Month: February 2021

Mabel lives with her parents in The Mermaid Hotel, by the sea. Mabel likes to keep an eye on the comings and goings of all the guests.

Then one day a particularly in-ter-est-ing old lady comes to stay. There is something very suspicious about her, with her growly voice and her heavy trunks and her beady-eyed tortoise. And why does no one know her REAL name?

There can only be one answer, Mabel decides … this guest is a SUPERVILLAIN. But even supervillains have a soft side, and as an unlikely friendship grows between the pair, their fantastical exploits take them well beyond the corridors of their seaside home.

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by Sophie Dahl
Suitable for ages 5+

Tomas has a secret – a big secret. He has his own tiny dragon, Flicker! A dragon which grew on a very special tree at the bottom of his grandad’s garden. And not only that – his friends Ted, Kai and Kat have dragons too, all grown on the same dragonfruit tree …

Having your own dragon is magical – but Tomas is also about to find out what living with a dragon is REALLY like. When the fire-breathing kicks in and you get singed every five seconds, it’s like having an unpredictable volcano in your pocket. Learning to train the dragons and keep them out of trouble at school and home will take all Tomas’s creativity and patience … What is more, the dragonfruit tree is starting to look droopy and unwell. Tomas and his friends have got to do all they can restore it to health and uncover its deepest mysteries, as well as trying to work out what big secret local bully Liam, ‘King of Trouble’, has got up his sleeve … One thing is for sure, life is never dull when you have a dragon in your pocket.

Available as an eBook and eAudiobook
Narrated by Ewan Goddard
Suitable for ages 5+

Mira CAN’T WAIT to start Unicorn School. (Her big sister goes and won’t stop going on about it.). But when Mira arrives on her first day all the unicorns are gone … except Dave!

Dave isn’t quite the sparkly unicorn Mira was expecting to find at the end of the rainbow – he’s more grumpy than glittery, more interested in lunch than magical Quests and he always runs off when Mira tries to ride him – but Mira’s not going to let that get her down. Along with her new friends and their (much more glittery) unicorns, she is determined to be the best at Quests and protect the special unicorn world!

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by Carlyss Peer
Suitable for ages 6+

After sixth grade, the very worst year of his life, Rafe Khatchadorian thinks he has it made in seventh grade. He’s been accepted to art school in the big city and imagines a math-and-history-free fun zone. Wrong! It’s more competitive than Rafe ever expected, and to score big in class, he needs to find a way to turn his boring life into the inspiration for a work of art. His method? Operation: Get a Life! Anything he’s never done before, he’s going to do it, from learning to play poker to going to a modern art museum. But when his newest mission uncovers secrets about the family Rafe’s never known, he has to decide if he’s ready to have his world turned upside down.

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by Bryan Kennedy
Suitable for ages 8+

Ari Helix has been running her whole life. An illegal immigrant in the territory controlled by the tyrannical Mercer Corporation, she’s always had to hide who she was. Until now. When Ari crash-lands on Old Earth and pulls a magic sword from its ancient resting place, she is revealed to be the forty-second reincarnation of King Arthur.

The wizard Merlin has been waiting for centuries for a King who can break the curse that’s aged him backwards into a teenager. He’s trained dozens of Arthurs over the centuries, but never a girl. Could Ari finally be the one?

Ari wants nothing to do with Merlin’s talks of quests and knights and dragons. She just wants to use her new power to find a way home. But the Mercer Corporation has been hiding a terrible world-destroying secret, and they’ll do anything to stop her from uncovering the truth.

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by Lauren Fortgang
Suitable for ages 13+

Leningrad, Russia, 1968.

Alexander Karpenko is no ordinary child, and from an early age, it is clear he is destined to lead his countrymen. But when his father is assassinated by the KGB for defying the state, he and his mother will have to escape from Russia if they hope to survive. At the docks, they are confronted with an irreversible choice: should they board a container ship bound for America, or Great Britain? Alexander leaves that choice to the toss of a coin . . .

In a single moment, a double twist decides Alexander’s future. During an epic tale of fate and fortune, spanning two continents and thirty years, we follow his triumphs and defeats as he struggles as an immigrant to conquer his new world. As this unique story unfolds, Alexander comes to realize where his destiny lies, and accepts that he must face the past he left behind in Russia.

Available as an eBook and eAudiobook
Narrated by Richard Armitage
Fiction

Dover, 1939

At the heart of Market Square lies Castle’s Café, run by the formidable Nellie Castle and her six children.

