Showing results by narrator "Jack Hawkins" in All Categories

The Silent Patient is a shocking psychological thriller of a woman's act of violence against her husband - and of the man obsessed with uncovering her motive.... Famous artist Alicia Berenson shoots her husband in the head five times and then never speaks again. Five years later, forensic psychotherapist Theo Faber must find a way to get Alicia to talk if he wants to treat her. Only then can he unravel the shocking events of that tragic night five years before....

February 1460. In the bitter dawn of a winter’s morning, a young man and a woman escape from a priory. In fear for their lives, they are forced to flee across a land ravaged by conflict. For this is the Wars of the Roses, one of the most savage and bloody civil wars in history. Where brother confronts brother, king faces king, and Thomas and Katherine must fight just to stay alive....

Welcome to the world of the Secret Barrister. These are the stories of life inside the courtroom. They are sometimes funny, often moving and ultimately life-changing. How can you defend a child abuser you suspect to be guilty? What do you say to someone sentenced to ten years whom you believe to be innocent? What is the law, and why do we need it? And why do they wear those stupid wigs?

Day one: The Georgia Flu explodes over the surface of the Earth like a neutron bomb. News reports put the mortality rate at over 99%. Week Two: Civilization has crumbled. Year Twenty: A band of actors and musicians called the Travelling Symphony move through their territories performing concerts and Shakespeare to the settlements that have grown up there. Twenty years after the pandemic, life feels relatively safe. But now a new danger looms, and it threatens the hopeful world every survivor has tried to rebuild.

Some agents have all the fun. Others save the world. Bob Howard is an IT expert and occasional field agent for The Laundry, the branch of Her Majesty's Secret Service that deals with occult threats. Dressed (grudgingly) in a tux and sent to the Caribbean, he must infiltrate a millionaire's yacht in order to prevent him violating a treaty that will start a war with an ancient underwater race.

Driven by money, power and success, Gabriel has worked ruthlessly to get to the very top of the banking game. He's not going to let the inconvenience of a terminal brain tumour get in his way. But the tumour has other ideas. As it grows, it appears to be doing strange things to Gabriel's personality. Whether he likes it or not, he seems to be becoming less selfish, less mercenary, less unlikeable. Once he could dismiss the rest of humanity as irrelevant. Now he's not so sure.

Most of us think the law is only relevant to criminals, if we even think of it at all. But the law touches every area of our lives: from intimate family matters to the biggest issues in our society. Our unfamiliarity is dangerous because it makes us vulnerable to media spin, political lies and the kind of misinformation that frequently comes from other loud-mouthed amateurs and those with vested interests. This 'fake law' allows the powerful and the ignorant to corrupt justice without our knowledge - worse, we risk letting them make us complicit.

Toby Clements's fourth and final instalment in the Kingmaker historical series, set during England's bloody and brutal War of the Roses. 1470. The recent tensions between King Edward and his great ally the Earl of Warwick lie forgotten these past months, but even as winter tightens her grip on the land, the peace is shattered by a vicious attack on one of the King's allies. Long buried secrets are brought to the surface, and Thomas and Katherine must finally decide where their loyalties lie and to choose between fight or flight.

Set during England's bloody and brutal War of the Roses, this is the second novel in an epic historical fiction series. If you liked Conn Iggulden's Stormbird, you will love Toby Clements' Kingmaker novels. October 1463. England is a divided nation. In the north the Lancastrian king struggles to hold power while in the south the princes of the house of York prepare for war.

Thomas of Hookton, a veteran of Crecy and many other battles, is the leader of a mercenary company of bowmen and men-at-arms who ravage the countryside east of Gascony. Edward, Prince of Wales, later to be known as the Black Prince, is assembling an army to fight the French once more, but before Thomas can join, he must fulfil an urgent task.

In his 17 years as a Formula 1 driver, Jenson Button has picked up a thing or two about how to do the job properly. Sure, you need to be able to drive a car fast - and Jenson is on hand to pass on a few tricks of the trade here - but you also need to know the real rules for making it to the top. Like, how to tell a multiple F1 champion they need to check their blind spot. What the difference is between a helmet and a hat, and indeed a 'helmet-hat'. How to practise your champagne spray ahead of the big day.

What if your prank killed your best friend? Could you live with yourself? You try to forget and move on; you enrol in Army training, you want to make something of your life. The training is tough and it almost breaks you. But you survive; you know you’ll make a good soldier. Finally, when you’re out in Afghanistan, under enemy fire, you come face-to-face with your best friend’s brother. He still blames you for his brother’s death. You now have more to fear than just enemy soldiers.

Just how do you become a barrister? And why do only one per cent of those who study law succeed in joining this mysteriously opaque profession? If it’s such a great occupation, how come you work 100-hour weeks for less than minimum wage? And why might a practising barrister come to feel the need to reveal the lies, secrets, failures and crises at the heart of this world of wigs and gowns? Nothing but the Truth charts an outsider’s progress down the winding path towards practising at the Bar,

Returning to the UK to try to sort out his stormy personal life, Ben runs into two old friends. Simeon and Michaela were once his fellow students at Oxford; now they are the Reverend and Mrs Arundel. Ben senses that Simeon is deeply troubled, but before the truth can emerge about his secretive research project concerning a mysterious, ancient "sacred sword", both he and Michaela are wiped out in a devastating road crash. Convinced that his friends' deaths were no accident, Ben is propelled on a global quest.

With his father dead, Martyn has a choice. Tell the police what happened - and be suspected of murder. Or get rid of the body and get on with the rest of his life. Simple, right? Not quite. One story leads to another. Secrets and lies become darker and crazier. And Martyn is faced with twist and turns that leave him reeling. Life is never easy. But death is even harder.

London can drain the life out of you.... Bob Howard is an intelligence agent working his way through the ranks of the top-secret government agency known as the Laundry. When occult powers threaten the realm, they'll be there to clean up the mess - and deal with the witnesses. There's one kind of threat that the Laundry has never come across in its many decades, and that's vampires. Mention them to a seasoned agent, and you'll be laughed out of the room.

Bob Howard's career in the Laundry, the secret British government agency dedicated to protecting the world from the supernatural, has involved brilliant hacking, ancient magic and combat with creatures of pure evil. Now the Laundry's existence has become public, and Bob is being trotted out on TV to answer pointed questions about elven asylum seekers.

Alex Schwartz had a great job and a promising future - until he caught an unfortunate bout of vampirism and agreed (on pain of death) to join the Laundry, Britain's only counter-occult secret intelligence agency. His first assignment is in Leeds - his old hometown. But the thought of telling his parents he's lost his job, let alone their discovering his 'condition', is causing Alex almost as much anxiety as his new lifestyle of supernatural espionage. His only saving grace is Cassie Brewer, a student from the local Goth Festival.

The second instalment of Ian Irvine's dramatic epic fantasy series, The Song of the Tears. Beset by false friends and the weight of a world's expectations, Nish flees his father, the God-Emperor - always searching for the means to orchestrate his downfall. Nish's reluctant allies are Maelys, who believes he betrayed her family; former scrutator Xervish Flydd, now stripped of power; and Colm, whom Nish owes a favour he can never repay.

Know your enemy. Liam Scott is back in Afghanistan, this time with 4 Rifles. No longer the new guy, it's his chance to prove himself and take the lead. But the warzone has changed dramatically, and so have the rules. Working alongside the Afghan National Army, Liam and his new patrol face daily attacks from Taliban insurgents. But the real threat seems to be coming from within his unit. It looks like there's a traitor in their midst.