Listen free for 30 days
-
Toksvig's Almanac 2021
- An Eclectic Meander Through the Historical Year by Sandi Toksvig
- Narrated by: Sandi Toksvig
- Length: 9 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged Audiobook
- Categories: History, Women
Add to basket failed.
Add to wishlist failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Listen with a free trial
Buy Now for £19.99
No valid payment method on file.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
Listeners also enjoyed...
-
Peas and Queues
- By: Sandi Toksvig
- Narrated by: Sandi Toksvig
- Length: 7 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
How do you get rid of unwanted guests? What do you do if there's a racket in the quiet carriage? How should you eat peas, and behave in queues? How to behave, like how to punctuate, is an aspect of life that many are no longer taught. Thankfully, Sandi Toksvig has come to the rescue with her entertaining guide to modern manners, with characteristic wit and perceptiveness.
-
-
If you love lists you'll love this
- By PPod on 02-12-14
-
Between the Stops
- The View of My Life from the Top of the Number 12 Bus
- By: Sandi Toksvig
- Narrated by: Sandi Toksvig
- Length: 9 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
'Between the Stops is a sort of a memoir, my sort. It's about a bus trip really, because it's my view from the Number 12 bus (mostly top deck, the seat at the front on the right), a double-decker that plies its way from Dulwich, in South East London, where I was living, to where I sometimes work - at the BBC, in the heart of the capital. It's not a sensible way to write a memoir at all, probably, but it's the way things pop into your head as you travel, so it's my way'.
-
-
Marvellous listening
- By cwmbear on 06-11-19
-
Hitler's Canary
- By: Sandi Toksvig
- Narrated by: Sandi Toksvig
- Length: 4 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's April 1940 and German troops are pouring onto the streets of Denmark. 12-year-old Bamse is ordered by his father to keep his head down and stay out of trouble. But Bamse and his daring friend Anton can't resist playing the occasional practical joke on the invading soldiers. When it becomes clear that the trouble isn't just going to pass them by, the people of Denmark decide to take action and Bamse and his eccentric family are about to take part in one of history's most dramatic rescues - smuggling Denmark's Jewish population, across the water to Sweden and safety.
-
-
Wonderful
- By nannapops on 05-11-20
-
Funny You Should Ask...
- Your Questions Answered by the QI Elves
- By: QI Elves, James Harkin, Anne Miller, and others
- Narrated by: John Lloyd, QI Elves, James Rawson, and others
- Length: 4 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Funny You Should Ask... features the QI Elves' answers to 200 questions on topics ranging from goosebumps to gherkins and everything in-between. Generously sprinkled with mind-boggling extra facts from the Elves, this is essential listening for the incurably curious.
-
-
Naturally, it's quite interesting
- By Ragne on 24-02-21
-
Spectacles
- By: Sue Perkins
- Narrated by: Sue Perkins
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Spectacles, the hilarious, creative and incredibly moving memoir from much loved comedian, writer and presenter Sue Perkins. When I began writing this book, I went home to see if my mum had kept some of my stuff. What I found was that she hadn't kept some of it. She had kept all of it - every bus ticket, postcard, school report....
-
-
I loved this book
- By Jeannette on 31-01-16
-
On This Day She
- Putting Women Back Into History, One Day at a Time
- By: Tania Hershman, Ailsa Holland, Jo Bell
- Narrated by: Jo Bell, Tania Hershman, Ailsa Hollan, and others
- Length: 12 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The tried and tested 'On This Day in History' format has elevated the stories of many people and their impact on the wider world. However, of those considered noteworthy by the Establishment, just a fraction are women. But this is not the whole story - not by half. Our past is full of influential women many of whom have been unfairly confined to the margins of history. Politicians, troublemakers, explorers, artists, writers, scientists and even the odd murderer; these women have shaped society around the globe.
-
Peas and Queues
- By: Sandi Toksvig
- Narrated by: Sandi Toksvig
- Length: 7 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
How do you get rid of unwanted guests? What do you do if there's a racket in the quiet carriage? How should you eat peas, and behave in queues? How to behave, like how to punctuate, is an aspect of life that many are no longer taught. Thankfully, Sandi Toksvig has come to the rescue with her entertaining guide to modern manners, with characteristic wit and perceptiveness.
-
-
If you love lists you'll love this
- By PPod on 02-12-14
-
Between the Stops
- The View of My Life from the Top of the Number 12 Bus
- By: Sandi Toksvig
- Narrated by: Sandi Toksvig
- Length: 9 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
'Between the Stops is a sort of a memoir, my sort. It's about a bus trip really, because it's my view from the Number 12 bus (mostly top deck, the seat at the front on the right), a double-decker that plies its way from Dulwich, in South East London, where I was living, to where I sometimes work - at the BBC, in the heart of the capital. It's not a sensible way to write a memoir at all, probably, but it's the way things pop into your head as you travel, so it's my way'.
