Showing results by narrator "Simon Prebble" in All Categories

A mysterious and sensual woman, shrouded in a heavy black veil, begs Gabriel Cynster to help protect her family's home from the unscrupulous man trying to steal it. Unable to resist a challenge, he agrees - but protection comes with a price. From one searing kiss to the next, the truth of her identity could be revealed, which could cost both of them everything -including their passion.

A Nobel Peace Prize recipient beatified by the Catholic Church in 2003, Mother Teresa of Calcutta was celebrated by heads of state and adored by millions for her work on behalf of the poor. In his measured critique, Hitchens asks only that Mother Teresa's reputation be judged by her actions - not the other way around. With characteristic élan and rhetorical dexterity, Hitchens eviscerates the fawning cult of Teresa, recasting the Albanian missionary as a spurious, despotic, and megalomaniacal operative.

The Rogue's Return continues the popular Company of Rogues series by New York Times best-selling author Jo Beverley. Simon St. Bride has been in Canada fighting the War of 1812 - but the war is over now, and Simon is ready to come home. Before he leaves, however, Simon must defend a young woman's honor. What does her past hide?

Literary agent Barbara Ragg has agreed to represent a man writing a book about his experiences hanging out with the Abominable Snowman. Terence Moongrove’s residence has become the target of New Age cosmologists. And pint-sized terrier Freddie de la Hay is being recruited by MI6 to infiltrate a Russian spy ring.

This trilogy about World War II, largely based on his own experiences as an army officer, is the crowning achievement of Evelyn Waugh's career. Its central character is Guy Crouchback, head of an ancient but decayed Catholic family, who at first discovers new purpose in the challenge to defend Christian values against Nazi barbarism, but then gradually finds the complexities and cruelties of war too much for him.

Charles Morwellan, eighth Earl of Meredith, knows he must marry, but he plans to do so on his own terms. So, after years of escaping the clutches of would-be wives, it is quite a shock when he is refused by the beautiful Sarah Conningham.

Daniel Waterhouse finds himself embroiled in a dark conflict that has been raging in the shadows for decades. It is a secret war between the brilliant, enigmatic Master of the Mint (and closet alchemist) Isaac Newton and his archnemesis, the insidious counterfeiter Jack the Coiner, a.k.a. Jack Shaftoe, King of the Vagabonds.

Arguably the most significant scientific discovery of the new century, the mapping of the 23 pairs of chromosomes that make up the human genome raises almost as many questions as it answers - questions that will profoundly impact the way we think about disease, about longevity, and about free will. Questions that will affect the rest of your life. Matt Ridley here probes the scientific, philosophical, and moral issues arising as a result of the mapping of the genome.

Men are fools for love. And that includes Marcus Didius Falco. To please his beloved, the tough shamus has become Procurer of the Sacred Poultry (i.e., babysitter of the temple geese). It's steady work and good pay, but Falco is soon restless. So when a beautiful child, chosen to enter the secret order of Vestal Virgins, disappears, he grabs the case. He quickly discovers that greed and religious fervor are only a thread away from madness.

Michael Anstruther-Wetherby is a rising member of parliament - a man destined for power. Except Michael lacks the single most important element of success: a wife. Political pressure sends him searching for his ideal bride, a gently bred, malleable young lady, preferably one with a political background. Michael discovers such a paragon but finds a formidable obstacle in his path - the young lady's beautiful, strong-minded aunt - Caroline Sutcliffe.

The story of France from the Renaissance to the 19th century, as Dumas vibrantly retold it in his numerous enormously popular novels, has long been absent one vital, richly historical era: the Age of Napoleon. But no longer. Now dynamically, in a tale of family honor and undying vengeance, of high adventure and heroic derring-do, The Last Cavalier fills that gap.

Claudine Burroughs, a volunteer in Hester Monk's clinic for sick and injured prostitutes, no longer expects closeness with her coldly ambitious husband and dreads the holidays. Then, at a glittering Yuletide gala, she meets the attractive poet Dai Tregarron, and suddenly her spirits lift. But an hour later, this fascinating man is enmeshed in a nightmare - accused of killing a young streetwalker who had been smuggled into the party.

The best-selling author of the Alienist series returns with a chilling elaboration on the Sherlock Holmes canon, as the famed detective investigates a pair of gruesome murders, which cast an otherworldly shadow as far as Queen Victoria herself.

The year is 1857, soon after the tragic Siege of Cawnpore. In the British garrison, a guard is killed and an Indian prisoner escapes, which leads to yet more British deaths. Cries for revenge are overwhelming. Despite no witnesses and no evidence against him, a luckless British medical orderly named John Tallis is arrested as an accomplice simply because he was the only soldier unaccounted for when these baffling crimes were committed.

A second battle-hardened, completely unstoppable, all-male hero, an ex-officer of the Crown, confronts the deadly enemy known only as the Black Cobra. He's focused on his mission, then sees a lady he never dreamed he'd see again - with an assassin on her heels. She secretly followed him, unaware her path is deadly - or that she'll join him to battle a treacherous foe.Through ever-present peril, through passion, desire, and ecstasy, they race to reach England - and their destiny.

The day after a Gothic door is returned to its original place in the Mottisham village church, two men are found dead. The Welsh villagers, closed and suspicious of outsiders, believe their deaths were not accidental, but part of an ancient legend that told of an unrepentant monk who tried to enter to the church by grasping the door's iron knocker.

When MI6 Agent Alex Rider wakes up in a hospital, he is thrilled to be alive. Left for dead by his dreaded nemesis Scorpia, Alex has survived to fight another day. Almost immediately, he locks horns with a super-rich Russian businessman who is building a luxury hotel in space.

After a daring mission in space, Alex returns to Earth, crash landing in Australia. There, the Australian Secret Service promptly recruits him on a special case. This time he'll have to infiltrate a deadly Asian drug gang known as the Snakeheads - and once again face his arch enemy, Scorpia.

James Allen's From Poverty to Power (1901) and As a Man Thinketh (1902) stand as seminal texts in the self-help genre that have served as sources of inspiration since their publication at the beginning of the 20th century. Loosely based in its principles around the Biblical proverb "As a man thinketh in his heart, so is he," As a Man Thinketh asserts the powerful idea that belief is central to bringing about positive events in one's life.

In Eastvale, a young Middle Eastern boy is found dead, his body stuffed in a wheelbarrow on the East Side Estate. Detective Superintendent Banks and his team know they must tread carefully to solve this sensitive case. But tensions rise when they learn that the victim was stabbed somewhere else and dumped. Who is the boy, and where did he come from? Then, in a decayed area of Eastvale scheduled for redevelopment, a heroin addict is found dead. Was this just another tragic overdose or something darker?