Showing results by narrator "Gordon Griffin" in All Categories

Shrewsbury, 1866. Julian Lockyer is an imposing gentleman in his late fifties. Having reserved a room for the night at the Station Hotel, he asks to be called early in the morning because he has a train to catch. Repeated attempts are made to wake him but there is no response. After forcing the door, the horrified hotel staff discover the bloodied corpse but with the knife still in his hand ... could he have killed himself in such a brutal manner?

May 1915. As zeppelin bombs fall on London and with the sinking of the Lusitania, anti-German hysteria reaches fever pitch and attacks on German immigrants surge. Not even the West End of London is immune. Jacob Stein's bespoke tailoring business comes under brutal attack, leaving his safe ransacked, his daughter, Ruth, raped and Jacob dead.

I was the new boy, so they saddled me with the worst jobs.' Rome, AD 71. Against his better judgement, Falco secretly disposes of a decayed corpse for the Emperor Vespasian, then heads for the beautiful Bay of Naples with his best friend Petronius. He conveniently forgets to mention to his companion that this will be no holiday. They have been sent to investigate the murderous members of a failed coup, now sunning themselves in luxurious villas and on fancy yachts.

For years, the Stranger House has stood in the village of Illthwaite, offering refuge to travellers. People like Sam, a brilliant young mathematician, who believes that anything that can't be explained by maths isn't worth explaining. And Miguel, a historian running from a priests' seminary, who sees ghosts. Sam is an experienced young woman, Miguel a 26-year-old virgin.

It is 1919 and Great Britain is still struggling to its feet after the First World War. Progress is slow, even in quiet spots like the village of Broughton Underhill. But moving on is impossible when former police sergeant Herbert Reardon returns to the village, determined to finally find out what happened the night that his daughter was found drowned. However, as Reardon begins to investigate, it becomes clear that secrets still abound.

Rats are always bigger than you expect.' Falco, ancient Rome's hangdog investigator, hates sharing a cell with a rodent - though being bailed by his old mother is almost as embarrassing. His high-born girlfriend can't decide if she wants him, and Titus Caesar's reward for past services is a wet fish. Hoping for a better life, or at least a better apartment, he takes on new clients. On the elegant slopes of the Pincian Hill, three nouveau riche freedmen with two flashy wives are under siege by a clever redhead.

"All the problems I know about are family ones." A frightened child approaches Roman informer Falco, pleading for help. Nobody believes Gaia's story that a relation wants to kill her--and neither does he. Beset by his own family troubles, by his new responsibilities as procurator of the sacred poultry, and by the continuing search for a new partner, Falco turns her away. Immediately he regrets it. Gaia has been selected as the new Vestal Virgin, and when she disappears Falco is officially asked to investigate.

The price for a country. The price for a King. The price for a marriage. The second book in the Tom Neave Trilogy. It's 1647. The king has surrendered to Parliament. Lord Stonehouse, to show his loyalty to Parliament, has named Tom as his successor. But Lord Stonehouse's son, Richard, is also Tom's estranged father and a fervent royalist. If the king reaches a settlement with Parliament, Richard will inherit...

Robinson Crusoe is the classic tale about one man's lust for adventure. Crusoe leaves his parents and hometown for the open sea in the year 1651. But the ocean can be unforgiving, and Crusoe unfortunately learns this the hard way. Through a series of wild events, he ends up shipwrecked on a shore in South America, being forced to salvage what he can in order to survive. Overcoming his despair, Crusoe begins a new life on this island, searching for meaning and eventually finding redemption.

Christopher Fowler's memoir captures life in suburban London as it has rarely been seen: through the eyes of a lonely boy who spends his days between the library and the cinema, devouring novels, comics, and cereal packets - anything that might reveal a story. Caught between an ever-sensible but exhausted mother and a DIY-obsessed father fighting his own demons, Christopher takes refuge in words.

harles II is well established at White Hall Palace, his mistress at hand in rooms over the Holbein bridge, the heads of some of the regicides on public display. London seethes with new energy, freed from the strictures of the protectorate, but many of its inhabitants have lost their livelihoods. One is Thomas Chaloner, a reluctant spy for the feared secretary of state, John Thurloe, and now returned from Holland in desperate need of employment.

In 523 BC, the Persian pharaoh Cambyses dispatched an army across Egypt's western desert to destroy the oracle at Siwa. Legend has it that somewhere in the middle of the Great Dune Sea his army was overwhelmed by a sandstorm and lost forever. Two and a half millennia later, a mutilated corpse is washed up on the banks of the Nile at Luxor, an antiques dealer is savagely murdered in Cairo, and a British archaeologist is found dead at the ancient necropolis of Saqqara.

November 1928. Family and friends have gathered at the Shropshire country home of Penrose Llewellyn to celebrate the retired wealthy businessman's 60th birthday. But the morning after what should have been a convivial supper party, their host is found dead in his bed - and the circumstances look decidedly suspicious.

I was just a freelance hero doing his best in a hard world.' The spirit of adventure calls Falco on a new spying mission for the Emperor Vespasian to the untamed East. He's picking up extra fees from his old friend Thalia the snake dancer as he searches for Sophrona, her lost water organist. With the Chief Spy Anacrites paying his fare, Falco knows anything can go wrong. A dangerous brush with the Brother, the sinister ruler of Nabataean Petra, sends Falco and his girlfriend Helena on a fast camel-ride to Syria.

Sex, Spies and Scandal is the story of John Vassall, a civil servant who was unmasked as a Soviet spy in 1962. Having been photographed in compromising positions while working at the British embassy in Moscow in 1954, Vassall was blackmailed into handing over secrets from the British Admiralty to his Soviet handlers, both in Moscow and in London, for more than seven years.

Paralysis. Stuttering. The shakes. Inability to stand or walk. Temporary blindness or deafness. When strange symptoms like these began appearing in men at casualty clearing stations in 1915, a debate began in army and medical circles as to what it was, what had caused it and what could be done to cure it. But the numbers were never large. Then, in July 1916, with the start of the Somme battle, the incidence of shell shock rocketed.

1917. The Lotus Hotel offers sanctuary for its exclusively female clientele, attracting the cream of London's society. But a dead body found in one of its rooms is hardly good for business, and when it is discovered that the woman was neither a guest nor a member of staff, the Lotus' reputation as a safe haven is cast in doubt. Inspector Marmion and Sergeant Keedy are dispatched to look into the events at the hotel and soon suspect foul play.

In 1945, Gwen Moffat deserted from her post as dispatch rider in the Army and went to live rough in Wales and Cornwall, climbing and living on practically nothing. She hitch-hiked her way around, travelling from Skye to Chamonix and many places in between, with all her possessions on her back. When the money ran out, she worked as a forester, went winkle-picking on the Isle of Skye and did a stint as an artist's model. And always there were the mountains, drawing her away from a "proper" job.

British organised crime has changed beyond all recognition over the last five years. Youth violence, the drug trade and rising levels of gun crime are rarely out of the news. Beginning on the troubled streets of the inner cities, Gang Land takes its readers on a journey up through the underworld hierarchy until it finally reaches the very highest levels, occupied by shadowy ‘Mr Big’ characters.

The Sunday Times top ten best seller. Thousands of lives have been saved by this spaniel. He is a best friend in dog's clothing. An RAF dog with his mossy feet firmly on the ground. A brave dog who has served his colleagues and his country with unstinting devotion. A dog in a million. This is the story of the partnership of Buster and Will, told by Will himself, describing how each came to save the other's life.