Showing results by publisher "Hodder & Stoughton" in All Categories

Dan 'Spider' Shepherd is used to putting his life on the line - for his friends and for his job with MI5. So when one of his former apprentices is kidnapped in the badlands of Pakistan, Shepherd doesn't hesitate to join a rescue mission.But when the plan goes horribly wrong, Shepherd, ends up in the hands of al-Qaeda terrorists. His SAS training is of little help as his captors beat and torture him. Shepherd's MI5 controller, Charlotte Button, is determined to get her man out of harm's way, but to do that she's going to have to break all the rules.

The Dragonbone Chair: Booktrack Edition adds an immersive musical soundtrack to your audiobook listening experience! Kitchen-boy Simon is bored, restless and 14 years old - a dangerous combination. It seems, however, that his life has just taken a turn for the better when he's apprenticed to his castle's resident wizard. As Simon's learning to read and write under Doctor Morgenes' tutelage, forces greater than he could possibly imagine are gathering: forces which will change Simon's life - and his world - forever.

The author of the best-selling Empire sequence continues his new epic of the uprising of the Batavi in AD 88. The Rhine frontier has exploded into all-out war. Summoned back to their homeland by their new leader, Kivilaz, the Batavi cohorts, so recently proud soldiers of Rome, find their lands transformed. All Roman influences have vanished after a battle in which two legions were humbled by the rebels, then chased away to lick their wounds in their fortress, the Old Camp.

1264. Storm clouds are gathering as Simon de Montfort and the barons of the realm challenge the power of Henry III. The barons demand reform; the crown demands obedience. England is on the brink of civil war. Adam de Norton, a young squire devoted to the virtues of chivalry, longs only to be knighted, and to win back his father's lands. Then a bloody hunting accident leaves him with a new master: the devilish Sir Robert de Dunstanville, who does not hesitate to use the blackest stratagems in pursuit of victory.

A sparkling celebration of our much-loved Queen Elizabeth II including special writings and illuminating insights around key moments in her 70-year reign, introduced and edited by Joanna Lumley. In 2022 Queen Elizabeth II celebrated seventy years as Queen and Head of the Commonwealth. She was Britain's longest reigning monarch and the very first to celebrate a Platinum Jubilee. A Queen For All Seasons, edited and introduced by Joanna Lumley, is a perceptive, touching and engaging tribute to this unique woman.

In this completely revised and updated edition of international best seller Watching the English, anthropologist Kate Fox takes a revealing look at the quirks, habits and foibles of the English people. Now with new survey data to add weight to her original fieldwork findings, and more extensive field-research and experiments to back up earlier observations, Kate Fox has deciphered yet more enigmatic behaviour codes, adding new rules, new subcultures, new chapters and more than 100 updates.

Jennifer Shahade, a two-time US Women's Chess Champion, spent her teens and twenties travelling the world playing chess. Tournaments have taken her from Istanbul to Moscow, and introduced her to players from Zambia to China. In this ultra male-dominated sport, Jennifer found shocking sexism, as well as an incredible history of the top female players that has often been ignored. But she also found friendships, feminism and hope. Through her own story, as well as in-depth profiles of pioneers of the game, Jennifer invites us into the extremely competitive world of chess.

It's summer in Memphis. The sweat is sticking to Rudy Baylor's shirt and creditors are nipping at his heels. Once he had aspirations of breezing through law school and punching his ticket to the good life. Now he doesn't have a job or a prayer-except for one: an insurance dispute that leaves a family devastated and opens the door for a lawsuit, if Rudy can find a way to file it. By the time Rudy gets to court, a heavyweight corporate defense team is there to meet him.

From the burning plains of Syria to the filthy backstreets of Paris and London, Brethren is the story of Will Campbell, coming of age in a time of conspiracy, passion, politics and war. Will has been brought up from boyhood in the ways of the all-powerful Order of the Knights Templar. With a tragedy in his past that looms over his future, he faces a long, hard apprenticeship to the foul-tempered scholar Everard, before he can have any chance of becoming a Knight.

The mystery of Elizabeth Keane's father is one that has never been solved by the people of Buncarragh - not for lack of speculation. Her mother, Patricia, had been assumed a spinster until she began dating a mysterious man from out of town and within months had left Buncarragh and had married. Less than two years later, Patricia was back, with a new baby in her arms but no new husband by her side and unbendingly silent about her recent past. A secret she would take with her to her grave.