-
-
Marvellous listening
- By cwmbear on 06-11-19
-
Hitler's Canary
- By: Sandi Toksvig
- Narrated by: Sandi Toksvig
- Length: 4 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's April 1940 and German troops are pouring onto the streets of Denmark. 12-year-old Bamse is ordered by his father to keep his head down and stay out of trouble. But Bamse and his daring friend Anton can't resist playing the occasional practical joke on the invading soldiers. When it becomes clear that the trouble isn't just going to pass them by, the people of Denmark decide to take action and Bamse and his eccentric family are about to take part in one of history's most dramatic rescues - smuggling Denmark's Jewish population, across the water to Sweden and safety.
-
-
Wonderful
- By nannapops on 05-11-20
-
Funny You Should Ask...
- Your Questions Answered by the QI Elves
- By: QI Elves, James Harkin, Anne Miller, and others
- Narrated by: John Lloyd, QI Elves, James Rawson, and others
- Length: 4 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Funny You Should Ask... features the QI Elves' answers to 200 questions on topics ranging from goosebumps to gherkins and everything in-between. Generously sprinkled with mind-boggling extra facts from the Elves, this is essential listening for the incurably curious.
-
-
Naturally, it's quite interesting
- By Ragne on 24-02-21
-
Spectacles
- By: Sue Perkins
- Narrated by: Sue Perkins
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Penguin presents the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of Spectacles, the hilarious, creative and incredibly moving memoir from much loved comedian, writer and presenter Sue Perkins. When I began writing this book, I went home to see if my mum had kept some of my stuff. What I found was that she hadn't kept some of it. She had kept all of it - every bus ticket, postcard, school report....
-
-
I loved this book
- By Jeannette on 31-01-16
-
On This Day She
- Putting Women Back Into History, One Day at a Time
- By: Tania Hershman, Ailsa Holland, Jo Bell
- Narrated by: Jo Bell, Tania Hershman, Ailsa Hollan, and others
- Length: 12 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The tried and tested 'On This Day in History' format has elevated the stories of many people and their impact on the wider world. However, of those considered noteworthy by the Establishment, just a fraction are women. But this is not the whole story - not by half. Our past is full of influential women many of whom have been unfairly confined to the margins of history. Politicians, troublemakers, explorers, artists, writers, scientists and even the odd murderer; these women have shaped society around the globe.
-
Valentine Grey
- By: Sandi Toksvig
- Narrated by: Joanna Bending, Peter Kenny
- Length: 10 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
London, 1897. A young girl, Valentine Grey, arrives in England. She's been brought up in the remote and sunny climes of India and finds being forced into corsets and skirts in damp and cold country insufferable. The only bright spot: her exciting cousin, Reggie. Reggie and his lover, Frank, seek out the adventure the clandestine bars and streets of London offer and are happy to include Valentine in their secret. And then comes the Boer War, and Reggie's father volunteers him; the empire must be defended. But it won't be Reggie who dons the volunteer regiment's garb.
-
-
Narration was irritating
- By Anonymous User on 13-07-22
-
Journeys to Impossible Places
- In Life and Every Adventure
- By: Simon Reeve
- Narrated by: Simon Reeve
- Length: 12 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Journeys to Impossible Places continues the story Simon started in his phenomenal Sunday Times best seller Step by Step, which traced the first decades of his life from depressed and unemployed teenager through to his early TV programmes. Now Simon takes us on the epic and thrilling adventures that followed, in beautiful, tricky and downright dangerous corners of the world, as he travelled through the Tropics, to remote paradise islands, jungles dripping with heat and life and on nerve-wracking secret missions.
-
-
Wonderful
- By Liam_H on 23-10-21
-
Bygone Badass Broads
- 52 Forgotten Women Who Changed the World
- By: Mackenzi Lee
- Narrated by: Lucy James
- Length: 4 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Based on Mackenzi Lee's popular weekly Twitter series of the same name, Bygone Badass Broads features 52 remarkable and forgotten trailblazing women from all over the world. With tales of heroism and cunning, in-depth bios and witty storytelling, Bygone Badass Broads gives new life to these historic female pioneers. Starting in the fifth century BC and continuing to the present, the book takes a closer look at bold and inspiring women who dared to step outside the traditional gender roles of their time.
