Showing results by narrator "Mike Grady" in All Categories

Could modernity be an illness? Umbrella follows the story of Audrey Dearth, who fell victim to the encephalitis lethargic sleeping sickness epidemic at the end of the First World War and has been in a coma ever since. Arriving at the asylum she still lingers in, maverick psychiatrist Zack Busner becomes involved in an attempt to bring her back to life - with wholly unforeseen consequences.

The destruction of Pan Am Flight 103 over the Scottish town of Lockerbie in December 1988 was the largest attack on Britain since World War Two. 259 passengers and 11 townsfolk of Lockerbie were murdered. Libyan Abdelbaset al-Megrahi was convicted of the crime. He maintained his innocence until his death in 2012.

The Sounds of Crime is an exclusive collection of five brand new short stories by some of the best crimewriters around. Using the theme of 'audio', this unique collection features brand new stories by Lawrence Block, Peter James, Val McDermid, Mark Billingham and Christopher Fowler.

Mrs. Bentley has been arrested for murder. The evidence is overwhelming: arsenic she extracted from fly papers was in her husband's medicine, his food and his lemonade, and her crimes are being plastered across the newspapers. Even her lawyers believe she is guilty. But Roger Sheringham, the brilliant but outspoken young novelist, is convinced that there is too much evidence against Mrs. Bentley and sets out to prove her innocence.

On a voyage toward the boundaries of the known universe, nine misfit academics seek out first contact with a shadowy alien race. But another enigma is the Nightflyer itself, a cybernetic wonder with an elusive captain no one has ever seen in the flesh. Soon, however, the crew discovers that their greatest mystery - and most dangerous threat - is an unexpected force aboard the ship wielding a thirst for blood and terror....

It is 1564. Catholic herald William Harley, Clarenceux King of Arms, is the custodian of a highly dangerous document. When it is stolen, Clarenceux immediately suspects a group of Catholic sympathisers, the self-styled Knights of the Round Table. Soon Clarenceux enters a nightmare of suspicion, deception, and conspiracy. Where has the document gone? Who really took it? And why?

Cream teas! School dinners! Satanic surfers! Join our heroes as they follow up The Norfolk Mystery with a bad case of...Death in Devon. Swanton Morley, the People's Professor, sets off for Devon to continue his history of England, The County Guides. Morley's daughter, Miriam, and his assistant, Stephen Sefton, pack up the Lagonda for a trip to the English Riviera. Morley has been invited to give the Founder's Day speech at All Souls School in Rousdon.

Thursday the Mouse fell from a balloon having just escaped from the Home for Waif-Mice and Stray-Mice. The Peck family of church mice adopt him and give him his name – Thursday – because the day he arrived was a Thursday to remember. Thursday joins the Pecks in their organ-loft home at the church of St Mary's in the Valley.

From exciting debut author Justin Fisher comes this rip-roaring, gripping new magical adventure. Perfect for fans of House of Secrets. Ned Waddlesworth has always considered his world to be exceptionally ordinary. Until the day he discovers it isn't. At all. Because on Ned's 13th birthday, he discovers that everything magical he's ever read about or imagined is real. And without him, the world will soon be engulfed in monstrous beasts and beings.

After the horrors of the First World War, Oxford looked like an Arcadia - a dreamworld - from which pain could be shut out. Soldiers arrived with pictures of the university fully formed in their heads and women finally won the right to earn degrees. Freedom meant reading beneath the spires and punting down the river with champagne picnics. But all was not quite as it seemed. Boys fresh from school settled into lecture rooms alongside men who had returned from the trenches with the beginnings of shellshock.

Shylo has always been the weakest and quietest of all of his family; his siblings spend their days making fun of him for not being like the rest of them. But when Shylo stumbles across a band of ratzis and overhears their evil plan to take a photo of the Queen in her nightie, it's up to this unlikely hero to inform the Royal Rabbits of London about the diabolical plot! But can a rabbit as timid as Shylo convince them that Queen is in danger?

A cottage on the coast on a windy evening. Under a pool of yellow light, two figures face each other across a kitchen table. A man and a cat. The story about to be related is so unusual yet so terrifyingly plausible that it demands to be told in a single sitting. The man clears his throat, and leans forward, expectant. 'Shall we begin?' says the cat….

Your God. Your Country. Your Kin. Who Do You Betray? London, 1563. Catholic plots against the young Queen Elizabeth spring up all over the country. William Harley - known to everyone as Clarenceux - receives a book from his friend and fellow Catholic, Henry Machyn, who is in fear of his life. Then Clarenceux is visited by Francis Walsingham and his ruthless enforcers, who will stop at nothing to gain possession of the book. What secret can the book hold?

At the age of only 36, Sir Mark Sykes was signatory to the Sykes-Picot agreement, one of the most reviled treaties of modern times. A century later, Christopher Sykes' lively biography of his grandfather reassesses his life and work - and the political instability and violence in the Middle East attributed to it.

Learning is the soul of our species. From our first steps to our last words, we are what we learn. Our education predicts our earnings, our contentment, even how long we'll live. But for all its obvious importance, learning has lost touch with human progress. We live in an information age, work in a knowledge economy, yet our schools remain relics of an industrial era. No more. In Natural Born Learners, Alex Beard takes us on a dazzling tour of the future of learning.

What is it about Middle-Earth and its inhabitants that has captured the imagination of millions of people around the world? And why does Tolkien's creation continue to fascinate and inspire us eighty-five years on from its first appearance? Beginning with Tolkien's earliest influences and drawing on key moments from his life, Twenty-First-Century Tolkien is an engaging and radical reinterpretation of the beloved author's work. Not only does it trace the genesis of the original books, it also explores the later adaptations and reworkings that cemented his reputation as a cultural phenomenon.

In 1992, after being fired from a secret nuclear facility, a KGB agent buried a nuclear suitcase. Sixteen years later he has found a buyer for it. Travelling to the exchange point with the buyer is an undercover policeman. But as their journey begins, it becomes clear that the agent may be suffering from Stockholm Syndrome, putting the lives of millions across Europe at risk...

From a garden shed laboratory where he manufactured the greatest stink in the world to a tent high in the Arctic in pursuit of fossils, this is a story of obsession and love of nature, flavoured with the peculiarities and restrictions of post-war Britain. Fortey tells the story of following his father down riverbanks to fish for trout, and also of his father's shocking death. He unfolds his early passions–fungi, ammonite hunting and eyeing up bird's eggs. He evokes with warmth and wit how the natural world started out as his playground and refuge, then became his life's work.

Ever since that first primordial fireball exploded in the void countless aeons ago, people have been doing comic sketches on the radio. And this is no exception. These two mouth-watering series feature a whole host of tasty takeaway skits and shenanigans, from 'The Man At Parties No-One Wants To Talk To' and 'Britain's Stupidest Postman' to sauna novices, the perfect Proms punter and Batman in his dotage. Other highlights include regular characters Mr Makesalotofmistakes, who can't seem to get anything right, and smug yuppies Richard and Dulcie ('Rich and Dull') Perrier.

A personal narrative blended with beautiful descriptions of gardening and the pleasures of losing yourself in the horticultural, Plot 29 weaves together memoir and memory from the author's childhood to the present day.