Showing results by narrator "David Thorpe" in All Categories

While hot on the heels of serial coupon-racketeer Gordon Ginner, Chief Inspector MacDonald of Scotland Yard receives word of an intriguing incident up in Lancashire – the summer cottage of local farmer Giles Hoggett has been broken into, with an assortment of seemingly random items missing which include a complete reel of salmon line, a large sack, and two iron dogs from his fireplace. What first appears as a simple break-in quickly spirals into a mystery of contested land grabs for fishing between farmers, made all the more enticing to MacDonald when a body is then found in the river.

John Milton has started to hope that he might have a future. He has a job driving a taxi around the streets of San Francisco. He has his anonymity and his solitude. Being invisible has become a comfortable habit. He doesn't want to be found. But when a girl he drives to a party goes missing, Milton is worried. Especially when two dead bodies are discovered, and the police start treating him as their prime suspect. Milton is a fugitive from the British Secret Service, and a man in his position needs extra attention like he needs a hole in the head.

John Milton is trying to make amends for a career spent killing for the British Secret Service. He has a burning need to right wrongs - and rewrite his own bloody past. He finds himself in Louisiana - the Big Sleazy, the bayou, and the post-Katrina wreckage of the Gulf Coast - with a debt of honor to repay. Isadora Bartholomew, who saved his partner's life, needs his help. Joel Babineaux, a ruthless property magnate, is out to sink the charity she established to help rebuild the Lower Ninth Ward.

John Tradescant the Younger has inherited his father’s unique collection of plants along with his unerring ability to nurture them. But as gardener to Charles I, he confronts an unbearable dilemma when England descends into Civil War. Fleeing from the chaos, John travels to the Royalist colony of Virginia in America. But the virgin land is not uninhabited. John’s plant hunting brings him to live with the native people, and he learns to love and respect their way of life just as it is threatened by the colonial settlers.

War has swept across Marquensas. Ruthless raiders have massacred the inhabitants of Beran's Hill, including Gwen, the beloved wife of Declan Smith. Hollow of heart, his hopes burned to ashes, Declan swears to track down and destroy the raiders, an ambition shared by Baron Daylon Dumarch, whose family was massacred as they fled the capital. Meanwhile Hava is closing in on the whereabouts of those who unleashed the murderous hordes.

A jam-fuelled week of disaster starts with a single doughnut! Roman Garstang is obsessed with food - particularly Squidgy Splodge doughnuts - but things are not always as sugar-coated as they seem. Because of his Monday-morning jam doughnut, Roman's week takes a sticky turn. By Friday he has been banned from eating for 24 hours, accidentally shoplifted, had a lift in a getaway van, styled his teacher's guinea pig with a blue Mohawk, started a riot...and barely managed a single doughnut.

An astonishing historical novel set in the shadowy, magical forests of South America, which draws on the captivating world of the international best seller The Watchmaker of Filigree Street. Deep in uncharted Peru, the holy town of Bedlam stands at the edge of a forest. The shrine statues move, and anyone who crosses the border dies. But somewhere inside are cinchona trees, whose bark yields quinine: the only known treatment for malaria. On the other side of the Pacific, it is 1859, and India is ravaged by the disease.

The Nightwatchman contains the very best of cricket writing from all over the world, produced in association with Wisden. It gathers together leading cricket journalists and well-known writers from other disciplines - mathematics, poetry, history and literature, to name but a few - to offer long-form original pieces about all aspects of cricket. It aims to ensure that the tradition of high-quality cricket writing is continued and to make that writing accessible from anywhere in the world.

The Gyrth family had guarded the Chalice for hundreds of years. It was held by them for the Crown. Its antiquity, its beauty, the extraordinary legends that were connected with it, all combined to make it unique of its kind. It was irreplaceable. No thief could hope to dispose of it in the ordinary way. And indeed no ordinary thief would dream of trying. But there are others besides those who make their living by robbery, others whose immense wealth and passion for collecting render them less immune to the practical considerations that must guide even the less honestly minded citizens.

