Showing results by narrator "Daniel Philpott" in All Categories

Beauty can be a gift...or a wicked temptation.... So it is for Filippo Lippi, growing up in Renaissance Florence. He has a talent - not only can he see the beauty in everything but he can capture it, paint it. But while beauty can seduce you and art can transport you - it cannot always feed you or protect you. To survive, Filippo di Tommaso Lippi, street urchin, forger, drinker, seducer of nuns, must become Fra Fra Filippo Lippi - Carmelite friar, man of God.

How long can you pretend to be mad without going mad? Two English pilots are forced to find out when they are shot down behind enemy lines in 1944. The area is swarming with German troops, so, unable to escape, they ditch their clothing and personal belongings, pose as German soldiers, and board a train carrying wounded SS men home from the eastern front.

Omar Yussef, teacher-turned-detective, is sent to the troubled Gaza Strip to carry out a routine school inspection. There he learns that a fellow teacher has been arrested, and, instinctively recognizing the signs of grave injustice, he sets out to investigate. The person responsible for the teacher's arrest is Colonel al-Fara, the most powerful - and dangerous - man in Gaza, and Omar's friends urge him not to intervene. But Omar confronts the colonel, and soon finds himself caught in a ruthless power struggle.

Reunited with his crew aboard the frigate HMS Themis, Captain Charles Hayden is ordered by the Admiralty to the West Indies to carry war to the French among their own islands. Before he makes port in Barbados, the Themis intercepts a single boat adrift in the middle of the ocean - its sole occupants, two young Spanish noblemen. But not is all as it seems with Hayden’s unexpected guests.

A bloody war is raging across the oceans, with the Pirate Federation and Nocturnals in alliance against the renegade Vampirates. Connor and Grace Tempest each have important roles to play - he as a pirate warrior; she as a powerful healer. As the twins face their greatest challenge yet, old allies and foes return to play their part in the ultimate battle of Pirate versus Vampirate.

When Connor Tempest and his swashbuckling pirate buddies get a rare break in their duties, they're in the mood for fun, sun and adventure. A chance meeting with the crew of The Lorelei seems to offer all that and more. Soon, Connor and co are learning to freedive into the amazing world far beneath the ocean's surface. But the pirates are further out of their depth than they realise.

Small towns can hide big secrets, but Rocco Schiavone will do whatever it takes to bring them into the light. The second novel in the internationally best-selling series from Italian crime maestro Antonio Manzini. In an elegant apartment in a chilly Alpine town, a cleaning lady makes a gruesome discovery: the body of her employer hanging from a chandelier in a dark room in an apparent suicide. Working the case is Deputy Police Chief Rocco Schiavone, banished from his beloved Rome to snowy, small-town Aosta.

When the body of a Russian agent is found down a monastery well, Yashim knows exactly who to blame. Fevzi Ahmet Pasha, ruthless commander of the Ottoman fleet. Years ago, Fevzi Ahmet was his mentor. And now Yashim must confront the secret that Fevzi Pasha has been keeping all these years, a secret whose roots lie deep in the tortured atmosphere of the sultan's harem.

When a high-profile pirate is slain, the Pirate Federation takes decisive action and begins training up a ship of dedicated vampire hunters. Amongst the dynamic crew is young pirate prodigy Connor Tempest. Meanwhile, Connor's twin sister Grace enjoys a bittersweet reunion with their mother, Sally, who has some important and shocking news for her daughter. As Grace uncovers the truth about her family's past, she realises that she and Connor face a daunting and uncertain future.

To Fred Archer, born in the village of Ashton-under-Hill in 1915 and growing up in the 1920s, nothing seemed to change except the seasons. This was the age of paraffin lamps, earth closets, and the last train from Evesham at 7 o’clock in the evening. The village was a self-sufficient community with its own hierarchy, strong Church and Chapel, fierce politics and home-made entertainment.

This is a story from the Famous People in History II collection.

Naive and already war-weary, James Gouding takes up a position in Naples in 1943. What he doesn't anticipate is that this involves a limited menu of fried Spam fritters and interrogating the would-be Italian fiancees of members of the armed forces.

The Hole-in-the-Tree gang, led by Quickpaw Cassidy and the Sunshine Cub, is the most daring group of raccoons in town. But when these cheeky chancers carry out the biggest, boldest heist of their lives, they push the neighbourhood too far. The heat is on, and the gang goes on the run in this wild adventure ultimately learning that there’s no place like home.

Already an international hit, a sly, sizzling mystery set in the Italian Alps, the first in a sensational crime series. The dark flanks of the Alps tower over everything. Wind whistles through the fir trees. An expanse of ice and snow with no end in sight. A growing stain. A mess of flesh and blood. A corpse buried six inches under the snow. Enter Rocco Schiavone, Deputy Police Chief and a man who has more beautiful women in his bed than sensible shoes under it. He's stuck in this backwards Alpine town after getting on the wrong side of the wrong people...

Farideh's husband is a corporal in the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, entrapped by MI6 for interrogation. His job as a driver to a top general has left him with potentially valuable knowledge, but he won't talk unless Farideh is brought out of Iran. The SAS say it's too dangerous, so MI6 assemble a team of three ex-soldiers and a student dropout who knows the language and smuggles them into Tehran.…

For decades, Omar Yussef has been a teacher of history to the children of Bethlehem. When a favourite former pupil, George Saba, is arrested for collaborating with the Israelis in the killing of a Palestinian guerrilla, Yussef is convinced that he has been framed. With George facing imminent execution Yussef sets out to prove his innocence. As Yussef falls foul of his headmaster and the local police chief, time begins to run out for Saba.

The third book in Jason Goodwin's celebrated series takes Yashim from the winding alleyways of Istanbul to the decaying grandeur of Venice. Charged by the Sultan to find a stolen painting by Bellini, he enlists the help of his friend Palewski, the Polish Ambassador, and goes undercover. Venice in 1840 is a city of empty palazzos and silent canals, and Palewski starts to mingle with Venetian dealers - self-made men, faded aristocrats and the hedonistic Contessa.

Istanbul 1838. Lefevre, a French archaeologist, has arrived in Istanbul determined to uncover a lost Byzantine treasure. Yashim is hired to investigate him, but when the man turns up dead, there is only one suspect: Yashim himself. Once again, the investigator finds himself in a race against time to uncover the startling truth behind a shadowy secret society dedicated to the revival of the Byzantine Empire, caught in a deadly game deep beneath the city streets, a place where the stakes are high—and betrayal is death...

Britain, AD366 - The island is at peace, enjoying an unprecedented age of prosperity. But from beyond the northern frontier come unsettling rumours: the barbarians are rising, eager to prey on the riches of the south. As the shadow of war looms, Cironius Agnus Paulus, a young soldier with a secret past, becomes ensnared in a conspiracy that endangers the home he has forsaken and the family he loves.

The brightest mind meets the darkest killer...1887. When James Murray, a young Scottish doctor fascinated by the workings of the criminal mind, travels to the vibrant city of Turin, it is to study with Cesare Lombroso, the world-renowned criminologist. But just hours after his introduction to Lombroso, the discovery of a horrifically mutilated body in the nearby Piazza Statuto, and a note that appears to implicate the celebrated criminologist himself, changes everything.