Since the scandalous birth of her son ten years ago, Marianne, Nellie’s eldest daughter, has preferred to stay in the kitchen, hidden away from the scrutiny of the town gossips. Overcome with shame, she has never revealed the identity of Donny’s father – not even to her own mother.

But with World War II just around the corner, soon Marianne’s past catches up with her. And suddenly the lives of the Castle family become a lot more complicated.

Will the secrets from her past destroy their future?

Available as an eBook and eAudiobook
Narrated by Bea Holland
Fiction

In 2008, twenty-year-old Jonny Benjamin stood on Waterloo Bridge, about to jump. A stranger saw his distress and stopped to talk with him – a decision that saved Jonny’s life.
Fast forward to 2014 and Jonny, together with Rethink Mental Illness launch a campaign with a short video clip so that Jonny could finally thank that stranger who put him on the path to recovery. More than 319 million people around the world followed the search. ITV’s breakfast shows picked up the story until the stranger, whose name is Neil Laybourn, was found and – in an emotional and touching moment – the pair re-united and have remained firm friends ever since.
The Stranger on the Bridge is a memoir of the journey Jonny made both personally, and publicly to not only find the person who saved his life, but also to explore how he got to the bridge in the first place and how he continues to manage his diagnosis of schizoaffective disorder. Using extracts from diaries Jonny has been writing from the age of thirteen, this book is a deeply personal memoir with a unique insight on mental health.
Jonny was recognised for his work as an influential activist changing the culture around mental health, when he was awarded an MBE in 2017. He and Neil now work full-time together visiting schools, hospitals, prisons and workplaces to help end the stigma by talking about mental health and suicide prevention. The pair ran the London Marathon together in 2017 in aid of HeadsTogether. Following the global campaign to find the stranger, in 2015 Channel 4 made a documentary of Jonny’s search which has now been shown in 14 territories.

Available as an eBook and eAudiobook
Narrated by  Jonny Benjamin, Britt Pflüger and Neil Laybourn
Non-Fiction

Sergeant Amy Callan and Lieutenant Caroline Cooke have a lot in common.
Both were army high-flyers. Both were aquainted with Jack Reacher. Both were forced to resign from the service.

Now they’re both dead.

Found in their own homes, naked, in a bath full of paint.
Apparent victims of an army man. A loner, a smart guy with a score to settle, a ruthless vigilante.

A man just like Jack Reacher.

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by Jeff Harding
Fiction

Fifteen years ago in small-town New Jersey, a teenage boy and girl were found dead.

Most people concluded it was a tragic suicide pact. The dead boy’s brother, Nap Dumas, did not. Now Nap is a cop – but he’s a cop who plays by his own rules, and who has never made peace with his past.

And when the past comes back to haunt him, Nap discovers secrets can kill …

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by John Chancer
Fiction

MI6 created him. Now they want him dead.

John Milton is an assassin for the British government, but he’s old and tired and wants to quit. Unfortunately, that’s impossible. Milton knows too much. The only way out of his job is in a box – there are no exceptions.

Milton goes on the run and meets a young mother who needs his help. Her son has been tempted by a life with a glamorous gang and the charismatic criminal who leads it. Milton must get the boy out of trouble – before it’s too late.

And when his old agency sends another agent after him, the odds against him are stacked even higher.

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by David Thorpe
Fiction

‘Am I normal?’
‘What’s an anxiety disorder?’
‘Does therapy work?’
‘How would I know if someone had an eating disorder?’

These are just a few of the questions Natasha Devon is asked as she travels the UK campaigning for better mental health awareness and provision. Here, Natasha calls upon experts in the fields of psychology, neuroscience and anthropology to debunk and demystify the full spectrum of mental health, from A (Anxiety) to Z (Zero F*cks – the art of high self-esteem) via everything from body image and gender to differentiating ‘sadness’ from ‘depression’.

Statistically, one in three of us will experience symptoms of a mental illness during our lifetime. Yet all of us have brains, and so we all have mental health – regardless of age, sexuality, race or background. The past few years have seen an explosion in awareness, yet it seems there is still widespread confusion. A Beginner’s Guide to Being Mental is for anyone who wants to have this essential conversation, written as only Natasha, with her combination of expertise, personal experience and humour, knows how.

Available as an eBook and eAudiobook
Narrated by Natasha Devon
Non-Fiction

Harrison Foster is a lawyer by training but works as a crisis manager for a London firm that specialises in such matters. Summoned to Newmarket after a fire in the Chadwick Stables slaughters six very valuable horses, including the short-priced favourite for the Derby, Harry (as he is known) finds there is far more to the ‘simple’ fire than initially meets the eye. For a start, human remains are found amongst the equestrian ones in the burnt-out shell. All the stable staff are accounted for, so who is the mystery victim?