Campion's glorious summer in Pontisbright is blighted by death. Amidst the preparations for Minnie and Tonker Cassand's fabulous summer party a murder is discovered and it falls to Campion to unravel the intricate web of motive, suspicion, and deduction with all his imagination and skill.

After one win in 17 by the start of the summer of 2022, England needed something new. For 145 years, Test cricket was played mainly in one way: batters laid a foundation before daring to attack – and, even then, only if circumstances were favourable. Bowlers tried to bowl maidens, calculating that they would eventually force an error. But the old ways weren’t working. Then came ‘Bazball’, driven by new head coach in Brendon (‘Baz’) McCullum and captain Ben Stokes.

This is the definitive account—insightful and nuanced—of the life of the Duke of Cambridge as he approaches his milestone birthday. Jobson explores the complex character of the man who will one day reign as King William V. It is the story of the making of a king for our times. The story of the making of a monarch for the 21st century.

It’s Christmas, and James and Beth are preparing for Harrington’s festive dinner and dance. This year, famous diva Olivia Dupre is singing; a wedding is taking place, and they’re hosting a reunion of PALs - ex-army comrades from the Great War. When Olivia falls ill and claims she’s been poisoned, James puts his sleuthing hat on. But things take a sinister turn when a further attack takes place.

In Cambridge, 1355, the colleges of the fledgling university are as much at odds with each other as they are with the ordinary townfolk. This tension has recently been heightened by the return of two well-born murderers after receiving the King's pardon, showing no remorse but ready to confront those who helped convict them. And in the midst of this Bartholomew the physician is called to the local mill to examine two corpses. It is almost a relief to be able to turn his back on the fractious town, but as always in Cambridge nothing is disconnected.

The Man on the Mountaintop tells the story of Holy Man Joe, an ageing and unassuming man who lives in a hermitage on top of a mountain. During the summer months, thousands of hopefuls line the path leading to his door, seeking his wisdom. From bombastic, wealthy nobles intent on cheating their way to the top to drunkards who gradually build the physical and mental strength they need to quit their addiction, The Man on the Mountaintop is a rousing tale full of humour, wit and life lessons.

Darien is no longer a lost outpost of humanity, but the prize in an intergalactic power struggle. Hegemony forces have a stranglehold over the planet and crack troops patrol its hotspots while Earth watches, passive, rendered impotent by galactic politics. But its Darien ambassador will soon become a player in a greater conflict. There is more at stake than a turf war on a newly-discovered world. An ancient Uvovo temple hides access to a hyperspace prison, housing the greatest threat sentient life has ever known.

Campion investigates once more, but this time he is on the run from the police - classic British crime writing at its best. Celebrated amateur detective Albert Campion awakes in hospital accused of attacking a police officer and suffering from acute amnesia. All he can remember is that he was on a mission of vital importance to His Majesty's government before his accident. On the run from the police and unable to recognise even his faithful servant Lugg or his own fiancée

First there was the drowned man, but maybe his death was an accident? Then there were the decapitated bodies, the burnt girl, the women pursued in the dark. Finally the police have to admit there’s a serial killer on the loose and he seems set on revenge. His name is Abel and his crimes are escalating every day.

Eighteen years ago, on a mission in Iraq, Captain John Milton made a reckless decision with serious consequences. But it was Major Connor Gordon who really paid the price. Now Milton is on a different mission: to atone for his past sins. A human rights activist has vanished without a trace and his dying mother is desperate to know the truth. When the mysterious disappearance leads Milton all the way to the Western Isles of Scotland, he sees an opportunity to find his old friend Connor and finally make amends. Milton is determined to track both men down, wherever his search may lead.

Ellen's therapist told her to forget the past, but the life she’s left with is boring. All she wants is to be happy and normal, but the approaching long, bleak nights of winter loom heavy before her, especially as she'll be alone. But when the secrets her mother put in place to protect her are exposed, Ellen learns the frightening truth. Her history is darker than she imagined. She's not who she thinks she is, and the real her is a very different person to the one whom others have mistreated and exploited.