Showing results by narrator "Robin Sachs" in All Categories

Acquired Tastes is a celebration of life's extravagances. It explores an aspect of human nature that, although dormant in hard economic times, is capable of erupting with the hint of good fortune and the drop of a credit card. It samples the luxuries of Havana cigars, Parisian hotels, bespoke London tailoring, and handmade shoes; discusses the proper color for a stretch limousine; and weighs the cost versus the pleasure of keeping a mistress.

For the first time in decades, here, in a single volume, is a fresh look at the fabled Tudor dynasty, comprising some of the most enigmatic figures ever to rule a country. Acclaimed historian G. J. Meyer reveals the flesh-and-bone reality in all its wild excess.

What is it like to be a swift, flying at over one hundred kilometres an hour? Or a kiwi, plodding flightlessly among the humid undergrowth in the pitch dark of a New Zealand night? And what is going on inside the head of a nightingale as it sings, and how does its brain improvise? Bird Sense addresses questions like these and many more, by describing the senses of birds that enable them to interpret their environment and to interact with each other.

On a summer day in 1914, a nineteen-year-old Serbian nationalist gunned down Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo. While the world slumbered, monumental forces were shaken. In less than a month, a combination of ambition, deceit, fear, jealousy, missed opportunities, and miscalculation sent Austro-Hungarian troops marching into Serbia, German troops streaming toward Paris, and a vast Russian army into war, with England as its ally. As crowds cheered their armies on, no one could guess what lay ahead in the First World War.

In Lombard Street, the money market is pictured as it really was in 1850-1870 and as Bagehot saw it with philosophic eyes.  

One of the great minds of the 20th century, Bertrand Russell explored philosophy, mathematics, and a variety of other intellectual, political, historical, and social issues in his lifetime. In this indispensable and easily accessible guide, drawn from his books and essays, readers will find Russell’s fundamental principles, from objectivity to ontological arguments to logical certainty, in his own words. Russell also explored topics such as war, evil, and the purpose and goal of human existence.

Five friends. One year. All bets are off. Reading, 2009. It may not be Vegas, but for Nick, Doug, Vijay, Alan and Simon, it's as good as they're going to get. Each in their 40s, and beset by anxieties, flaws and frustrations, they meet monthly in each other's houses for a 'friendly' game of poker, enabling Doug to show off his new-minted wealth, Simon to insist on serving only red wine and goats' cheese and Nick - swimming in a cocktail of envy, fear, bravado and disappointment - to make increasingly desperate attempts to bring an end to his interminable losing streak.

On a summer's day in June 1761, astronomers all over the world cast their eyes to the sky to witness a rare astronomical event: the transit of Venus across the face of the sun. It was one of the most important collaborations of scientific history, as by racing to different points around the world and comparing results, these men hoped to unlock the key to one of the most pressing questions of the Enlightenment: the distance between the Earth and the sun, which would allow them to calculate the dimensions of our solar system.

Afghanistan's strategically significant lands have long been fought over by foreign invaders. Today, as yet another generation risks life and limb in this inhospitable territory, an ever-rising death toll puts back under the spotlight the way the modern war in Afghanistan is being run, and demands answers. Drawing on interviews with Afghan politicians, businessmen and ordinary people, British, American and European diplomats and soldiers, Sandy Gall addresses the challenges that face those now fighting on the most dangerous frontier in the world.

A new compilation of Bram Stoker’s cult vampire novels for the 100th anniversary of his death. This delightful new compilation of Bram Stoker's cult classics will be sure to satisfy any lover of vampire fiction, from Dracula to Twilight. All three novels were published after Dracula debuted in 1897. They flirt with vampirism, horror, and human folly in the best Gothic tradition - all attempts to duplicate Stoker's only success.

In 1990—after the Iron Curtain has lifted but before East and West Germany become one—an uneasy truce exists between the spy agencies of Berlin’s two halves. As the governments of the divided state negotiate reunification, espionage continues quietly. That calm is about to explode. An English agent, on a routine collection of microfilm on the other side of Checkpoint Charlie, is arrested for spying, and all hell threatens to break loose.

George R. R. Martin's New York Times best-selling epic fantasy book series, A Song of Ice and Fire, and the HBO television show adapted from it, have earned critical acclaim and inspired fanatic devotion. This book delves into the many philosophical questions that arise in this complex, character-driven series, including: Is it right for a "good" king to usurp the throne of a "bad" one and murder his family? How far should you go to protect your family and its secrets?

As president of the World Bank for a decade, James Wolfensohn tackled world poverty with a passion and energy that made him a uniquely important figure in a fundamental arena of change. Using a lifetime of experience in the banking sector, he carved a distinct path in Asia, Africa, Latin America, and Europe for the institution that serves as the major lender to the world's poor.

The return of the shifter Geth!In the wake of the Last War, a new king has risen and seeks to unite the newly formed goblin kingdom of Darguun under his rule. He seeks an ancient scepter, a symbol under which to unite his people and hires Geth, a shifter who owns one of the trio of artifacts to which the scepter once belonged, to find it. But will the artifact do what the Darguul king needs it to?

Father Pat Connor knows marriages. Having presided over more than two hundred weddings and conducted pre-marriage and marriage counseling for more than forty years, he’s something of an expert. And now he is sharing his wealth of experience with women everywhere on the subject of Whom Not to Marry.

With the premiere of two new film versions of the Snow White tale, Blackstone enters the fray with its own adult, edgy, and not altogether serious full-cast exposé of fairy-taledom. At last it can be told! Was Snow White really as pure as the driven snow? Did her allegedly wicked stepmother get a bum rap from the Grimm brothers? What went on behind the closed Dutch doors of the dwarves’ cottage? How many handsome princes does it take to screw in a light bulb?

Geth and his allies have fled the city of Rhukaan Draal, after failing to dethrone Lhesh Tariic, and reach out to the Kech Volaar for help. There they seek information on how to destroy the enigmatic Rod of Kings by searching for the secret doom of a third goblin artifact, the Shield of Nobles. Meanwhile, imprisoned, Ashi d’Deneith seeks a chink in Tariic’s armor. The exciting conclusion to the Legacy of Dhakaan!

Rare Stamps offers a revealing insight into the life of an actor and the making of a man. Beginning with an Academy Award nomination for Billy Budd in 1962, Terence Stamp was called "the most beautiful man alive," only to be discarded at the end of the decade with the words "we're looking for a younger Terence Stamp." Soul searching, he traveled alone through India, staying at the Taj Mahal Hotel while studying above a public lavatory with a chain-smoking guru, only to wind up back in London and broke by 1984.

In spring 1945, as the Russians moved on Berlin and it became clear the Nazi cause was lost, Adolf Hitler assured his most trusted henchmen that even if he were to die, "the seed of National Socialism will grow again one day [in]…a radiant rebirth." Several times after the war, the distinguished author Peter Wyden, himself a victim of the Nazis, returned to Germany to discover, to his dismay, that Hitler's prediction was all too true. In this unsettling audiobook, Wyden documents the reality that the "Hitler virus" is still very much alive.

Three young women have been brutally assaulted and murdered in the city of Philadelphia. Lieutenant William Fogarty, a time-toughened cop hardened by personal tragedy, is shocked by the brutality of the crimes. His only lead comes from medical examiner Josef Tanaka. Half Japanese and half American, Tanaka, a skilled practitioner of the martial arts, claims to recognize the method used in the attacks: a karate strike known as nukite, or spear hand. Fogarty has nowhere else to turn.