These are bittersweet and sometimes funny true Romany Gypsy stories from my childhood, from 1943 to 1959. These are true Romany Gypsy stories from my childhood as I remember them, with a little bit of the author’s artistic license to make them more enjoyable. If you are looking for stories that romanticize a Romany Gypsy life on the open road, then this audiobook is probably not for you. However, if you are interested in the true life of Romany Gypsy's, you may find this audiobook interesting.

Jack loves his childhood toy Dur Pig. DP has always been there for him, through good and bad. Until one Christmas Eve something terrible happens - DP is lost. But Christmas Eve is a night for miracles and lost causes, a night when all things can come to life...even toys. And Jack’s newest toy - the Christmas Pig (DP’s annoying replacement) - has a daring plan: Together they’ll embark on a magical journey to seek something lost and to save the best friend Jack has ever known....

It is 1950. London is still reeling from World War II, and Margery Benson, a schoolteacher and spinster, is trying to get through life, surviving on scraps. One day, she reaches her breaking point, abandoning her job and small existence to set out on an expedition to the other side of the world in search of her childhood obsession: an insect that may or may not exist - the golden beetle of New Caledonia. When she advertises for an assistant to accompany her, the woman she ends up with is the last person she had in mind.

This is not a fairy tale. This is about real witches. Grandmamma loves to tell about witches. Real witches are the most dangerous of all living creatures on Earth. There's nothing they hate so much as children, and they work all kinds of terrifying spells to get rid of them. Her grandson listens closely to Grandmamma's stories - but nothing can prepare him for the day he comes face-to-face with The Grand High Witch herself!

David Walliams burst on to the American scene with his New York Times best seller Demon Dentist, and now he’s bringing his signature humor to this raucous tale of prison breaks and heists gone wrong in Bad Dad. Frank’s dad was a champion hot-rod racer, Gilbert the Great. But when a terrible accident sees him go from hero to zero, Frank and Gilbert are left with nothing - and in the grips of a wicked crime boss and his henchmen. After Gilbert is thrown in prison, only Frank can come to his rescue....

Even a life on the untamed plains of Africa can't prepare Wilhelmina for the wilds of an English boarding school in this lovely and lyrical novel from the author of Rooftoppers, which Booklist called "a glorious adventure". Wilhelmina Silver's world is golden. Living half-wild on an African farm with her horse, her monkey, and her best friend, every day is beautiful. But when her home is sold and Will is sent away to boarding school in England, the world becomes impossibly difficult.

When Elsie, an orphan on the streets of Victorian London, hears about the mysterious Ice Monster - a woolly mammoth found at the North Pole - she’s determined to discover more.... Luckily, a chance encounter brings Elsie face-to-face with the creature, sparking the adventure of a lifetime - from London to the heart of the Arctic!

Danny: The portrait of a surreal killer. Each one of us has an invisible space alien perched upon our shoulders controlling our thoughts. This is not a good thing! Danny used to be a sad and lonely man, but now he is happy. Because now Danny has a dog of his very own. A nice big dog with a waggy tail and a smiley face. The dog’s name is Demolition but only Danny can see him. Men from The Ministry of Serendipity are monitoring Danny’s every move.

Life in a small town can be pretty boring when everyone avoids you like the plague. But after their father unwittingly sends them to stay with an aunt who’s away on holiday, the Hardscrabble children take off on an adventure that begins in the seedy streets of London and ends in a peculiar sea village where legend has it a monstrous creature lives who is half boy and half animal.

In this wickedly dark, unusual, and compelling novel, Ellen Potter masterfully tells the tale of one deliciously strange family and a secret that changes everything.

By day, 17-year-old Jo Kuan works as a lady's maid for the cruel daughter of one of the wealthiest men in Atlanta. But by night, Jo moonlights as the pseudonymous author of a newspaper advice column for the genteel Southern lady, "Dear Miss Sweetie". When her column becomes wildly popular, she uses the power of the pen to address some of society's ills, but she's not prepared for the backlash that follows when her column challenges fixed ideas about race and gender.

Can Danny and his father outsmart the villainous Mr. Hazell? Danny has a life any boy would love - his home is a gypsy caravan, he's the youngest master car mechanic around, and his best friend is his dad, who never runs out of wonderful stories to tell. But one night Danny discovers a shocking secret that his father has kept hidden for years. Soon Danny finds himself the mastermind behind the most incredible plot ever attempted against nasty Victor Hazell, a wealthy landowner with a bad attitude. Can they pull it off? If so, Danny will truly be the champion of the world.

Stephen Smith is the boy who did not exist. Born out of wedlock in the early 1960s, Steve's parents - both devout Catholics - had felt so 'shamed' by their son's illegitimate birth that they hid him away from the world by locking him in the cellar...for 13 years. Apart from a few admissions to hospital as a result of his 'imprisonment', Steve remained in the coal cellar of the family home where he was deprived of daylight, his childhood, school and human contact until he'd reached his teenage years.

Black Swan Green tracks a single year in what is, for 13-year-old Jason Taylor, the sleepiest village in muddiest Worcestershire in dying Cold War England, 1982. But the 13 chapters, each a short story in its own right, create an exquisitely observed world that is anything but sleepy. Pointed, funny, profound, left-field, elegiac, and painted with the stuff of life, Black Swan Green is David Mitchell's subtlest and most effective achievement to date.

Nominated for a 2011 Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album For Children. Who better to read the novel of the new Nanny McPhee film than Nanny McPhee herself, Emma Thompson, who also wrote both the screenplay and the novel. This delightful audio edition captures the magic and the mayhem of Nanny McPhee’s brand new adventure – it will have you laughing out loud!