-
How to Be a Victorian
- By: Ruth Goodman
- Narrated by: Patience Tomlinson
- Length: 15 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
We know what life was like for Victoria and Albert. But what was it like for a commoner like you or me? How did it feel to cook with coal and wash with tea leaves? Drink beer for breakfast and clean your teeth with cuttlefish? Dress in whalebone and feed opium to the baby? Surviving everyday life came down to the gritty details, the small necessities and tricks of living. Drawing on Ruth's unique firsthand experience gained from living on a Victorian farm for a year, this book will teach you everything you need to know about 19th-century living.
-
-
If you only like fashion get this book.
- By Mr Christopher on 25-04-20
-
Melted into Air
- By: Sandi Toksvig
- Narrated by: Sandi Toksvig
- Length: 3 hrs and 9 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Frances Angel, drunk and disgruntled, arrives in Italy to attend the I Zingari Art School, leaving behind her dazzling career as a successful theatrical impresario and returning to a distant and painful past. She falls into an eclectic group of performance artists, ex-soldiers and a housewife who really just wants to paint something to match her settee.
-
-
Entertaining and very witty
- By Donna Barry on 11-09-06
-
Animal
- The Autobiography of a Female Body
- By: Sara Pascoe
- Narrated by: Sara Pascoe
- Length: 9 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Take a funny and illuminating tour of the female body with award-winning comedian Sara Pascoe. Women have so much going on, what with boobs and jealousy and menstruating and broodiness and sex and infidelity and pubes and wombs and jobs and memories and emotions and the past and the future and themselves and each other. Here's a book that deals with all of it. Sara Pascoe has joked about femininity and sexuality on stage and screen, but now she has a book to talk about it all for a bit longer.
-
-
A fascinating dopamine-release
- By Sarah on 24-04-16
-
Baggage
- Tales from a Fully Packed Life
- By: Alan Cumming
- Narrated by: Alan Cumming
- Length: 9 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Baggage chronicles the actor’s life in Hollywood and the ways in which work has repeatedly whisked him away from personal calamities to sets and stages around the world. Taking us through the highs and lows of his career, his struggle with mental health, each failed relationship or encounter with a legend (Liza! X-Men! Gore Vidal! Kubrick! Spice Girls!), every bad decision or moment of sensual joy, Cumming shows how every experience - good or bad - has shaped who he is today: a happy, flawed, vulnerable, fearless middle-aged man, with a lot of baggage.
-
-
Fantastic
- By TM on 06-11-21
-
The Diary of a Bookseller
- By: Shaun Bythell
- Narrated by: Robin Laing
- Length: 9 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Shaun Bythell owns The Bookshop, Wigtown - Scotland's largest second-hand bookshop. In these wry and hilarious diaries, Shaun provides an inside look at the trials and tribulations of life in the book trade, from struggles with eccentric customers to wrangles with his own staff. He takes us with him on buying trips to old estates and auction houses, recommends books and evokes the rhythms and charms of small-town life, always with a sharp and sympathetic eye.
-
-
A gentle pleasure
- By Flint on 11-12-17
-
Isabella
- The She-Wolf of France
- By: Alison Weir
- Narrated by: Lisette Lecat
- Length: 21 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Here is the first full-length biography of a much maligned but astonishingly colourful Queen of England. In Newgate Street, in the city of London, stand the meagre ruins of Christ Church. On the same site once stood a royal mausoleum set to rival Westminster Abbey in the 14th century. Among the many crowned heads buried there was Isabella of France, Edward II's queen - one of the most notorious femme fatales in history. But how did she acquire her evil reputation? And is it justified?
-
-
Excellent Historical Work
- By Gregory on 18-02-11
-
The Girl Who Saved the King of Sweden
- By: Jonas Jonasson
- Narrated by: Peter Kenny
- Length: 12 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On 14th June, 2007, the King of Sweden disappears. In 1994 South Africa dismantles six missiles developed during its brief nuclear weapons programme. In 1961 Nombeko Mayeki is born in a Soweto shack. Seemingly destined for a life nasty, brutish and short, her path takes an entirely unpredictable turn. Because really this story is all about the seventh South African missile - the one that was never supposed to have existed. The one that Nombeko knows far too much about.
-
-
if you enjoyed the 100 year old man. ..
- By Billericay Pete on 05-11-15
-
The Girl Explorers
- The Untold Story of the Globetrotting Women Who Trekked, Flew, and Fought Their Way Around the World
- By: Jayne Zanglein
- Narrated by: Kirsten Potter
- Length: 9 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Girl Explorers is the inspirational and untold story of the founding of the Society of Women Geographers - an organization of adventurous female world explorers - and how key members served as early advocates for human rights and paved the way for today's women scientists by scaling mountains, exploring the high seas, flying across the Atlantic, and recording the world through film, sculpture, and literature.
