Showing results by publisher "Naxos AudioBooks" in Classics

On the eve of his marriage to the beautiful Mercedes, having that very day been made captain of his ship, the young sailor Edmond Dantès is arrested on a charge of treason, trumped up by jealous rivals. Incarcerated for many lonely years in the isolated and terrifying Chateau d'If near Marseille, he meticulously plans his brilliant escape and extraordinary revenge.

Romance and anarchist violence collide in this thought-provoking thriller about the London underworld and the political unrest that seethes there. Set in the late 19th century and written in James’s elegant, impressionistic style, The Princess Casamassima follows the life of bookbinder Hyacinth Robinson. The illegitimate son of a French woman imprisoned for murdering his father, Hyacinth is raised by an impoverished seamstress in a poor area of London.

Abandoned and destitute, Roxana harnesses her faculties to change her fortunes. With her wits, her looks and her loyal maid Amy, she flouts all the rules, transforming herself from penniless widow to celebrated courtesan, dressed in finery and cavorting with princes. Yet, brazen and bejewelled, she becomes more and more trapped by deceit.

In a remote part of 19th-century Afghanistan, two British adventurers pursue their ambition to rule an empire. Using betrayal, threats, and guns, they win the respect of a primitive tribe and become worshipped as gods until one day they draw blood, and the game is up. "The Man Who Would Be King" is an action-packed tale about the pitfalls of colonialism and the temptations and evils of power.

First published in 1924, Beau Geste tells the story of a stolen sapphire and three brothers, who consequently join the Foreign Legion. Michael "Beau" Geste, as his nickname suggests, represents honor and bravery in the midst of deceit and treachery. An action-packed adventure, much of the plot is set in French North Africa, where the Geste brothers have to contend with both a mutiny in their ranks and the attacks of the Touaregs.

For a century Bram Stoker's Dracula has reigned supreme as the undisputed masterpiece of horror writing. We have all grown up under the shadow of the elegant Count, at once an attractive, brutal, and erotic creature of the night.

The Letters of Abelard and Heloise is one of the most extraordinary correspondences in European history. Written in the 12th century, the letters document the love affair between Peter Abelard, a revolutionary philosopher and biblical scholar, and his beautiful and precocious student, Heloise. Eviscerated by his religious opponents and castrated by Heloise’s family, Abelard is haunted by ill fortune, and the star-crossed lovers are forced into separate lives, as monk and nun respectively, with letters being their only form of communication.

The First World War is over. Eric Vernon is on the cusp of adulthood. Tall, bony and awkward, he finds himself torn between a desire to emulate his heroic father, who led a life of quiet sacrifice, and resentment toward his father’s roguish friend Edward Blake, who survived the war only to throw himself into gay life in Berlin.

Lovers of legends know that this is the finest retelling of the story of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table; lovers of literature know that this is the greatest of all 19th-century narrative poems. In Tennyson’s gloriously written tale of swashbuckling feats on and off the jousting field, the honour of maidens, knights, queens and kings is won or lost. Above all, the Quest for the Holy Grail spurs the bravest of knights on to deeds of terrifying foolhardiness and courage.

The ultimate escapist adventure story, The Prisoner of Zenda transports the listener into a bygone era, awash with swashbuckling heroism, cunning plots and courtly love. The popularity of Hope’s tale of intrigue was such that it spawned an entirely new genre known as the ‘Ruritanian romance’. When the King of Ruritania is kidnapped, the onus falls on a British tourist, who bears an uncanny resemblance to the King, to stand in for him and to avert disaster by coming to his rescue.

Ivanhoe has never been superseded as the epitome of chivalric novels. The brave knight comes from the Crusades to claim the Anglo-Saxon princess, Rowena, as his bride. But he becomes caught up in the feud between Prince John and his brother, Richard the Lionheart, who has returned to England incognito.

Carruthers is rescued from a hot summer at a deserted Foreign Office in London, by an out-of-the-blue invitation to join an acquaintance, Davies, on his yacht in the Baltic. He arrives to find not only that he comprises the whole crew, but also that Davies needs his help in a spying mission with enormous stakes.

Robinson Crusoe, the first English novel, was an immediate success when first published in 1719, and has been an internationally popular classic ever since. The compelling tale of a man who put to sea in search of adventure and found himself shipwrecked on a desert island and alone for decades has become a resonant modern myth.

The heroic and honorable Zorro, an ace with a whip and a demon with a sword, fights for the poor and oppressed - a far cry from the effete young aristocrat Don Diego, who spends his days reading poetry and dreaming of the beautiful Lolita Pulido. When Lolita's family faces ruin and accusations of treason, Zorro must step in to save her family and her honor. But who is this masked caballero?

Somewhere in Africa, a tiny, primitive tribe, the Amahaggers, live secretly amongst the debris of a lost Egyptian civilization, ruled by the beautiful semi-goddess Ayesha, or She-who-must-be-obeyed. Ludwig Horace Holly, a Cambridge academic, is reluctantly drawn into plans for a voyage in search of this legendary queen. With his adopted son, Leo, he sets out on a brave journey, following a trail of clues. Shipwrecked and captured by cannibals, their voyage soon turns into a nightmare.

With a horse between his thighs and a weapon in his grip, the dashing Brigadier Etienne Gerard, Colonel of the Hussars of Conflans, gallops through the Napoleonic campaigns on secret missions for his beloved Emperor and his country. He encounters danger and hair-breadth escapes but never loses his bravado, his eye for a pretty girl, his boastfulness, or his enormous vanity. Gerard is Conan Doyle’s most lovable character.

In a fog-wreathed London, the respected Dr Jekyll’s experiments on the dual nature of man unleash a brute that feels no moral restraint or remorse. Although excited by this freedom, Jekyll discovers that he is unable to control the power of his vicious alter ego and is faced with shameful discovery or ignominious death.

Set in the days of the British Raj, Kipling's finest novel is the exciting and touching tale of an Irish orphan-boy who has lived free in the streets of Lahore before setting out, with a Tibetan Lama, on a spiritual quest. Kim later enrols in the Indian Service and simultaneously embarks on an espionage mission of supreme importance.

Somewhere in Africa, a tiny, primitive tribe, the Amahaggers, live secretly amongst the debris of a lost Egyptian civilization, ruled by the beautiful semi-goddess Ayesha, or She-who-must-be-obeyed. Ludwig Horace Holly, a Cambridge academic, is reluctantly drawn into plans for a voyage in search of this legendary queen. With his adopted son, Leo, he sets out on a brave journey, following a trail of clues. Shipwrecked and captured by cannibals, their voyage soon turns into a nightmare.

After rejecting the life his father has laid out for him, Frank Osbaldistone is sent to the North of England to live with his Uncle, where he is to repent his sins. However, when his father's wealth and reputation are threatened, he is drawn to the Scottish Highlands, where he must retrieve a set of stolen documents. It is here that he is pulled into a number of skirmishes relating to the Jacobite uprising of 1715, and where his path frequently crosses with the mysterious maverick outlaw known as Rob Roy....