Showing results by narrator "Malk Williams" in All Categories

DI Tudor Manx was hoping for a quiet life. But his hopes are dashed when there's a gruesome find - a mutilated body, crucified to the bow of a fishing boat. Is this a message or a macabre premonition? Manx's past still haunts him - the disappearance of his younger sister, Miriam: a cold case that remains unsolved. Can he work it all out before the body count rises?

Growing up poor, Yasmine vowed she would always protect her little brother from harm. She broke her promise on the day she left home, abandoning Fadi to his life in the Stockholm slums. Now, years later, Yasmine still carries the guilt of leaving him behind. Then she hears a rumour that he has been killed by a US drone in Syria. What happened to turn her brother into one of the CIA's most wanted men? The answer will shock her. It will shock you, too.

In 1994 Marko Novak's world is torn apart by the death of his best friend - Kemal Lekic, a soldier in the Bosnian war. After the funeral Marko flees to England, hoping to put his broken homeland behind him. In 2004 human rights researcher Anya Teal is following a tenuous lead in the hunt for a Bosnian man with blood on his hands. What no one can know is that a disaster as destructive as war is approaching...a disaster that will connect the fates of Marko and Anya across the years and continents.

With his mother missing and his father dead, 12-year-old Flip's new home is a remote storm-tossed Dutch island. Menaced by the local bullies and with a shadowy mute girl as his only friend, Flip tries to adapt to life on his uncle's farm - but his whole life changes when a sunken transport ship leaves a drowning stallion floundering in the waves.

Nicky has always known Russell was rich, but he has no idea how astronomically rich Russell is until his friend drops dead, on his 50th birthday, in his San Francisco mansion, with Nicky as the only witness. For forty years the two men have kept up their friendship, with Russell's birthday offering him an annual opportunity to remind Nicky of how much more successful Russell is, and how much further he has come since their English suburban childhood.

Alfraed of Norton is given the task of protecting the Empress Matilda back to the emperor, her husband. He and his men have to fight enemies, bandits and treachery from within as they battle thorough an empire that is a nest of treachery and political ambition. While princes play for thrones, Alfraed must keep the empress safe.

Lucretius' poem On the Nature of Things combines a scientific and philosophical treatise with some of the greatest poetry ever written. With intense moral fervour he demonstrates to humanity that in death there is nothing to fear since the soul is mortal, and the world and everything in it is governed by the mechanical laws of nature and not by gods; and that by believing this men can live in peace of mind and happiness. He bases this on the atomic theory expounded by the Greek philosopher Epicurus, and continues with an examination of sensation, sex, cosmology, meteorology, and geology.

King Henry is dead and Stephen of Blois claims the throne of England and the Dukedom of Normandy. The Earl of Cleveland returns to England to fight for the heirs of Henry. When King David and his Scottish army capture most of northern England it is only Alfraed who holds out against him. Set in the early years of the Anarchy this is a fast moving book filled with battles and intrigue.

There are plots to invade England and Normandy. There are assassination attempts and the only man who can stop all of these is the Earl of Cleveland. Moving from Scotland to Normandy and back again this is a fast moving novel set in the months before the civil war in England and Normandy begins.

The Analects are a collection of Confucius’s sayings brought together by his pupils shortly after his death in 497 BC. Together they express a philosophy, or a moral code, by which Confucius, one of the most humane thinkers of all time, believed everyone should live. Upholding the ideals of wisdom, self-knowledge, courage and love of one’s fellow man, he argued that the pursuit of virtue should be every individual’s supreme goal.

The war in Gaul is over. The rebels are defeated. Now the battle for Rome has begun.

46 BC. Pompey is dead, Egypt is settled and Rome is controlled by the loyal Marcus Antonius. As the new year looms, Rome's greatest general and dictator Julius Caesar moves precipitously to take on the last stronghold of the rebel faction: Africa. Crossing against all advice in the middle of winter, with minimal forces and little forward planning, the campaign almost dies before it begins, legions scattered across the sea by vicious storms, the general putting ashore with just a single legion and his most trusted veteran commander: Marcus Falerius Fronto.  

Winter, 48 BC. Caesar and his small force are trapped in the Egyptian city of Alexandria. Caught up in the dynastic struggles of the House of Ptolemy, the consul has sided with the clever and ruthless Queen Cleopatra. Her brother and fellow monarch, Ptolemy XIII, languishes in the palace, a hostage of Caesar's, while a huge army under the command of the Egyptian General Achillas closes on the city to free him. 

The Emperor Henry of the Holy Roman Empire is dying, and his wife, the Empress Matilda, is in danger from those who would use her to gain the title and the power. King Henry of England sends Alfraed of Norton to rescue her and avoid a war. With enemies from France, Flanders and the empire, as well as Norman traitors, the handful of Northern Knights have to fight across Europe and back. A fast-moving novel that moves from Germany to the Scottish borders in the turbulent times of the early 12th century, when friends could become foes overnight.

It is 48 BC, and Caesar is master of Rome, but Pompey is at large in the huge recruiting grounds of the east with a core of powerful officers, nominally representing the senate in absentia. As the general deals with matters in the city, his army gathers at the coast, waiting to cross the sea and fight that worst of all conflicts: civil war.

No disease sparked as much dread in the 18th century as smallpox. The virus killed millions across the globe, carrying off one in every five victims and disfiguring survivors with tell-tale pitted scars. But one mysterious method offered hope: inoculation, the practice of piercing the skin to insert a drop of infected matter and induce a mild case of smallpox. Those inoculated safely were protected from the ‘Speckled Monster’ and stayed immune for life. Only one problem remained: convincing people to accept the treatment.

More than 2,500 years ago, a Chinese commander, Master Sun—or Sun-tzu—collected together his precepts on generalship to form the kernel of one of the most famous military treatises of all time. Our understanding of strategic warfare that comes out of his writings has yet to be surpassed. Eschewing conventional courage and military might as primary deciding factors, The Art of War is characterised by a profoundly enlightened emphasis on moderation, imagination, good morale and scrupulous forward planning.

With the Empress Matilda about to marry the Count of Anjou, Alfraed is thrown into a world of intrigue and treachery as he tries to hold on to the north with depleted numbers of warriors. When he succeeds he finds that he is punished and sent to the east by King Henry and his family held hostage in the Tower of London. He finds himself embroiled in plots and campaigns there where he finally serves with his father's old comrades: the Varangian Guards. After a journey home which is fraught with danger he finally rescues his family and returns to his beloved castle.

Enthralled by his own exquisite portrait, Dorian Gray exchanges his soul for eternal youth and beauty. Influenced by his friend Lord Henry Wotton, he is drawn into a corrupt double life; indulging his desires in secret while remaining a gentleman in the eyes of polite society. Only his portrait bears the traces of his decadence.

The Great Network is a place of drones and androids, maintenance spiders and Station Angels. The place of the thousand gates, where sentient trains crisscross the galaxy in a heartbeat. Zen Starling is a petty thief from Thunder City. So when mysterious stranger Raven sends Zen on a mission to infiltrate the emperor's train, he jumps at the chance to cross the galaxy in a heartbeat. But the Great Network is a dangerous place....