Showing results by narrator "Simon Vance" in All Categories

Vacationing at a luxurious Tuscan island resort, Nicolas Duhamel is hopeful that the ghosts of his past have finally been put to rest.… He's now a best-selling author, but when he was 24 years old, he stumbled upon a troubling secret about his family - a secret that was carefully concealed. In shock, Nicholas embarked on a journey to uncover the truth that took him from the Basque coast to St. Petersburg - but the answers wouldn’t come easily.

Sir William the Marshal, legend in his own time, has promised to go on crusade, a vow made to his Young King as he lay dying. But when the Oliphant, legendary war horn of Roland, is stolen by the lethal Assassins, he's charged with returning the relic in order to stop the very thing he'd vowed to undertake - a crusade; this one engineered by the thieves. With his small band of trusted companions - Sir Baldwin, his tourney compatriot; Eustace, his squire; and Henrik, the giant Norseman - William sets out to take back the relic.

Thomas Hall is an artist with astonishing talent - and a vainglorious sense of self. Since his days as a child prodigy he has reveled in recognition and believed in his inevitable destiny. Chosen. Entitled. He presumes his artistic brilliance deserves a lavish life of independence, fast cars, and drop-dead gorgeous women. Thomas Hall wants it all and more. Destiny has other plans. When "Cass", the woman from the Healing Place, walks into his life, nothing can ever be the same again.

A brief, lyrical novel with a powerful emotional charge, Rules for Old Men Waiting is about three wars of the twentieth century and an ever-deepening marriage. In a house on the Cape “older than the Republic,” Robert MacIver, a historian who long ago played rugby for Scotland, creates a list...

The first Sherlock Holmes letter barrister Reggie Heath answered cost him most of his personal fortune, all of his Baker Street chambers clients, and quite possibly Laura Rankin, the love of his life. But Reggie intends to earn all of it—the money, the career, and the love—back again. His latest client is the driver of one of London’s famous black cabs, accused of murdering two American tourists.

"Marley was dead to begin with...." These chillingly familiar words begin the classic Christmas tale of remorse and redemption in A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. Now R. William Bennett rewinds the story and focuses the spotlight on Scrooge’s miserly business partner, Jacob T. Marley, who was allowed to return as a ghost to warn Scrooge away from his ill-fated path. Why was Marley allowed to return? And why hadn’t he been given the same chance as Ebenezer Scrooge? Or had he?

In 1897, at the age of 50, Bram Stoker was touring manager to the actor Henry Irving and was enjoying a modest success as a journalist and writer. Publication in that year of Dracula was to bring him international and lasting fame.

No writer is more identified with the modern idea of Christmas than Charles Dickens. In some ways, Dickens helped define the holiday that we now celebrate by immortalizing it as a time of warmth and sharing, with an emphasis on family and friends.

Prepare to meet the most seductively female and the most shockingly fatal of femmes fatales, brought to you by 17 of today's finest authors of mystery and suspense fiction. Award-winning editor Otto Penzler presents a collection of short and sizzling masterpieces of kisses and kiss-offs, gams and gats, published for the first time anywhere.

A classic since its first publication in 1863, The Water-Babies is the story of a little chimney sweep named Tom and his magical adventures beneath the waves. The ill-treated Tom flees his dangerous toil and his cruel master, Grimes. When he jumps into a cool stream to clean the soot off himself, he becomes a water-baby, cleaner and happier than he has ever been, in a hidden fairy world. There, Tom meets haughty dragonflies, makes friends with a slow-witted lobster, and dodges hungry otters.

Featuring 20 unabridged selections from the charitable anthology 100 Stories for Haiti, this special audio download will benefit the Red Cross, with all proceeds being donated to help those in need following the destruction and devastation caused by the recent earthquakes in Haiti.

When a traveling bard stumbles into a dragon's den, he is forced to tell stories or end up being eaten. Eventually running out of tales to share, he makes a deal: for his freedom, he will return with new sagas of adventure, romance, and bravery. Tales of the Dragon's Bard is the story of one man's quest to collect the most exciting stories he possibly can, and Eventide is the first town he encounters. With wish-women, gnomes, a centaur farmer, a resident Gossip Fairy, and a blacksmith dwarf, those living in Eventide have enough going on to keep the Dragon's Bard busy .

The boys at Linbury Court Preparatory School are eager to speed up the progress of space travel, and none more so than Jennings, whose first task is to find a suitable helmet. But is it really a good idea to take a dome-shaped glass-case, which previously housed a stuffed woodpecker, and place it over his head? Petrified paintpots! Jennings and Darbishire's luck is in when they hitch a ride with an international cricketer, and could it be that they've done something right for once when they attempt to apprehend a suspected burglar? Bat-witted clodpoll!

We all know gossip is a sin, but gossip can also demonstrate that a church preaches the gospel. Every true church that belongs to Jesus will be gossiped about just as Jesus was labeled demonic and talked about. If we want the Holy Spirit to guide us to a church we should worship at, we must tune out the gossip in order to hear the voice of God. This book not only examines the sin of gossip and how it relates to the preaching of the gospel, but shows us how to refute it. From the Choice Morsel recipe, to an examination of bitter roots, this book exposes the sin of gossip.

Though Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is best known for his detective stories, he also wrote other short stories which are masterpieces of mystery and suspense. In some of the stories, a supressed uneasiness gradually builds up and evolves into sheer terror; in others, the story line unexpectedly changes and comes to an unlikely conclusion. In "The Beetle-Hunter", a beginning doctor is employed on a strange errand to a coleopterist.

Can religious beliefs survive in the scientific age? Are they resoundingly outdated? Or, is there something in them of great importance, even if the way they are expressed will have to change given new scientific context? These questions are among those at the core of the science-religion dialogue.

Aglirta, known as the Kingless Land, has fallen into lawlessness. Now, a powerful warlord has come to take control through force, while the diabolic minions of the Serpent move into position for a climactic battle that will scar the valiant Band of Four forever.

These five classic mysteries offer chilling darkness, drama, and intrigue. Includes: "Murders in the Rue Morgue" by Edgar Allan Poe; "Silver Blaze" by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle; "The Secret of the Growing Gold" by Bram Stoker; "The Honour of Israel Gow" by G. K. Chesterton; and "The Signal-Man" by Charles Dickens.

Hawkril the mighty warrior, Embra the beautiful sorceress, and Craer the crafty thief mourn their lost companion but now must forge new alliances in their roles as overdukes of Aglirta, a land that has been torn asunder by double-crossing royals, savage warlords, and sinister high priests.

The Silvertree Stronghold is more than just the family estate of the feared and awed Silvertree dynasty, whose wizardly powers and political cunning has survived through many generations. But with their power comes a curse, a curse more terrifying than rival warlords or the mystical threats of the dreaded faceless, an inward corruption of the soul that binds one's power to a downward spiral of madness and magic.