Harry knows very little about horses, indeed he positively dislikes them, but he is thrust unwillingly into the world of Thoroughbred racing where the standard of care of the equine stars is far higher than that of the humans who attend to them.

The Chadwick family are a dysfunctional racing dynasty, with the emphasis being on the nasty. Resentment between the generations is rife and sibling rivalry bubbles away like volcanic magma beneath a thin crust of respectability.

Harry represents the Middle-Eastern owner of the Derby favourite and, as he delves deeper into the unanswered questions surrounding the horse’s demise, he ignites a fuse that blows the volcano sky-high, putting him in grave jeopardy. Can Harry solve the riddle before he is overcome by the toxic emissions from the eruption and is bumped off by the fallout?

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by Martin Jarvis
Fiction

Meet Lori Gottlieb, an insightful and compassionate therapist whose clients present with all kinds of problems. There’s the struggling new parents; the older woman who feels she has nothing to live for; the self-destructive young alcoholic; and the terminally ill 35-year-old newlywed. And there’s John, a narcissistic television producer, who frankly just seems to be a bit of a jerk. Over the course of a year, they all make progress.

But Gottlieb is not just a therapist – she’s also a patient who’s on a journey of her own. Interspersed with the stories of her clients are her own therapy sessions, as Gottlieb goes in search of the hidden roots of a devastating and life-changing event.

Personal, revealing, funny and wise, Maybe You Should Talk to Someone opens a rare window onto a world that is most often bound by secrecy, offering an illuminating tour of a profoundly private process.

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by  Brittany Pressley
Non-Fiction

April 1941, Romsey, England.

Josephine ‘Jo’ Fox hasn’t set foot in Romsey in over twenty years. As an illegitimate child, her family – headed by her controlling grandfather – found her an embarrassment. Now, she wants to return to what was once her home and uncover the secret of her parentage. Who was her father and why would her mother never talk about him?

Jo arrives the day after the Luftwaffe have bombed the town. The local pub, The Cricketers’ Arms, has been completely destroyed and rescue teams are searching for the remains of the seven people known to have been in the pub at the time the bomb hit. They are shocked, however, to uncover eight bodies, not seven. The eighth, unidentified, body is that of a teenage girl, who no one in the town claims to know. Who is she, how did she get there, but most importantly – who killed her?

Teaming up with local coroner and old friend, Bram Nash, Jo sets out to establish the identity of the girl and solve the riddle of her death. In doing so, she also uncovers her own personal mystery.

Everyone has secrets – some are just more deadly than others . . .

Available as an eBook and eAudiobook
Narrated by Lucy Price-Lewis
Fiction

Meet the Hunter family: Adam, Kate, and their children Hal and Charlotte. And Prince, their black Labrador.

Prince is an earnest young dog, striving hard to live up to the tenets of the Labrador Pact (Remain Loyal to Your Human Masters, Serve and Protect Your Family at Any Cost). Other dogs, led by the Springer Spaniels, have revolted. As things in the Hunter family begin to go badly awry – marital breakdown, rowdy teenage parties, attempted suicide – Prince’s responsibilities threaten to overwhelm him and he is forced to break the Labrador Pact and take desperate action to save his Family.

Available as an eBook and eAudiobook
Narrated by Mark Meadows
Fiction

In October 1940, the handsome young David Sparsholt arrives in Oxford. A keen athlete and oarsman, he at first seems unaware of the effect he has on others – particularly on the lonely and romantic Evert Dax, son of a celebrated novelist and destined to become a writer himself. While the Blitz rages in London, Oxford exists at a strange remove: an ephemeral, uncertain place, in which nightly blackouts conceal secret liaisons. Over the course of one momentous term, David and Evert forge an unlikely friendship that will colour their lives for decades to come . . .

Available as an eBook and eAudiobook
Narrated by David Dawson
Fiction

1820, London. 

Sarah McCaffrey, fleeing arrest for her part in a failed rebellion, finds herself alone and on the run. She boards the Serpent, bound from London to the colony of New South Wales – and when the captain’s reckless actions lead the ship to be dashed onto Sydney’s notorious rocks, Sarah is the only survivor.

Adopting a false identity, Sarah determines to make a new life for herself. She takes the first work she can find, under the formidable Molly Thistle, who runs a sprawling trade empire. Sarah begins to see that there is more than one way of changing the world, but her new life is thrown into chaos when her past follows her across the seas.

