Showing results by narrator "Richard Dillane" in All Categories

Widely regarded as the most engaging historical novels ever written, the 21 books in Patrick O'Brian's Aubrey/Maturin series have garnered millions of fans since the publication of the first volume over 50 years ago. Included here are BBC radio adaptations of the first seven thrilling stories.

Seven Bones is the story of one of the more bizarre murder investigations in Australia’s history. Two wives die in suspicious circumstances: co-incidence or, as husband Thomas Keir describes it, ‘bad luck’? Three years after Thomas Keir alleged his first wife, Jean, deserted him and her young son for another man, his second wife, Rosalina, Jean’s cousin, lay scorched and strangled on her bed. Arriving on the scene, Detective Peter Seymour realised he was either dealing with the world’s unluckiest husband or a serial wife killer.

One of the greatest novelists of all time, Leo Tolstoy is famed worldwide for his masterpieces of realist fiction, War and Peace and Anna Karenina. This comprehensive collection contains both those iconic works, as well as his final novel, Resurrection, his autobiographical essay 'A Confession', Stephen Wakelam's dramatic account of his tempestuous marriage, Mrs Tolstoy, and In Our Time: Tolstoy.

Bobby Cobbler's family have only just moved to Pip Street when his beloved cat, Conkers, goes missing. As a mammoth-sized search begins, Bobby makes friends with the tiny and fizzy Imelda, who lives next door. The friends soon discover that a lot of cats from Pip Street are missing. In fact so are the ones from Chip Street and Dip Street, too! What on Earth is going on?!

Pip Street is the very ordinary place where extraordinary things happen. Bobby Cobbler is worried. His good friend Richard Keiths' mobility scooter has broken, and without the money to fix it he might have to leave Pip Street! Can brilliant Bobby and fizzy Imelda find a way for him to stay?

Who turned out all the lights? Oh, no one - it's a power cut. Which is bad news for usually brave Bobby Cobbler, because he's scared of the dark. And, worse luck for Bobby, this is not just one random power cut - it's the beginning of a plague of power cuts! Something on Pip Street isn't right, and just between you and me, I think it might be to do with that pig with the spooky, hypnotic eyes who's living in Jeff the Chalk's house....

Things move slowly in the village of Illthwaite, but that's about to change with the arrival of two strangers intent on digging up bits of the past the locals would rather keep buried. Sam Flood is a young Australian mathematician whose grandmother was despatched from Illthwaite four decades ago, courtesy of the Child Migrant scheme. Miguel Madero, Sam's fellow guest at the Stranger House Inn, is a Spanish wannabe-priest-turned-historian in pursuit of an ancestor last seen setting sail with the Armada in 1588.

This is the story of the battle between appeasers and anti-appeasers in the period before - and just after - the start of the Second World War, and the formation of the 1940 coalition government which, like the election of 2010, abruptly ruptured all previous political alignments. Based on real events, this is a fascinating and little known tale of idealism, blackmail, and political skulduggery.

Can crumpets be cool? When Bobby's dad becomes the manager of the local crumpet factory, Bobby thinks his moving worries are at last over. He likes it here on Pip Street, especially now he has found a new best friend in Imelda from next door. Except crumpets are boring! And no one is buying them. Unless someone (and I bet it'll have to be Bobby) comes up with a fantabulous plan to make crumpets more interesting....