Showing results by narrator "David Thorpe" in All Categories

In the Swiss Alps a teenage girl is thrown from a helicopter and her boyfriend is brutally abducted to Trieste, a city filled with undercurrents of past hatreds. Ruari, son of Irish media owner J J Breslin, is in desperate danger, at the mercy of ruthless kidnappers making impossible demands...

From the once-popular yet unfairly neglected Victorian writer Charlotte Riddell comes a pair of novels that cleverly upholster the familiar furniture of the haunted house story. In An Uninhabited House, the hauntings are seen through the perspective of the solicitors who hold the deed of the property. In Fairy Water, Riddell again subverts the expectations of the audience, suggesting a complex moral character for her haunting spirit.

Fifth century of the Byzantium Empire. Flavius Belisaurius is son of the governor of Dorostorum City, and his father has two goals: to keep out the barbarians and to expose the deep roots of secular and ecclesiastical corruption. Seeking to prevent a raid, the Governor enlists the help of the powerful magnate, Senuthius Vicinus. Vicinus's corruption is widespread but his support is crucial to win the battle.

The familiar call of the common cuckoo, "cuck-oo", has been a harbinger of spring ever since our ancestors walked out of Africa many thousands of years ago. However, for naturalist and scientist Nick Davies, the call is an invitation to solve an enduring puzzle: How does the cuckoo get away with laying its eggs in the nests of other birds and tricking them into raising young cuckoos rather than their own offspring?

It’s a busy time of the year for Lord James Harrington and his wife, Beth - there’s the Michaelmas Fair in the village to enjoy. But matters take a sinister turn when the body of the founder of the Jolly Madrigals singing group is discovered after the Fair. James’ friend DCI George Lane is in charge of the investigation, but as further murders occur, he grows increasingly baffled. James and George are convinced that a single killer is responsible for these deaths.

In 2050 there will be 9.3 billion people alive - compared with 7 billion today - and the number will still be rising. The population aged over 65 will have more than doubled, to more than 16 percent; China's GDP will be 80 percent more than America's; and the number of cars on India's roads will have increased by 3,880 percent. And, in 2050 it should be clear whether we are alone in the universe.What other megachanges can we expect - and what will their impact be? This comprehensive and compelling book will cover the most significant trends that are shaping the coming decades.

Simon Peake does care… he just isn’t sure about what right now. The ex-soldier’s life is as close to rock bottom as it gets. He needs a job and he needs a quiet life. What he gets is a whole load of mess working for New York-based Irish mobster Harry Lafferty. A job that requires him to use his special skills on some very unsavory people. His relationship with Harry’s niece isn’t exactly conducive to a quiet existence either…

When Harry Jones discovers that former friend Zac Kravitz's life is in danger, a debt of honour sends him on a perilous rescue mission to Ta'argistan, a mountainous and landlocked former Soviet republic bordering Russia, China, and Afghanistan.

From atop the choppy waves to the choking darkness of the abyss, the seas are full of mystery and rife with tales of inexplicable events and encounters with the unknown. In this anthology we see a thrilling spread of narratives: sailors are pitched against a nightmare from the depths, invisible to the naked eye, a German U-boat commander is tormented by an impossible transmission via Morse Code, a ship ensnares itself in the kelp of the Sargasso Sea and dooms a crew of mutineers, seemingly out of revenge for her lost captain.

Alaric has been home for a year. He went north and saved the Cimbri, just as he said he would. But the cost has been higher than he ever thought. A shadow of the War Lord he once was, he now trades in amber and dotes on his children. A simple life. And with it, contentment. But he knew this couldn’t last forever; peace isn’t for someone like him, and sure enough trouble finds him once again. A routine journey south turns into a new and unknown wave of danger as red-cloaked legionaries attack, causing confusion and carnage.

