Showing results by narrator "Richard Burnip" in All Categories

After his recent unveiling of a devious assassin, Sir Hugh Corbett has returned to service as the Keeper of the Secret Seal, begrudgingly admitting that his appetite for adventure has once again been whetted. Summoned to meet the King to be congratulated on their work together, Corbett and Ranulf learn of the death of Corbett's close friend, Ralph Grandison. Ralph, a leper, has been found dead in a rowing boat, a dagger thrust through his chest. But this murder is not the first of its kind.

1066 – Senlac Ridge, England. William the Bastard, Duke of Normandy, defeats Harold Godwinson, King Harold II of England, in what will become known as the Battle of Hastings. But England will not be conquered easily, the Anglo-Saxons will not submit meekly to Norman rule. Although his heroic deeds will nearly be lost to legend, one man unites the resistance. His name is Hereward of Bourne. His honour, bravery and skill at arms will change the future of England.

In 1995, 12-year-old Sidney Parsons was savagely murdered by two boys his own age. No reason was ever given for this terrible crime, and the 'Demonic Duo' who killed him were imprisoned until their release in 2002, when they were given new identities and lifetime anonymity. Online journalist Scott King investigates the lead-up and aftermath of the killing, uncovering dark and fanciful stories of demonic possession, and encountering a village torn apart by this unspeakable act.

Monica Jones was Philip Larkin's partner for more than four decades and was arguably the most important woman in his life. She was cruelly immortalised as Margaret Peel in Kingsley Amis's Lucky Jim and widely vilified for destroying Larkin's diaries and works in progress after his death. She was opinionated and outspoken, widely disliked by his friends and Philip himself was routinely unfaithful to her. But Monica Jones was also a brilliant academic and an inspiring teacher in her own right.

Deep in the trenches of Flanders Fields, men are dying in the thousands every day. So one more death shouldn't be a surprise. But then a body turns up with bizarre injuries, and Sherlock Holmes' former sidekick, Dr. John Watson - unable to fight for his country due to injury but able to serve it through his medical expertise - finds his suspicions raised.

When the murdered body of a woman is found in a Sheffield carpark, former cop turned private investigator Matt Forrester finds himself embroiled in the case, because the last call the victim made was to him…But the case isn’t as simple as the drug theft it looks like, and – when a young boy becomes the next victim – Matt and his life partner, DI Karen Nelson, realise they’re investigating a terrifying series of revenge killings. Arrests start to be made, but enemies are being made. And, as the killings continue, nobody is safe…

In September 1985, 19-year-old John Lindqvist moves into a dilapidated old building in Stockholm, planning to make his living as a magician. Something strange is going on in the building's basement - and the price of entry is just a little blood. I Always Find You is a horror story - as bizarre and macabre as any of Lindqvist's best-selling novels. It's also a book about being young and lonely, about making friends and growing up. It's about magic and the intensity of human connection - and a society's communal responsibility for a devastating act of political violence.

June 1914. The beginning of another long, prosperous summer for Britain. But beneath the clear skies, the chill wind of social discontent swirls around this sceptred isle. Shots ring out in a distant European land - the assassination of a foreign aristocrat. From that moment the entire world is propelled into a conflict unlike any seen before. This is the story of five British communities, their circumstances very different, but who will all share in the tragedy that is to come.

In The Line, Dr Freeman reveals the medical principles and practices that helped lead these athletes to success - ideas that we now consider commonplace, but many of which were in fact the Doc's own innovations. And in a sport where there's an ethical line as well as a finishing line, Dr Freeman gives a frank and open account in response to allegations of misuse of medical treatment to enhance performance.

Vienna 1770: Baron Wolfgang von Kempelen unveils an amazing invention, The Mechanical Turk, an unbeatable chess playing automaton. Hailed as the greatest innovation of the century, the chess machine is really a brilliant illusion, secretly operated from inside by the Italian dwarf Tibor. But when a beautiful and seductive countess dies mysteriously in the presence of the automaton, the machine and its inventor become the target of espionage, persecution, and intrigue.

