Showing results by narrator "Allan Corduner" in All Categories

According to The Nice and Accurate Prophecies of Agnes Nutter, Witch (the world's only completely accurate book of prophecies, written in 1655, before she exploded), the world will end on a Saturday. Next Saturday, in fact. Just before dinner. So, the armies of Good and Evil are amassing, Atlantis is rising, frogs are falling, tempers are flaring. Everything appears to be going according to Divine Plan.

Arthur Penhaligon has wrested five of the Keys from their immortal guardians, the Trustees of the Will. But gaining the Sixth Key poses a greater challenge than any he has ever faced before. Superior Saturday is not just one of the Trustees, she is also the oldest Denizen and the most powerful and knowledgeable sorcerer within the House. She has tens of thousands of sorcerers at her command - and she has been preparing her forces all along.

Retired publisher Susan Ryeland is living the good life. She is running a small hotel on a Greek island with her long-term boyfriend, Andreas. It should be everything she's always wanted - but is it? She's exhausted with the responsibilities of making everything work on an island where nothing ever does, and truth be told she's beginning to miss her old life in London.

When editor Susan Ryeland is given the tattered manuscript of Alan Conway's latest novel, she has little idea it will change her life. She's worked with the revered crime writer for years, and his detective, Atticus Pund, is renowned for solving crimes in the sleepy English villages of the 1950s. As Susan knows only too well, vintage crime sells handsomely. It's just a shame that it means dealing with an author like Alan Conway.... But Conway's latest tale of murder at Pye Hall is not quite what it seems.

Zachary Ezra Rawlins is a graduate student in Vermont when he discovers a strange book hidden in the library stacks. As he turns the pages, entranced by tales of lovelorn prisoners, key collectors, and nameless acolytes, he reads something strange: a story from his own childhood. Bewildered by this inexplicable book and desperate to make sense of how his own life came to be recorded, Zachary uncovers a series of clues that lead him to a masquerade party in New York, to a secret club, and through a doorway to a subterranean library, hidden far below the surface of the earth.

The much-anticipated final installment of the Keys to the Kingdom series. Arthur Penhaligon wields six of the seven Keys to the Kingdom, but will that be enough to defeat Lord Sunday? Master of the Incomparable Gardens, the last of the Trustees, and the most powerful Denizen in the house, Lord Sunday is a fierce opponent. And Arthur is running out of time. With everything falling to pieces around him, Arthur must be quick if he is to stem the tide of Nothing and save the House and the Secondary Realms.

There have always been whispers. Legends. The warrior who cannot be killed. Who’s seen a thousand civilizations rise and fall. He has had many names: Unute, Child of Lightning, Death himself. These days, he’s known simply as “B.” And he wants to be able to die. In the present day, a U.S. black-ops group has promised him they can help with that. And all he needs to do is help them in return.

An unabridged recording of Orwell's brilliant first novel read by Allan Corduner. The story is largely based on Orwell's own experiences as a police officer in Burma. Set in the dying days of the Raj, it depicts the harshness and darker side of colonial rule. And at its centre is John Flory, a lone individual hopelessly trapped in a vast political system; themes which set the agenda for much of his writing. Burmese Days was Orwell's first novel, and was issued in 1934 in America, then a year later in the UK where there had been fears and controversy initially that the material could be libellous.

Among the many important historical documents from the Classical world of Greece and Rome The Antiquities of the Jews by Flavius Josephus is one of the most distinctive and characterful. Josephus (37-c100 CE) set out with the clear purpose of telling the history of the Jews from the creation in Genesis to the Jewish revolt against the Romans in 66 CE. Born in Jerusalem as Yosef ben Matityahu, he rose to become a leading participant in the First Jewish Revolt (66-73 CE).

Chichikov, a mysterious stranger, arrives in the provincial town of 'N', visiting a succession of landowners and making each a strange offer. He proposes to buy the names of dead serfs still registered on the census, saving their owners from paying tax on them, and to use these 'dead souls' as collateral to re-invent himself as a aristocrat. In this ebullient picaresque masterpiece, Gogol created a grotesque gallery of human types, from the bear-like Sobakevich to the insubstantial fool Manilov and, above all, the devilish con man Chichikov.

Arthur Penhaligon is supposed to be in bed - after all, it's only been 12 hours since he saved the world. But there's no time to rest. Grim Tuesday has laid claim to the Lower House and the First Key, and now his misshapen servants are repossessing Arthur's world and plunging it into financial disaster. To stop them, Arthur must venture back into the House, that surreal, unpredictable realm where he almost met his death.

A land-surveyor, known only as K., arrives at a small village permanently covered in snow and dominated by a castle to which access seems permanently denied. K.'s attempts to discover why he has been called constantly run up against the peasant villagers, who are in thrall to the absurd bureaucracy that keeps the castle shut, and the rigid hierarchy of power among the self-serving bureaucrats themselves.

From Margaret Atwood, the internationally acclaimed, award-winning author of The Handmaid's Tale and The Testaments, comes a dazzling collection of fifteen stories. These stories explore the full warp and weft of experience, from two best friends disagreeing about their shared past, to the right way to stop someone from choking; from a daughter determining if her mother really is a witch, to what to do with inherited relics such as World War II parade swords.

Following their adventures in the Border Sea, Arthur and Leaf head for home. But only Leaf gets through the Front Door. Arthur is blocked because someone – or something – has assumed his identity and is taking over his life.

Septimus Heap, the seventh son of the seventh son, disappears the night he is born, pronounced dead by the midwife. That same night, the baby's father, Silas Heap, comes across an abandoned child in the snow—a newborn girl with violet eyes. Who is this mysterious baby girl, and what really happened to the Heaps' beloved son Septimus?

Arthur Penhaligon is not supposed to be a hero. He is, in fact, supposed to die an early death. But then he is saved by a key shaped like the minute hand of a clock. Arthur is safe – but his world is not. Along with the key comes a plague brought by bizarre creatures from another realm. A stranger named Mister Monday, his avenging messengers with blood-stained wings, and an army of dog-faced Fetchers will stop at nothing to get the key back – even if it means destroying Arthur and everything around him.

Seven days. Seven keys. Seven virtues. Seven sins. One mysterious house is the doorway to a very mysterious world - where one boy is about to venture and unlock a number of fantastical secrets. As Arthur gets closer to the heart of his quest, the suspense and mystery grow more and more intense.

With his notorious reputation for trickery and deception, and an ability to cause as many problems as he solves, Loki is a Norse god like no other. Demon-born, he is viewed with deepest suspicion by his fellow gods who will never accept him as one of their own and for this he vows to take his revenge. But while Loki is planning the downfall of Asgard and the humiliation of his tormentors, greater powers are conspiring against the gods and a battle is brewing that will change the fate of the Worlds.

Lady Friday tempts Arthur with an unexpected offer - but it is a cunning trap for the Rightful Heir to the Kingdom, or a chance he must seize before Superior Saturday or the Piper snatch it first? Who will win the race to discover the secret of the Middle House?

Morrie Schwartz, the beloved subject of the classic, multimillion-copy number one bestseller Tuesdays with Morrie, explores these questions and many more in this profound, poetic and poignant masterpiece of living and aging joyfully and creatively. Later life can be filled with many challenges, but it can also be one of the most beautiful and rewarding passages in anyone's lifetime. Morrie draws on his experiences as a social psychologist, teacher, father, friend and sage to offer us a road map to navigate our futures.