-
-
Inspired
- By jessica on 13-05-21
-
Wonder Women
- 25 Innovators, Inventors, and Trailblazers Who Changed History
- By: Sam Maggs
- Narrated by: Jodelle Ferland
- Length: 6 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In Wonder Women, author Sam Maggs tells the stories of the brilliant, brainy, and totally rad women in history who broke barriers as scientists, engineers, mathematicians, adventurers, and inventors. Also features interviews with real-life women in STEM careers, an extensive bibliography, and a guide to women-centric science and technology organizations - all to show the many ways the geeky girls of today can help to build the future.
-
-
Very informative and well read by Jodelle Ferland
- By CiscoBear on 21-11-20
Summary
Let Sandi Toksvig guide you on an eclectic meander through the calendar, illuminating neglected corners of history to tell tales of the fascinating figures you didn't learn about at school. From popes who gave birth during papal processions, to the inventor of Scrabble, to pioneering civil rights activist Ida B. Wells, who refused to give up her seat on a train decades before Rosa Parks was born. As witty and entertaining as it is instructive, this is an essential companion to each day of the year.
More from the same
What listeners say about Toksvig's Almanac 2021
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Pen Name
- 23-11-20
Fabulous!
A wonderful, witty book. Brilliantly read by the author. Celebrating the remarkable stories of women in history, as well as delightful poems and interesting facts and folklore about our calendar itself. Have recommended to all of my most discerning friends!
12 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- laura
- 12-06-21
A new school history silabus
what we should have learned in school and never got the chance. this brilliant romp through the women of history will leave you feeling inspired and more than a little angry that you've never heard of any of them!
10 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Miri
- 04-06-21
Wonderful and inspiring
Wonderful. I'm off to research womenI'd never heard of and really should have. I can't wait to share it with my daughters.
9 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Catrat
- 30-12-20
Outstanding as always
Another amazing listen, Sandi is so wonderful to listen to and her writing is superb.
7 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Amazon Customer
- 23-04-21
Uplifting and inspiring
I’ve always liked Sandi but I loved this book. It is full of incredible ladies from history and must have taken a huge amount of research to put together. It’s interesting and funny and I can’t recommend it enough.
4 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Missy
- 27-04-21
brilliant!
love this! big fan of Sandi. did not disappoint. full of fun facts, really well written and read. Definitely recommend xx
3 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Georgina
- 23-06-21
Caution
just utterly gorgeous. but listen with caution you will want a pen and paper to note down all the people you want to research
2 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Mrs H V Barnes
- 15-05-21
Kate Greenaway
I enjoyed this very much and learned a great deal. My only quibble is that there was no mention of how Kate Greenaway has been commemorated by the UK’s Library Association by the naming of an award after her. The annual award for illustration in books for children is named in her honour the Kate Greenaway Award and has been won by some very prestigious people.
2 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Mrs. Meryl Williams
- 13-05-21
educative, amusing and inspiring
Sandi has opened my eyes to a world of women and their unsung contribution over time to every walk of life. I feel angry that I knew so little if so many of these women. I am inspired to write.
2 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Falco
- 26-02-21
Brilliant peak into the lives of spectacular women
Beautiful, eye-opening, easy read, bringing brief biographies of impressive women into the light from the corners of history to which they have been unfairly banished. Just the kind of life-enhancing book that can make a lockdown lighter.
2 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Katie J
- 22-01-22
Perfection! 10 stars ✨
I love everything Sandi has written and recommend her books including this one to EVERYONE. She is hilarious and incredibly intelligent. 100% entertaining.
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Rae
- 05-06-22
simply one of my favorite people
Sandi is so witty and wonderful in everything she appears on and I was thrilled to find she'd written books. Even more chuffed to hear her narrating! Feminist fun for every day of the year plus some!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Mcconn 318
- 19-12-21
Brilliantly researched; lovingly delivered
Wonderful learning experience. Was encouraged that someone was working to uncover the untold contributions of so many women. It is also saddening that so many talents were stolen, obscured or just omitted.
Here’s to a future where women are no longer marginalized. Thank you Sandy.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story

- Anonymous User
- 07-05-21
Gripping, fascinating and brilliantly performed!
Treat yourself to this wonderful book. Sandi steers you through the year, and on the way you will encounter women who each in their own way have made the world a better place. Some of them you might have heard of, but most of them not. We are the stories that we tell, and history is the stories that have been told. This book inspires to change history by telling everywomans story. Thank you Sandi ❤️