In 1944, as waves of German ninjas parachute into Kent, Britain's best hopes for victory lie with a Spitfire pilot codenamed Ack-Ack Macaque. The trouble is, Ack-Ack Macaque is a cynical, one-eyed, cigar-chomping monkey, and he's starting to doubt everything, including his own existence.

It's 1952. More than a decade since humiliation at Dunkirk brought an end to Britain's war and the beginning of an uneasy peace with Hitler.

In Africa, the swastika flies from the Sahara to the Indian Ocean. The brutal presence of the SS is visible everywhere. Now, however, the demonic plans of Walter Hochburg - architect of Nazi Africa - threaten Britain's ailing colonies.

In England, ex-mercenary Burton Cole is offered one last contract. He jumps at the chance to settle an old score with Hochburg.

Harper wakes every night, terrified of the sounds outside his hut halfway up the mountain in Bali. He is afraid that his past as a mercenary has caught up with him and that his life may now be in danger. As he waits to discover his fate, he meets Rita, a woman with her own tragic past, and begins a passionate affair. Their exile makes Harper realise that exile comes in many forms - but can Rita and Harper save each other while they are putting each other very much at risk?

Only the intervention of the Great Powers of France, Russia and Britain can save Greece. In the wild south, the people of the Mani have risen up against 400 years of Ottoman rule. But initial triumph leads to bitter feuding among the Greek victors, and the Sultan sends his vassal, Ibrahim Pasha of Egypt, to invade. Burning everything in his path, he is on the point of victory.

King Henry II reigns over a vast empire, but he is aging, and his ambitious sons are restless. Henry’s third son, Richard of Aquitaine, is developing a fearsome reputation as a ruthless warrior and he earns the name Richard Lionheart for his bravery and brutality on the battlefield. After the deaths of his brothers, Richard’s impatience to take the throne leads him to form an alliance with France. And so, Richard begins his bloody quest to return the Holy Land to Christian rule.

The author of the Masters of the Sea series is back with a standalone battle book that will blow all others out of the water.1587. Two nations are locked in bitter conflict. One strives for dominance, the other for survival.After decades of religious strife, Elizabeth sits on the throne of England. The reformation continues. Catholic revolts have been ruthlessly quashed, and Elizabeth has ordered the execution of her cousin, Mary Queen of Scots.

The year is 1917, and Dr. John Watson is held in a notorious POW camp deep in enemy Germany, there as medical officer for the British prisoners. With the Allied blockade, food is perilously short in the camp, and when a new prisoner is murdered, all assume the poor chap was killed for his Red Cross parcel. Watson, though, isn't so sure.

Gilbert Foliot, Bishop of London, has lived through Henry II’s reign and has witnessed the terrifying civil war between Henry II’s mother, the Empress Matilda, and her cousin, Stephen; a time so traumatic that it becomes known as the Anarchy. The greatest letter writer of the 12th Century, Gilbert Foliot, Bishop of London, gives an intimate account of one of England’s most troubled eras. Central to his account is the life of a knight he first met over 50 years earlier, Harold of Hereford.

Manchester, England 1965. Little Kathy Openshaw is waiting in the car, with only her toy doll for company, while her mother Connie visits close friends Myra and Ian. But when Connie returns to the car, Kathy has vanished. Instantly, she thinks of the news reports of the children who have gone missing from the area. Parents everywhere are worried sick. Connie is struck with terror: What kind of mother leaves their child alone, when a kidnapper is on the loose? Listen to this pulse-pounding, heart-wrenching, and unforgettable story.

October 1941. Twenty-one-year-old Alan Mart is posted to India and taken under the wing of the overbearing Acting-Captain Sam Holl. Following the Japanese advance on Singapore, the men are deployed to Malaya. What follows is a quietly shattering and searingly authentic depiction of the claustrophobia of jungle warfare and the indiscriminate nature of conflict. Based on David Piper's own wartime experience in South East Asia, this new edition of a 1959 classic includes a contextual introduction from IWM which sheds new light on the dramatic true events that so influenced its author.