Showing results by narrator "Christian Rodska" in All Categories

After the Iraq War, when the reputation of Britain's spooks hit an all-time low, John le Carré's intellectual hero George Smiley came to be seen as the perfect spy, a man who would never allow intelligence to be misused for political purposes. Le Carré had revealed shortly before that the model for Smiley was the author and MI5 officer John Bingham, the 7th Baron Clanmorris. Michael Jago's brilliant account of Bingham's life is the story of an intelligence officer who had a deep influence on le Carré, then a junior colleague in MI5.

Robin Glendinning's BBC Radio 4 full-cast black comedy telling the story of a real mystery. Originally broadcast in the ‘Saturday Play’ slot on 11 July 2009. In 1946, the Duke of Windsor (formerly Edward VIII) and his wife (formerly Wallis Simpson) paid a visit to Britain, hoping to secure...

In the high summer of AD 77, Marcus Didius Falco is beset by personal problems. Newly bereaved and facing unexpected upheavals, it is a relief for him to consider someone else’s misfortunes. A middle-aged couple who supplied statues to his father, Geminus, have disappeared. They had a feud with a bunch of notorious freedmen, the Claudii, who live rough in the pestilential Pontine Marshes, terrorising the neighbourhood.

In Masters and Commanders Andrew Roberts describes how four titanic figures shaped the grand strategy of the West during the Second World War. The book attempts to give answers to key questions regarding allied strategy based on the personalities and relationships between two political masters - Winston Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt - and the military commanders of their armed forces - the Chief of the Imperial General Staff, General Sir Alan Brooke, and the US Army Chief of Staff, General George C. Marshall.

Against the odds, former steel worker Harry Perkins has led the Labour Party to a stunning victory. His manifesto includes the removal of American bases, public control of finance and the dismantling of media empires. The Establishment is appalled. Something must be done. As MI5 conspires with the City and the press barons to bring Perkins down, he finds himself caught up in a no-holds-barred battle for survival.

Unputdownable naval action from the master of the sea story - 'In Stockwin's hands the sea story will continue to entrance readers across the world' Guardian 1807. Captain Sir Thomas Kydd's famous sea action aboard Tyger has snatched his reputation from ignominy. He is the hero of the hour. But...

By 1941, after serving in North Africa and Crete, Guy Crouchback has lost his Halberdier idealism. A desk job in London gives him the chance of reconciliation with his former wife. Then, in Yugoslavia, as a liaison officer with the partisans, Crouch becomes finally and fully aware of the...

Brought to you by Penguin. Five lives overlap across two centuries. School teacher Geoffrey’s war takes him to the brink of sanity; Billy’s fortitude lifts him from the Victorian slums in London; Elena and Jeanne interrogate the notion of the soul, from opposite points of view, a century...

When the middle-class Empsons move from London to picturesque Winterleaf Gunner, they find themselves totally unprepared for country life - and utterly reliant on Winston. Handyman, village poacher, scholar, gentleman romantic and out-and-out rogue, Winston transforms their lives, fixing up their dilapidated house, introducing them to the works of Kingsley Amis - and giving Nancy a lesson in love.

An Admiralty summons to England cuts short Thomas Kydd's service in the turquoise waters of the Caribbean. While the crew of L'Aurore can look forward to liberty and prize money, a shadow hangs over their captain: the impending court martial of his one-time commander, Commodore Popham, who led a...

The Hotel Southern Savoy has become the reluctant host to two corpses on a single night - and homicide inspector Scobie Malone knows this investigation will be a nightmare from the moment he arrives. The first victim was the wife of the American ambassador, a slaying that will certainly have international repercussions - and worse, if the lady's dark secrets are ever revealed. But it's the second murder that strikes straight at Malone's heart. The dead man was the husband of a woman from Malone's past, a brief love long over but never forgotten.

This is the story of a rifleman's resourcefulness in a single-handed war against the forces of Napoleon. Separated from his regiment, he uses a band of undisciplined Portuguese guerrillas to battle his way back to his own lines.

Nottingham Bumstead – otherwise known as Snotty – may be small and weedy, but his life is fun because he lives ALONE! Without parents to nag him his house is his own, with a football pitch in the living room and juke boxes in the bedroom.Of course there are one or two hitches – like what to do when the money for milkshakes and pizzas runs out – but as long as he can pay the bills and keep out the neighbours, then he can keep his home just as he likes!

Afghanistan, Summer 2006. This is war. Afghanistan in the summer of 2006. In blazing heat in remote outposts the 3 Para battlegroup is pitted against a stubborn enemy who keep on coming. Until now, the full story of what happened there has not been told. This is it. In April 2006, the elite 3...

When Elizabeth Price engages private detective Roland ‘Orlando’ Gibbons to find out the truth about her husband’s suspected affair, she unwittingly sets off a chain of correspondence that reunites four formerly close-knit couples. They all live just a few suburban streets away from each other, they are all still married, so how – and why – did they become so estranged? In a series of letters, each protagonist is far more self-revealing than they would ever be in person.

THE GLORY DAYS OF GAZZA: IN HIS OWN WORDS 'Gascoigne the player deserves to be remembered. And Gazza the book deserves to be read' Tom Watt, Mail on Sunday 'A rattlingly good read' John Rawling, Guardian 'A very honest book' Daily Telegraph 'Hilarious, terrifying and touching' Daily Express...

The time has come for Scobie Malone to leave the homicide and serial offenders unit of the Sydney police, and his last investigation could be the most bizarre case ever to cross his desk. Called in when a housemaid is found dead in a dot-com millionaire's penthouse, Malone suspects he's dealing with a kidnapping gone wrong. In fact, it couldn't have gone more wrong.

This is the novel in which SAS Sergeant Geordie Sharp, always a loner and a maverick, finally goes over the edge. He is sent to Moscow to lead a team training the Russian Protection Service, a division of the former KGB, to acquire new anti-terrorist skills. The Russian Mafia is threatening to take control of the country, and Geordie learns, too, of their massive new presence in London.

In Greenmantle, Richard Hannay, hero of The 39 Steps, travels across war-torn Europe in search of a German plot and an Islamic messiah. He is joined by three more of Buchan's heroes: Peter Pienaar, the old Boer Scout; John S. Blenkiron, the American determined to fight the Kaiser; and Sandy Arbuthnot. The intrepid four move in disguise through Germany to Constantinople and the Russian border to face their enemies.

SAS Sergeant Geordie Sharp is required to undertake two top-secret missions in the full knowledge that if things go wrong, the authorities will deny all involvement. In the first mission he is to serve as a commander of a hit team on a Black, or 100% non-attributable operation assigned to the SAW, the Regiment's ultra-secret Subversive Action Wing. His target is an Iraqi who defected to Libya after the Gulf War. The aim is to kill him and leave no clue to the identity or origin of the assassins.