Available as an eBook and eAudiobook
Narrated by Lucy Dixon
Fiction

Fixie Farr can’t help herself. Straightening a crooked object, removing a barely-there stain, helping out a friend … she just has to put things right. It’s how she got her nickname, after all.

So when a handsome stranger in a coffee shop asks her to watch his laptop for a moment, Fixie not only agrees, she ends up saving it from certain disaster. To thank her, the computer’s owner, Sebastian, scribbles her an IOU – but of course Fixie never intends to call in the favour.

That is, until her teenage crush, Ryan, comes back into her life and needs her help – and Fixie turns to Seb. But things don’t go according to plan, and now Fixie owes Seb: big time.

Soon the pair are caught up in a series of IOUs – from small favours to life-changing debts – and Fixie is torn between the past she’s used to and the future she deserves.

Does she have the courage to fix things for herself and fight for the life, and love, she really wants?

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by Fiona Hardingham
Fiction

Give me one name. One person.
And I will make them disappear . . .

When Sarah rescues a young girl in trouble, she expects nothing in return. But her act of bravery puts a powerful and dangerous man in her debt.
He lives by his own brutal code, and all debts must be repaid – in the only way he knows how.

He offers Sarah a way to solve a desperate situation with her intolerable boss. A once-in-a-lifetime deal that will make all her problems disappear.

No consequences. No comeback.
No chance of being found out.

All it takes is a 29-second phone call.

Because everyone has a name to give. Don’t they?

Available as an eBook and eAudiobook
Narrated by Jane Slavin
Fiction

That morning, Jim Sams, clever but by no means profound, woke from uneasy dreams to find himself transformed into a gigantic creature.

Jim Sams has undergone a metamorphosis. In his previous life he was ignored or loathed, but in his new incarnation he is the most powerful man in Britain – and it is his mission to carry out the will of the people. Nothing must get in his way: not the opposition, nor the dissenters within his own party. Not even the rules of parliamentary democracy.

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by Bill Nighy
Fiction

These and many other questions trouble David Mitchell. Join him on a tour of the absurdities of modern life – from Ryanair to Richard III, Downton Abbey to phone etiquette, UKIP to hot dogs made of cats. Funny, provocative and shot through with refreshing amounts of common sense, Thinking About It Only Makes It Worse celebrates and commiserates on the state of things in our not entirely glorious modern world.

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by  David Mitchell
Non-Fiction

Join these two comedy greats and lifelong friends on their journey from recuperation to riverbank in this hilarious and heart-warming audiobook that gives you a front-row seat at an exclusive Bob and Paul production.

Bob Mortimer and Paul Whitehouse have been friends for 30 years, but when life intervened, what was once a joyous and spontaneous friendship dwindled to the odd phone call or occasional catch up. Then, Glory Be! They were both diagnosed with heart disease and realised that time is short. They’d better spend it fishing…. 

So they dusted off their kits, chucked on their waders and ventured into the achingly beautiful British countryside to fish, rediscover the joys of their friendship and ruminate on some of life’s most profound questions, such as: How did we get so old? Where are all the fish? What are your favourite pocket meats? What should we do if we find a corpse?

Available as an eBook and eAudiobook
Narrated by Bob Mortimer and Paul Whitehouse
Non-Fiction

When it’s a bad night for New York City’s rich and famous, they call NYPD Red.

A renowned documentary filmmaker is found dead after a sex game goes horribly wrong. Across town, a homemade bomb explodes at a charity benefit. The only cops who can work both cases are Zach Jordan and Kylie MacDonald of NYPD Red – the elite, hard-charging, investigative task force called in exclusively for New York City’s most high-profile crimes.

Racing against the clock to keep the city’s most prominent citizens safe, Zach and Kylie uncover enough corruption, blackmail, drugs, sex and vengeance to shock even the most jaded of New Yorkers. But when their investigation threatens to expose the very citizens they’re supposed to protect, Zach and Kylie must put aside their unrequited feelings for one another and follow the truth, no matter where it leads.

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by Edoardo Ballerini
Fiction

Spring 1935.

On London’s Hampstead Heath two girls meet by chance: well-mannered and smartly dressed Verity and dishevelled and grubby Ruby. Yet the mismatched pair form an instant friendship strong enough to survive their parents’ disapproval.

When war engulfs the country – sending Ruby to Devon while Verity struggles to find a new beginning under a shadow from her past – the girls are convinced they will always be there for each other.

Until the day one breaks the other’s heart …

Can Verity and Ruby find a way back to each other before it’s too late?

Available as an eAudiobook
Narrated by Eve Webster
Fiction