Showing results by narrator "Rachel Atkins" in All Categories

Pearl Winter hasn't been outside in 43 years. Since she arrived in Dartmoor as a teenager, her isolated cottage has been her whole world. A place of safety. But now Pearl is utterly alone—except for the postman, the local crows, and her memories of the summer when her life turned upside down. Connor Matthews feels like a stranger in his own home. Since his mother's death, he's been adrift from his remaining family and the life that's always been mapped out for him. But when Connor takes a summer job as Pearl's gardener, their unexpected friendship opens the door to a fresh start.

The Letter: Booktrack Edition adds an immersive musical soundtrack to your audiobook listening experience! Tina Craig longs to escape her violent husband. She works all the hours God sends to save up enough money to leave him, also volunteering in a charity shop to avoid her unhappy home. Whilst going through the pockets of a second-hand suit, she comes across an old letter, the envelope firmly sealed and unfranked. Tina opens the letter and reads it - a decision that will alter the course of her life for ever....

The Queue tells the unforgettable story of three strangers, nineteen-year-old Abbie, 40-year-old Mike and 63-year-old Janet, who meet in Southwark Park on 17th September 2022 on a day that will change their lives forever. Over the next twenty-four hours, alongside 250,000 others, friendships are formed, celebrities are spotted and rom-com dreams are ignited. As the unlikely trio wind along the Thames, edging ever closer to Westminster and the Queen, it's clear that they have unknowingly become a part of history.

The Awakened Life: Wicca and Witchcraft teaches you how to look inside yourself and let the God and Goddess empower you with spirituality, knowledge and self-esteem, and help you appreciate the profound beauty of living in tune with nature. Along your path, you'll learn about the many types of witches, traditions and deities of the Craft. You'll learn about the magickal tools and objects and how to use them.

Three brand-new adventures for glamorous bounty hunter Vienna Salvatori. 'Dead Drop' by Mark Wright. Dwarfed by the burning star of the Hyspero system, two devastating battle fleets face each other across the stars. On one side the Dyarid Primary Vanguard, commanded by Admiral Salaron aboard the starship Custodian. On the other a Chtzin battle cluster.

Gangland Queen Nell has the perfect life of crime as a top shoplifter by day and glamorous club owner by night. But a betrayal and botched robbery suddenly reverse her fortunes...and her old rival, Alice Diamond, is hell-bent on taking her down. After escaping a poverty-stricken childhood, nightclub dancer Zoe has more on her mind than settling scores for Alice. But the life of luxury Zoe craves comes at a terrible price. And when a vicious gang tightens its grip on Soho, all three women realise it pays to keep your friends close and your enemies closer.

A collection of fabulous tales of genies, heroes, flying carpets and fantastic voyages, The Arabian Nights has enchanted generations of children and adults. Forged in the Islamic Golden Age, it was brought to Europe in the 18th Century, where it became an instant sensation. Included here are seven full-cast dramatisations, starring Carolyn Backhouse as Shahrazad and Derek Jacobi as the King, as well as a bonus edition of In Our Time exploring the story behind the tales.

Virginia Woolf: The Essays contains the most important and impactful of Woolf's non-fiction writing, including five essay collections and her most renowned essay: A Room of One's Own. Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) was an English novelist and essayist regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century. During the interwar period, Woolf was a significant figure in London literary society and a member of the famous Bloomsbury Group.

This collection contains Virginia Woolf's two most important and impactful non-fiction essays: A Room of One's Own and Three Guineas which have inspired and enraptured readers for decades. Virginia Woolf (1882-1941) was an English novelist and essayist regarded as one of the foremost modernist literary figures of the twentieth century. During the interwar period, Woolf was a significant figure in London literary society and a member of the famous Bloomsbury Group.

