Showing results by narrator "Louise Brealey" in All Categories

The One State is the perfect society, ruled over by the enlightened Benefactor. It is a city made almost entirely of glass, where surveillance is universal and life runs according to algorithmic rules to ensure perfect happiness. And D-503, the Builder, is the ideal citizen, at least until he meets I-330, who opens his eyes to new ideas of love, sex and freedom.

Florence Nightingale sends care instructions to the woman who has just adopted her angora tomcat, Mr. White. T. S. Eliot issues a rhyming birthday party invitation to all Jellicle cats for his four-year-old godson. Jack Kerouac's mother grieves at the death of the family cat. Jack Lemmon winkingly suggests to Walter Matthau that they go in on a cat ranch in Mexico. This utterly charming collection offers a warm and friendly look at the place that cats occupy in our hearts and lives.

New York City goes by many names - Gotham, Empire City, the City That Never Sleeps - and once served as the capital of America. It came together as we know it in 1898 and has become one of the world's most powerful, most important megacities, shaping art, culture, finance, and media across the globe. This iconic collection of 30 letters smartly explores the history of life in the five boroughs. You'll need more than a New York minute to enjoy it all. 

Descriptive copy is not yet available from the publisher.

When two police officers knock on Laura's door, her life changes forever. Her nine-year-old daughter, Betty, has been killed in a hit-and-run car accident. When the death is ruled an accident, Laura takes revenge into her own hands. But will her daughter's killer be brought to justice? Laura's loss and bereavement reopen old wounds, and she is thrown back to the story of her passionate love affair with Betty's father, David, their marriage, and his subsequent love affair with another woman.

Edinburgh, 1850. Despite being at the forefront of modern medicine, hordes of patients are dying all across the city, with doctors finding their remedies powerless. But it is not just the deaths that dismay the esteemed Dr James Simpson - a whispering campaign seeks to blame him for the death of a patient in suspicious circumstances. Simpson's protégé Will Raven and former housemaid Sarah Fisher are determined to clear their patron's name.

In Letters of Note: Fathers, Shaun Usher collects letters celebrating weird and wonderful dads.

The eagerly awaited first book in Philippa Gregory’s sweeping new series begins with the story of Alinor, a young midwife who finds herself tempted by a forbidden love affair. But in a society that has already set a path for her, she is all too aware of the dangers that await a woman who dares step out of place....

I’m Johanna Morrigan, and I live in London in 1995, at the epicentre of Britpop. I might only be 19, but I’m wise enough to know that everyone around me is handling fame very, very badly. My unrequited love, John Kite, has scored an unexpected Number One album, then exploded into a Booze And Drugs HellTM - as rockstars do. And my new best friend - the maverick feminist Suzanne Banks, of The Branks - has amazing hair, but writer’s block and a rampant pill problem. So I’ve decided I should become a 'Fame Doctor'.

In Letters of Note: Dogs, Shaun Usher brings together a delightful collection of correspondence about our canine friends, featuring affectionate accounts of pups' playful misdemeanors, heartfelt tributes to loyal fidos, and shared tales of remarkable hounds.

Sylvia Townsend Warner was a prolific author of novels, short stories and poetry, who also wrote a biography of T. H. White, translated Proust and was an authority on Tudor church music. A sharp, insightful storyteller, she was one of the 20th Century's most acute observers of English mores, and her work is infused with subversive themes reflecting her feminist and Marxist views. This comprehensive anthology includes dramatisations of her two best-known novels.

For 15 years, Lexi and Jake have played the same six numbers with their friends, the Pearsons and the Heathcotes. Over dinner parties, fish & chip suppers and summer barbecues, they’ve discussed the important stuff – the kids, marriages, jobs and houses – and they’ve laughed off their disappointment when they failed to win anything more than a tenner. But then, one Saturday night, the unthinkable happens. There’s a rift in the group. Someone doesn’t tell the truth. And soon after, six numbers come up which change everything forever.

Number-one New York Times best-selling author Philippa Gregory’s new historical novel tracks the rise of the Tidelands family in London, Venice, and New England.

When Leonard and Ellie Franks leave London for retirement in secluded Dartmoor everything seems perfect. Until their new life is shattered. One evening Leonard heads outside to fetch firewood - and never returns. Nine months later, with the investigation at a dead end, Leonard's family turn to David Raker - a missing persons investigator. Nothing could prepare Raker for what he uncovers. 

Every year, Tess and Maggie meet up to try a different activity, something they've never done together before. This year, it's baking, and for a few hours each Friday afternoon, they put the rest of their lives on hold to make cakes. And not just ordinary cakes, but spectacular, unique and glorious gateaux, to celebrate special occasions and commemorate landmark events. When they help a neighbour in distress, they create their first showstopper - a dark, sultry bitter chocolate cake. 

Midsummer’s Eve, 1670. A wealthy man waits outside a poor London warehouse to meet with Alinor, the woman he failed 21 years before. He has everything to offer: money, land, status - and he believes she has the only thing he cannot buy: his son and heir. Meanwhile in New England, Alinor’s brother, Ned, cannot find justice in the New World, as the king’s revenge stretches across the Atlantic and turns the pioneers against each other and against the American Indians.

In Letters of Note: Art, Shaun Usher celebrates extraordinary correspondence about art, from missives on the agony of being overlooked, the ecstasy of producing work that excites, to surprising sources of inspiration and rousing manifestos. A star-studded cast of readers brings the letters to life, with contributions from Sanjeev Bhaskar, Louise Brealey, Simon Callow, Crystal Clarke, Benedict Cumberbatch, Stephen Fry, Neil Gaiman, Toby Jones, Ferdinand Kingsley, Jude Law, Helen McCrory, Stephen Mangan, Clarke Peters, Juliet Stevenson, Mark Strong and Meera Syal.

It is 1685, England is on the brink of a renewed civil war against the Stuart kings and many families are bitterly divided. Ned Ferryman cannot persuade his sister Alinor that he is right to return from America with his Pokanoket servant Rowan to join the rebel army. Instead, Alinor has been coaxed by the manipulative Livia to save the queen from the coming siege. The rewards are life-changing: the family could return to their beloved Tidelands, and Alinor could rule where she was once lower than a servant.

It is 1685, England is on the brink of a renewed civil war against the Stuart kings and many families are bitterly divided. Ned Ferryman cannot persuade his sister Alinor that he is right to return from America with his Pokanoket servant Rowan to join the rebel army. Instead, Alinor has been coaxed by the manipulative Livia to save the queen from the coming siege. The rewards are life-changing: the family could return to their beloved Tidelands, and Alinor could rule where she was once lower than a servant.

A brand-new collection from the internationally best-selling author of Letters of Note.