Ruby Lennox begins narrating her life at the moment of conception, and from there takes us on a whirlwind tour of the 20th century as seen through the eyes of an English girl determined to learn about her family and its secrets.

When Murph Cooper rocks up to his new school, he can't help but feel a bit out of his depth. And it's not because he's worried about where to sit, and making friends, and fitting in, or not knowing where the loos are. It's because his mum has enrolled him at a school for superheroes by mistake. And unlike his fellow students Murph has no special abilities whatsoever. But just because you don't have superpowers, it doesn't mean you can't save the day....

In East Prussia, January 1945, the German forces are in retreat, and the Red Army is approaching. The von Globig family's manor house, the Georgenhof, is falling into disrepair. Auntie runs the estate as best she can since Eberhard von Globig, a special officer in the German army, went to war, leaving behind his beautiful but vague wife, Katharina, and her bookish 12-year-old son, Peter. As the road fills with Germans fleeing the occupied territories, the Georgenhof begins to receive strange visitors - a Nazi violinist, a dissident painter, a Baltic baron, even a Jewish refugee.

Getting a life isn't always easy. And hanging on to it is even harder.... Jodi Taylor brings all her comic writing skills to this heartwarming tale of self-discovery. Known as The Nothing Girl because of her severe stutter and chronically low self-confidence, Jenny Dove is only just prevented from ending it all by the sudden appearance of Thomas, a mystical golden horse only she can see. Under his guidance Jenny unexpectedly acquires a husband - the charming and chaotic Russell Checkland.

The four Melendy children live with their father and Cuffy, their beloved housekeeper, in a worn but comfortable brownstone in New York City. There's thirteen-year-old Mona, who has decided to become an actress; twelve-year-old mischievous Rush; ten-year-old Randy who loves to dance and paint; and thoughtful Oliver, who is just six-years-old.

Charged with gross incompetence, Satan is fired from his job as prince of Hell and exiled to that most terrible of places: English suburbia. Forced to live as a human under the name of Jeremy Clovenhoof, the dark lord not only has to contend with the fact that no one recognizes him or gives him the credit he deserves but also has to put up with the bookish war-gamer next door and the voracious man-eater upstairs.

Somewhere on the frontier between thought and reality exists the Discworld, a parallel time and place that might sound and smell very much like our own, but which looks completely different. Particularly as it’s carried though space on the back of a giant turtle (sex unknown). It plays by different rules. But then, some things are the same everywhere. The Disc’s very existence is about to be threatened by a strange new blight: the world’s first tourist, upon whose survival rests the peace and prosperity of the land.

It's the end of the roaring twenties, and the exuberant and Honourable Phryne Fisher is dancing and gaming with gay abandon. But she becomes bored with London and the endless round of parties. In search of excitement, she sets her sights on a spot of detective work in Melbourne, Australia. And so mystery and the beautiful Russian dancer, Sasha de Lisse, appear in her life. From then on it's all cocaine and communism until her adventure reaches its steamy end in the Turkish baths of Little Lonsdale Street.

Emma Reed and her beloved Corgi move from London to Cornwall with the dream of opening a tea shop - but first, they'll have to collar a criminal in the first book in a charming new series.

Conrad Clarke, former RAF pilot and alleged gangster, gets a text – and a visit – from The Allfather. Odin has a challenge for Conrad: Sign up to protect England from wild magick and get a commission in the King’s Watch. All he has to do is find a missing witch. Simple. Conrad never could resist a challenge. Before you can say “Ragnarok”, he’s plunged into a world of gods, mages, witches, dwarves, and one very aggressive giant mole.

It is 1968 in rural Australia and lonely Tom Hope can't make heads or tails of Hannah Babel. Newly arrived from Hungary, Hannah is unlike anyone he's ever met - she's passionate, artistic, and fiercely determined to open sleepy Hometown's first bookshop. Despite the fact that Tom has only read only one book in his life, the two soon discover an astonishing spark. Recently abandoned by an unfaithful wife - and still missing her sweet son, Peter - Tom dares to believe that he might make Hannah happy.

Jodi Taylor reads the long-awaited prequel in her Chronicles of St Mary’s series, as Dr Bairstow struggles to set up St Mary’s as we know it in a world still scarred by the ravages of civil war. Ever wondered how it all began? It’s two years since the final victory at the Battersea Barricades. The fighting might be finished, but for Dr Bairstow, just now setting up St Mary's, the struggle is only beginning. How will he assemble his team? From where will his funding come?

Life in a small town can be pretty boring when everyone avoids you like the plague. But after their father unwittingly sends them to stay with an aunt who’s away on holiday, the Hardscrabble children take off on an adventure that begins in the seedy streets of London and ends in a peculiar sea village where legend has it a monstrous creature lives who is half boy and half animal.

In this wickedly dark, unusual, and compelling novel, Ellen Potter masterfully tells the tale of one deliciously strange family and a secret that changes everything.

Ruby Lennox begins narrating her life at the moment of conception, and from there takes us on a whirlwind tour of the 20th century as seen through the eyes of an English girl determined to learn about her family and its secrets.

Nominated for a 2011 Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Album For Children. Who better to read the novel of the new Nanny McPhee film than Nanny McPhee herself, Emma Thompson, who also wrote both the screenplay and the novel. This delightful audio edition captures the magic and the mayhem of Nanny McPhee’s brand new adventure – it will have you laughing out loud!

Fusing Keatsian mists and mellow fruitfulness with the vitality, the immediacy, and the color hit of Pop Art, Autumn is a witty excavation of the present by the past. The novel is a stripped-branches take on popular culture and a meditation, in a world growing ever more bordered and exclusive, on what richness and worth are, what harvest means.