We never forget the one who got away. Eighteen years ago Nell fell in love in the mountains of Crete, and life changed forever. Nell's daughter, Demi, has never met her dad. Nell never saw him again. When she gets the chance to return to the hilltop town of Vounoplagia - where everything began - Nell can't resist the urge to go back and find him. Working on a honey farm perched high up in the hills, there's plenty to keep her busy. And she will quickly realise the town harbours just as many secrets as she does.

Since Goronwy Rees' death, his daughter, Jenny, has had to cope with the frequently made allegation that her father was another of the spies recruited at Cambridge in the 1930s. He never disguised his friendship with Guy Burgess, who, with Donald Maclean, had defected to Moscow in 1951, and in 1979, Rees helped Andrew Boyle unmask Anthony Blunt, the Fourth Man. So, was Rees himself actually a spy? The opening of KGB files has acted as a spur to Jenny Rees in her quest to exorcise the past.

Chris Beckett's thought-provoking and wide-ranging collection of contemporary short stories is a joy to listen to, rich in detail and texture. From stories about first love, to a man who discovers a labyrinth beneath his house, to an angel left alone at the end of the universe, Beckett displays both incredible range and extraordinary subtlety as a writer. Every story is a world unto itself - each one beautifully realized and brilliantly imagined.

London, 1851. Restless and bored after a long hot summer, apothecary and poison expert Jem Flockhart decides to redesign her physic garden. But plans are thrown into confusion when a man's skeleton is unearthed from beneath the deadly nightshade, a smaller, child-like skeleton curled at its feet. The body bears evidence of knife wounds to its ribs and arms, and is accompanied by a collection of macabre objects: a brass bowl, a curious coin-like token, a set of tiny ivory sculls.

Jenny and Mark have been together since they were at school. Now they are getting a divorce - largely, it would appear, because it is easier than answering difficult questions. (For example, why has it taken them 15 years to get married?) Only Jenny and Mark are determined that their carefully planned separation will lead to the world's first truly amicable divorce. But Jenny and Mark's friends and family are not so happy about their plans for a 'perfect divorce'. They find their loyalties divided.

The question of how and why organisms age has teased scientists for centuries. There are myriad competing theories, from the idea that ageing is a simple wear and tear process, like the rusting of a car, to the belief that ageing and death are genetically programmed and controlled. In fact, there is no clearly defined limit to life and no single, predictable program playing itself out: different things are happening within and between tissues, and each system or organ accumulates damage at its own pace, according to the kind of insults imposed on it by daily living.

Orphaned Jane emerges from a cold, hostile upbringing at Lowood Institution to take her place as governess at Thornfield, home of Mr Rochester. Her petulant but loving charge, Adele, and the housekeeper, Mrs Fairfax, are her sole company, while Rochester remains a distant, mysterious and yet imposing presence.

Mary lives a contented life as wife to a wealthy merchant in Elizabethan London. But there's a part of her past she can't forget.... As a small girl she was cursed for causing the death of a vagrant child, a curse that predicts that she will hang. Sometimes the happiest households are not what they seem, and Mary's carefully curated world begins to falter. Mary's whole life is based on a lie. Is she the woman her husband believes her to be?

Forty-four-year-old Londoner Olivia Holmes has a demanding office job, a big mortgage and an underwhelming love life. So, when she and two distant cousins inherit a ramshackle vineyard, she just may have found a wonderful distraction from her everyday existence. However, there’s a catch.

This is a singular memoir: an excavation of mother love, a candid account of the agonies and absurdities of the cancer experience and a doggedly optimistic paean to life. When Genevieve Fox finds a lump in her throat, she turns up for the hospital diagnosis in a party frock and fancy hair. I can't have cancer, she thinks. I've done my hair. But there is another reason she can't countenance cancer. Genevieve was orphaned to it at the age of nine.

A thrilling radio re-imagining telling the story of Charles Dickens' last days and providing a brand-new conclusion to his famous unfinished novel. April, 1870. Bone-weary, sick and struggling with a hidden guilt, Charles Dickens is grappling with what will be his final book - The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Two months later, he is dead and the novel remains unfinished: only six of the 12 planned instalments had been completed.