Rome, AD 68. Nero has committed suicide. One hundred years of imperial rule by the descendants of Julius Caesar has ended, and chaos rules. His successor, Galba, dismisses the incorruptible Germans of the Imperial Bodyguard for the crime of loyalty to the dead emperor. Ordering them back to their homeland, he releases a Batavi officer from a Roman prison to be their prefect. But Julius Civilis is not the loyal servant of empire that he seems.

Dora Wildwood is escaping a most unsuitable marriage. She's on the first train to London, having smuggled herself out of the house at dead of night, like all the best books. She plans to go straight to her godmother Lady Dreda Uglow, the only woman she knows who seems to live life on her own terms, and ask to stay. Dora ducks into the London Library to hide, asking the quizzical but kind Ben Stark and the clever Miss Amani for help. And it is there, surrounded by books, where she should feel most safe, that Dora Wildwood most unfortunately stumbles across her first dead body.

In this classic collection of four novellas, the grand master takes you on irresistible journeys into the far reaches of horror, heartache and hope. 'Rita Hayworth and Shawshank Redemption' is the story of two men convicted of murder - one guilty, one innocent - who form the perfect partnership as they dream up a scheme to escape from prison. In 'Apt Pupil' a golden schoolboy entices an old man with a past to join in a dreadful union.

One of the most beautiful and brilliant women of her time, Gladys Deacon dazzled as much as she puzzled the glittering social circles in which she moved. Born in Paris to American parents in 1881, she suffered a traumatic childhood after her father shot her mother's lover dead. Educated in America, she returned to Europe, where she captivated and inspired some of the greatest literary and artistic names of the Belle Époque.

Mickey and Mark Moore are ordinary decent criminals - hard men who live by their own code and leaders of a gang that has made millions at the point of a gun. But when Dan 'Spider' Shepherd is sent to infiltrate the tightly knit team of bank robbers, he discovers that he has more in common with them then he first thought. And that perhaps being a career criminal isn't the worst thing in the world.

An international icon in the world of tennis, legendary coach Patrick Mouratoglou has worked with some of the world's biggest players - from Serena Williams and Coco Gauff to Stefanos Tsitsipas, Simona Halep and Holger Rune. Now, in Champion Mindset, he presents the invaluable principles, skills, and mindsets that have made tennis championships and applies them to challenges and opportunities we face every day.

Using never before seen sources, Once a King is a fresh, revelatory and gripping insight into the Duke of Windsor - King Edward VIII - who gave up the throne to marry the woman he loved, twice divorced American Wallis Simpson. Considering Edward VIII's travels and interests as Prince of Wales as well as his relationship with Wallis Simpson and the course of events leading up to his abdication and subsequent exile, Once a King offers a previously unexplored lens through which we encounter two of the twentieth century's most iconic Royal figures: the Duke and Duchess of Windsor.

A gorgeous and evocative novel about three sisters and a life-changing summer in Corfu. What if your life worked out perfectly...for someone else? It's been 18 years since Ava spent the summer on the Greek island of Corfu, but she has never forgotten what happened during those months—or who she left behind. Now single, estranged from her family, and preparing to wave her daughter off to university, Ava's life seems a million miles away from the one she dreamed about as a teenager—a life now being lived by her sister instead.

July, 1997. Matilda is killed in a tragic accident on the Dorset rocks, leaving her best friend Sophie alone, wracked with guilt. Decades later, Sophie is back for the first time since that terrible summer, to sell her family's old beach hut and bury the memories forever. But on clearing out the hut, she finds evidence that Matilda's death was no accident. What really happened the night she died? As Sophie edges closer to the truth, the past starts to close in on the present.

Mary Stewart, one of the great British storytellers of the 20th century, transports listeners to rural Northumberland for this tale of romance, ambition and deceit - a perfect fit for fans of Agatha Christie and Barbara Pym. Whitescar is a beautiful old house and farm situated in Roman Wall country. It will make a rich inheritance for its heirs, but in order to secure it, they enlist the help of a young woman named Mary who bears remarkable resemblance to missing Whitescar heiress Annabel Winslow. Their deception will spark a powder keg of ambition, obsession and long-dead love.