Showing results by narrator "Alison Larkin" in All Categories

In 2011, Christine Toomey met an unforgettable group of Tibetan Buddhist nuns. After hearing their stories - of prison, extreme hardship, and ultimately fleeing into exile - she resolved to learn more about the private, courageous women of Buddhism: who they are, their experience of suffering, what motivates them to seek enlightenment, and what stands in their way. Toomey's quest took on even greater urgency with the sudden deaths of her father and mother and her own search for healing wisdom in the aftermath of loss.

In this delightful double-bill of Agatha Christie's first two novels, award winning narrator/comedienne Alison Larkin and TV star James Warwick bring The Secret Adversary and The Mysterious Affair at Styles to sparkling new life.

Based on the theme "The Power of Reading", the sixth year of the Jane Austen Literacy Foundation short story writing competition attracted a higher standard of entries than ever before–any of the top 12 stories could have been a winner!

A century after a devastating volcanic eruption forced Iceland's inhabitants to abandon its shores, the island has become enshrouded in legend. But the truth behind the legends is mechanical, not magical - and the mystery of the island a matter of life and death for a community of women who once spilled noble blood to secure their freedom. Five years ago, Annika unwittingly endangered that secret, but her sister Källa took the blame and was exiled. Now Annika serves on an airship, searching for her sister.

Walking through London's West End after a night at the theater, Amory Ames and her husband Milo run into some old friends: wealthy investor and former actor Gerard Holloway and his wife, Georgina. When Holloway invites them to the dress rehearsal of the new play he's directing, Amory readily accepts. However, Amory is shocked to learn that Holloway has cast his mistress, Flora Bell, in the lead role. Furthermore, the casual invitation is not what it seems - he admits to Amory and Milo that Flora has been receiving threatening letters, and he needs their help in finding the mysterious sender.

Fungi can appear anywhere, from desert dunes to frozen tundra. They can invade our bodies and live between our toes or our floorboards. They are unwelcome intruders or vastly expensive treats, and symbols of both death and eternal life. But despite their familiar presence, there’s still much to learn about the eruption, growth, and decay of their secret interconnected world. From fields, feasts, and fairy rings to death caps, puffballs, and ambrosia beetles, this is an intoxicating journey into the life of an extraordinary organism, one that we have barely begun to understand.

For lovely young Miss Patricia Patterson, life seemed a delightful dream - until the specter of her guardian, Lord Charles Gaunt, cast a shadow over her carefree days of idleness and enchanting evenings of dazzling balls and delicious flirtations. Lord Charles demanded she act the part of a proper and perfectly boring young miss. Even worse, he insisted she devote her waking hours to cultivating her mind rather than captivating her swarm of admirers. Thus, the battle was joined - between the handsome, arrogant aristocrat who had Patricia in his lawful power, and Patricia, who vowed to turn this hateful tyrant into her lovelorn slave.

Dagmar Marie Sophie is a poverty-stricken Danish princess whose annoying royal cousin is about to have her stuffed away in a convent. When she finds a wounded man unconscious in her garden, she sees a way out of her desperate situation. Leopold Ernst George Mortimer, seventh earl of March and a spy in the service of the king, finds himself on the wrong end of a saber and left for dead. He wakes up not remembering what happened - and in the care of a beautiful woman who says she is his wife.

From the picturesque valleys of Wales to the stunning Italian island of Sardinia, Welsh-Italian cook Michela Chiappa visits 100-year-olds, longevity experts, and her own long-lived family in order to unravel the secrets of their success. It's a warm and enchanting journey that mixes food, lifestyle, and science in order to come up with a surprising recipe for a long and healthy life that any one of us could achieve.

After a duke's betrayal, the resilient Sarah Forrester reinvents herself as the Golden Lady: Society's leading light, the beautiful and witty life of the party. It's all a facade of course - one that protects her from another intimate disloyalty. When her old friend, Lieutenant Jackson Fletcher, returns to London, he is determined to rediscover the true and trusting Sarah he once knew. It'll take more than a kiss and a promise. It might even call for an innocent and necessary deception.

It's 2015, and Patricia Cowan is very old. "Confused today," read the notes clipped to the end of her bed. She forgets things she should know - what year it is, major events in the lives of her children. But she remembers things that don't seem possible. She remembers marrying Mark and having four children. And she remembers not marrying Mark and raising three children with Bee instead.

As an animal-talent fairy, there’s nothing Beck likes better than speaking Bird, or Chipmunk. So when a conflict breaks out between the hummingbirds and the chipmunks, she steps forward to act as a mediator, but nothing she says seems to help. Will Beck be able to bring peace to the animals?...

England, 1819. The earl of Amhurst has returned to his estate in search of a wife and, more importantly, an heir. Simon Devere isn't interested in some comely, simpering creature. A beautiful woman brings only heartbreak and ruin, and Simon's disfigured visage is proof enough of that. No, he wants a wife who is unattractive and undesirable - and the homelier, the better.

Meet Custard, Digger, Greta, Will, and Whisper—five rabbit friends who roam the wooded hillsides of Massachusetts and discover that true wisdom begins with listening. When an unexpected friendship challenges what they think they know, the rabbits learn the power of shared leadership, cooperation, and learning from someone very different from themselves.

Lady Catherine "Cat" Sinclair must rescue her impoverished family by marrying a wealthy suitor. But there is one problem: she knows nothing of seduction. But Thomas Montrose - a rake who has long set the town ablaze with his passion - may be able to help. Can Cat persuade him to give her a few scandalous lessons? But he may get schooled....

Anxious to secure his own success at the glittering court of Henry VIII, heiress Tamsin Lodge’s ambitious guardian obtains her a position as maid of honor to young Princess Mary Tudor. Tamsin soon comes to love the neglected child, but in the Tudor court, not even a princess is secure. Mary’s father is besotted with the lovely Anne Boleyn, and the girl’s future has grown perilous. Plotting to be Mary’s eyes and ears, Tamsin joins Anne’s service, but the handsome silk worker who is her co-conspirator may be her undoing.

Meet Thor, a young Triceratops with an extraordinary gift: dreams of a future where dinosaurs are gone—and humans must learn to care for the planet they inherit. At first, these visions frighten him. Then Thor realizes his dreams may help shape a kinder, more hopeful world.

Alice in Wonderland and Jabberwocky come alive in a fresh new and highly accessible way in this in this brilliant recording by acclaimed comedienne Alison Larkin and Audie-award-winning narrator Derek Perkins. The recordings are followed by a short excerpt from The Life and Letters of Lewis Carroll, by Carroll's nephew, Stuart Dodgson Collingwood.

Shy, young heiress Lady Lily Rutherford is in no hurry to marry. She dreams of true love and a real courtship. But when disaster strikes, she finds herself facing a scandal-forced marriage to her rescuer, Edward Galbraith, a well-known rake. Despite his reputation, Lily is drawn to the handsome Galbraith. In the gamble of her life, she agrees to marry him, hoping to turn a convenient marriage into a love match. As heir to a title, Galbraith knows he must wed, so a convenient marriage suits him perfectly. But there is a darkness in his past.

Beautiful Lady Anne Stafford, lady-in-waiting to Queen Catherine of Aragon, is torn between her love for her husband, George, Lord Hastings...and the king’s boon companion, the attentive Sir William Compton. But when King Henry VIII, amorous as always, joins the men clustering around her, Anne realizes she has become perilously enmeshed in the intrigues of the court. Will she be forced to decide between the two men she desires - and the one she doesn’t?