"Carnivorine" follows the tale of Ellis Graham, who has been asked to find his friend’s lost son, Julius. Ellis heads to Europe in his search, only to find Julius on the brink of a remarkable discovery about carnivorous plants.

Eight days before the summer solstice, a man is butchered in a blood-freezing sacrifice on the ancient site of Stonehenge before a congregation of robed worshippers. Within hours, one of the world's foremost treasure hunters has shot himself in his country mansion. And to his estranged son, young archaeologist Gideon Chase, he leaves a cryptic letter.

James Witts is 45 years old, fatty deposits have begun to nestle on his back and he has a penchant for craft ale. He also rides a little. But not a lot. In his job as cycling journalist, however, he does have unparalleled access to the world's best riders and their expert support staff. Which got him thinking: could spending time with the pros, discovering the training, gear and nutritional tricks of the trade, transform this back-of-the-pack sportive straggler into a fit-and-fast frontrunner?

For the first time in audio, the Cycle of Fire Trilogy, a stout and epic tale mixing sci-fi and fantasy, by acclaimed author Janny Wurts.

In Book 2, Keeper of the Keys, Ivainson Jaric, Keeper of the Keys, heir of the Firelord, is being hunted down by the Accursed. His blood gifts him with raw power but not enough to overcome the evil forces....

Tough City brokers Dekker Ward created, and dominate, the turbulent market in Latin American bonds. Ricardo Ross is their most successful trader: they call him the Marketmaker. You're either with him or you've made an enemy for life. Disgruntled academic Nick Elliot is Dekker's greenest trader, content to ride his luck as the new boy on the stand. Until strange things start happening to Dekker's employees. One top trader is fired, another dies in a bungled robbery. Nick falls for his colleague Isabel. Then she is kidnapped.

Lucius Falerius is dead, and Rome in its entirety mourns the passing of its most powerful senator. It falls to his son Marcellus to carry out his father's legacy and restore the rights promised to the defeated Sicilian slaves, yet there are those who will not see the honour of Rome compromised and the slaves assuaged. On the Roman border provinces there is trouble, and the legions move north to neutralise the threat posed by the Celts.

For Pyke and his crew it should have been just another heist. Travel to a backwater desert planet, break into a museum, steal a tracking device then use it to find a ship buried in the planet's vast and trackless sandy wastes. Except that the museum vault is a bioengineered chamber, and the tracking device is sought after by another gang of treasure hunters led by an old adversary of Pyke's, the devious Raven Kaligara. Also, the ship is a quarter of a million years old and about two kilometres long, and somewhere aboard it is the Essavyr Key....

The spiritualist movement has captivated a segment of society: manifestations, the occult, and “sensitives” are in vogue. But the séance sites seem to be targeted for burglaries. Then, while Cribb is on the case, someone murders the medium. There was a great vogue for table-turning and getting in touch with the dead in Victorian times, and this lent itself to fraud, at the very least. It seemed inevitable that Cribb and Thackeray should take part in a séance at some stage. They come to it indirectly, following an art theft.

Newly estranged from his girlfriend, Lindy Hey, Inspector Domenic Jejeune returns to Southern Ontario, where he receives news that his brother, Damian, has gone missing in Wood Buffalo National Park while conducting research on whooping cranes. Domenic immediately heads out to try to find him. Back in the UK, Jejeune’s plan to protect Lindy has failed, and she has been kidnapped by his old foe, Ray Hayes. Jejeune's trusty sergeant, Danny Maik, tracks down Lindy, but there is far more to the situation than he anticipated.

Forbidden in Victorian England, the grim and violent world of bare-knuckle fighting has gone underground. So when a headless body is found floating in the Thames, his hands "pickled" for fighting, Sergeant Cribb knows he is facing a challenge. Desperate for information, they select the young constable Henry Jago to infiltrate the gang, subjecting him to a rigorous program of purging, pickling, and training. Cribb is certain that the losing fighters are being killed, or worse, so getting Jago out just in time is crucial....