On a June day, a young woman in a summer dress steps off a Chicago-bound bus into a small midwestern town. She doesn't intend to stay. She is just passing through. Yet her stopping here has a reason and it is part of a story that you will never forget. The time is the 1950s, when life was simpler, people still believed in dreams, and family was, ve...

Howards End is a novel by E. M. Forster which tells a story of social and familial relations in turn-of-the-century England. The main subject matter comprises the difficulties and benefits of relationships between people of divergent outlook, gender, or class; a further concern of the book is the need to accept and link multiple outlooks on the wor...

Mary Anning is probably the world's best-known fossil-hunter. As a little girl, she found a fossilised sea monster, the most important prehistoric discovery of its time. Best-selling author Laurence Anholt turns Mary's fascinating life into a beautiful story, ideal for reading aloud.

Dr. Geoff Bunn presents a journey through 5000 years of our understanding of the most complex thing in the known universe: the brain, in this major ten-part BBC Radio 4 series. In Episode 4, 'Spirits in the Material World', the focus is on Thomas Willis, the 17th century physician after whom the 'Circle of Willis' - the circuit of arteries supplyin...

Nicholas Parsons chairs the devious BBC Radio 4 word game. Paul Merton and Graham Norton talk about how to pass the time if you're stuck in traffic, and Sue Perkins and Liza Tarbuck debate whether bikers should be clad in leathers or lettuce.

A morality tale from BBC Radio 4's 'Afternoon Play' slot, about a struggling chef in Salford. 'The Janitor' was originally broadcast on 6 May 2011. Kevin is struggling to keep his new restaurant afloat in posh Salford Quays. But then Jonno turns up. The boy he was a dad to for a couple of years when he was shacked up with his mother. He couldn't sa...

Jade is so used to being with and agreeing with Vicky, her best friend, that when a tragic accident occurs, she can hardly believe that Vicky's no longer there. But Vicky is not going to let a little thing like being dead stop her from enjoying life to the full. Wherever Jade is, Vicky makes her presence felt.

Tom Ripley detests murder unless it is absolutely necessary. He prefers someone else to do the dirty work. But if he's called on to act there is no one more cool, calculating and clever. In these dramatisations, BBC Radio 4 brings all Patricia Highsmith's Ripley novels together in one thrilling series. In The Talented Mr Ripley, Tom makes a bid for...

This story is both shocking and absorbing, a vivid evocation of the dynamics within relationships between husbands and wives, which are not always happy, and can be violent. An apocalyptic masterpiece, Women in Love was originally refused publication for four years after completion due to its strong content. Describing violent relationships, animal...

Four classic episodes of the popular BBC TV series starring Richard Briers, Felicity Kendal, Penelope Keith, and Paul Eddington. Tom, Barbara, Jerry, and Margo return in more endearingly funny episodes featuring Surbiton's most famous residents. The episodes are The Last Posh Frock, Away from It All, The Green Door, and Our Speaker Today.

Described by Barry Took as 'A kaleidoscope of funny voices, catch phrase and innuendo revolving at breakneck speed and with a complete disregard for logic', 'I'm Sorry I'll Read That Again' pre-dates 'I'm Sorry I Haven't A Clue' and showcases the comic talents of Tim Brooke-Taylor, John Cleese, Graeme Garden, David Hatch, Jo Kendall and Bill Oddie.

Set in late 1930s London, this is the dark and disquieting tale of George Harvey Bone, a drunk. With few prospects and suffering from mental health problems, George spends most of his time discussing theoretical plans and political issues with his bunch of drinking acquaintances. Driven by loneliness and his increasingly-violent schizophrenic delus...

The troubled teenager continues to struggle valiantly against the slings and arrows of growing up and his own family's attempts to scar him for life. In between the ups and downs of his relationship with the divine Pandora and worrying that his genius is going unrecognized, Adrian Mole chronicles the pains and pleasures of a misspent adolescence.

1807: An old passion is reawakened when Captain Sir Thomas Kydd meets Persephone Lockwood, a beautiful and determined admiral's daughter from his past. To win her hand, he must enter the highest echelons of London society. Mixing with aristocracy and royalty brings other responsibilities. The Prince of Wales asks him to take a temporary comand of t...

Random House presents the audiobook edition of Our Kind of Cruelty by Araminta Hall, read by Nick Hendrix and Eleanor Matsuura. Passion. Obsession. Murder. Mike and Verity have a special game. The Crave. They play it to prove what they already know: that Verity loves Mike. That she needs Mike. Even though she's marrying another man. Now Mike knows...

London, 1893. When Cora Seaborne's controlling husband dies, she steps into her new life as a widow with as much relief as sadness. Along with her son Francis - a curious, obsessive boy - she leaves town for Essex, in the hope that fresh air and open space will provide refuge. On arrival, rumours reach them that the mythical Essex Serpent, once sai...

4 weeks, 5 parts, 1 thrilling story. The penultimate part of the gripping murder mystery from bestselling thriller writer James Patterson, with exclusive extra content. Detective Jenna Murphy is drawn further into the mysteries surrounding the killings at No. 7 and just doesn't know who to trust. With 3 possible suspects in mind she takes matters i...

The bleak expanse of Vangmoor was a dark, forbidding place. One victim had been found there, blonde, her face disfigured, her head shorn close to the scalp - killed without motive or mercy. Then a second woman went missing on the moor, and a sense of utter dread gripped the fifty local men who searched for her. Someone watched them in that treacher...

On 7 November 1974, a nanny named Sandra Rivett was bludgeoned to death in a Belgravia basement. A second woman, Veronica, Countess of Lucan, was also attacked. The man named in court as perpetrator of these crimes, Richard John Bingham, 7th Earl of Lucan, disappeared in the early hours of the following morning. The case, solved in the eyes of the...

The events of Pietro Russell's life are told in 26 chapters. From A-Z each chapter is set in a different place and reveals a fragment of his story. As his memories flicker back and forth through time in his search for a resolution to the conflicts of his life, his tory gradually unfolds. . .

Rowan knows he is strange. But dangerous? He didn't mean to scare his sister. In his right mind, he wouldn't hurt a fly. But there's a place he can go where they say they can fix his mind... As the second World War begins, Rowan is diagnosed as schizophrenic and sent away to a hospital where the latest treatments are available. But the treatments a...