes back many centuries - informally to the time of Geoffrey Chaucer in 1389 and followed thereafter by a number of ‘volunteer laureates’. It was formally assigned to Ben Jonson in 1617 and, as a Royal office by letters patent in 1670, to John Dryden. It is a rich, rewarding history that bursts with the words, themes and visions of many great poets that has bound poetry and poets to a nation's soul.

Helena Flemming has fallen out of love with John Eisenmenger and wants their relationship to end. Eisenmenger is devastated and finds solace in returning to his life as a forensic pathologist. His first case reunites him with DI Beverley Wharton; a young petty criminal is found stabbed and the obvious suspect is a man who had threatened to kill him just hours before. There is pressure on Beverley to close the case.

In the early hours of the morning, Turkish TV star Erol Gencer is found dead at his home on the outskirts of Istanbul. But he is not alone. Beside him lies a Syrian refugee whose stomach has been split open with a cheese knife. Did Gencer kill his guest before committing suicide, or are they victims of a sinister double murder? The dead Syrian is soon identified as Wael Al Hussain, whose wife, Samira, is in prison for attempting to kill Gencer a year ago.

Herne - the hunter, mischief-maker, spirit of the forest, leader of the wild hunt - hurtles through the centuries pursued by his creator. A shape-shifter, Herne dons many guises as he slips and ripples through time - at candlelit Twelfth Night revels, at the spectacular burning of the Crystal Palace, at an acid-laced '60s party. Wherever he goes, transgression, debauch and enchantment always follow in his wake. But as the forest is increasingly encroached upon by urban sprawl and gentrification and the world slides into crisis, Herne must find a way to survive.

In the wake of several unexpected deaths at the hospital, Dr Claire Woodforde suspects there is a killer amongst the staff. As Detective Chief Inspector Beverley Wharton and her new sergeant, Tom Bayes, begin to investigate, they too start to wonder if the deaths were natural or whether someone helped them along. But as they start to make headway, something much more sinister comes to light.

August 1958. DI Stratton has just been posted to Notting Hill. Stratton's new manor is rife with racial tension. The end of the war saw a flood of Caribbean migrants. Now, a decade later, working-class Teddy Boys are showing mounting hostility towards their black neighbours. Notorious landlord Danny Perlmann, a Polish refugee, is taking full advantage and is making a fortune off the high rents he charges. Caught in the middle of this war over rents and turf is Irene, a young runaway on the verge of going on the game.