Showing results by narrator "John Sackville" in All Categories

Sleep is one of the most important aspects of our life, health and longevity and yet it is increasingly neglected in 21st century society, with devastating consequences: every major disease in the developed world - Alzheimer's, cancer, obesity, diabetes - has very strong causal links to deficient sleep. Until very recently, science had no answer to the question of why we sleep, or what good it served, or why its absence is so damaging to our health. Compared to the other basic drives in life - eating, drinking and reproducing - the purpose of sleep remained elusive.

Ships are sinking for no apparent reason, carrying hundreds to a dark underwater grave. Strange fireballs race through the sky above the deepest trenches of the oceans. Something is about to show itself, something terrible and alien, a force capable of causing global catastrophe.

When a decapitated body washes up on the banks of the River Loire in the ancient city of Tours, the reluctant juge d’instruction Mattiew Lombard is brought in to lead the investigation. But when Lombard’s young niece appears, the inquiry changes course. Suddenly immersed in another world – one of eco-terrorism, bio-medical research, French aristocracy and the violent forgotten underbelly of society – Lombard begins to make unexpected connections.

Renowned World War Two historian James Holland presents an entirely new perspective on one of the most important moments in recent history. Unflinchingly examining the brutality and violence that characterised the campaign, it's time to draw some radically different conclusions. D-Day and the 76 days of bitter fighting in Normandy that followed have come to be seen as a defining episode in the Second World War. Its story has been endlessly retold, and yet it remains a narrative burdened by both myth and assumed knowledge.

Was there a beginning of time? Could time run backwards? Is the universe infinite, or does it have boundaries? These are just some of the questions considered in an internationally acclaimed masterpiece by one of the world's greatest thinkers. It begins by reviewing the great theories of the cosmos, from Newton to Einstein, before delving into the secrets which still lie at the heart of space and time, from the big bang to black holes, via spiral galaxies and strong theory.

For more than 20 years, Dr Andrew Jenkinson has helped thousands of people to solve their weight problems. Looking at how we eat today, in this audiobook he explores why modern nutrition has failed us. Why We Eat (Too Much) draws on the latest scientific research on appetite, anthropological insights from food habits around the world and personal stories of healthy and lasting weight loss. It is your one-stop solution to eating well and feeling more energised with no complications to your lifestyle.

Beartown is a small town in a large Swedish forest. For most of the year it is under a thick blanket of snow, experiencing the kind of cold and dark that brings people closer together - or pulls them apart. Its isolation means that Beartown has been slowly shrinking with each passing year. But now the town is on the verge of an astonishing revival. A bright new future is just around the corner. Until the day it is all put in jeopardy by a single, brutal act. It divides the town into those who think it should be hushed up and forgotten, and those who'll risk the future to see justice done.

The car jolts to a halt at the pavement's edge, the driver waving through the windscreen to attract Richard's attention. He starts with astonishment. The driver is Gemma, his ex-wife. He has not seen or spoken to her for several years. They have, she memorably assured him the last time they met, nothing to say to each other. But something has changed her mind - something urgent.

Wilkie Collins' follow-up to The Woman in White and No Name is an innovative take on mistaken identity, the nature of evil, and the dark underbelly of Victorian England. The story concerns two distant cousins, both named Allan Armadale, and the impact of a family tragedy, which makes one of them a target of the murderous Lydia Gwilt, a vicious and malevolent charmer determined to get her hands on the Armadale fortune. Will the real Allan Armadale be revealed, and will he survive the plot against his life?

This compelling book on Hitler and Stalin - the culmination of 30 years' work - examines the two tyrants during the Second World War, when Germany and the Soviet Union fought the biggest and bloodiest war in history. Yet despite the fact they were bitter opponents, Laurence Rees shows that Hitler and Stalin were, to a large extent, different sides of the same coin. Hitler's charismatic leadership may contrast with Stalin's regimented rule by fear, and his intransigence later in the war may contrast with Stalin's change in behaviour in response to events.

Fifty thousand years ago, we were not the only species of human in the world. There were at least four others, including the Neanderthals, Homo floresiensis, Homo luzonesis and the Denisovans. At the forefront of the latter's ground-breaking discovery was Oxford Professor Tom Higham. In The World Before Us, he explains the scientific and technological advancements.

A hundred thousand dragons lie, underneath an Arabian sky. How do a few lines of poetry, a chance encounter in a London hotel, and a death in Sussex lead to a lost city of Arabia, and to the tombs of the Whispering Dead? Jack Haldean has evaded the truth for years, but now, enmeshed in the web of murder, theft and deception, he must find the answer and face up to the truth – a truth as deadly as any dragon...

Random House presents the audiobook edition of The Circadian Code, by Dr Satchidananda Panda. Change your daily routine, transform your health. Circadian rhythms are biological processes or clocks that exist in each one of our cells. Programmed to turn genes on or off at different times of the day or night, they influence every aspect of our health from weight and energy levels through to resistance to disease and infection, and how well we sleep.

When an English expat is brutally murdered, his charred corpse left on a Loire Valley hillside, the police turn to juge d’instruction Matthieu Lombard to find the perpetrator. Instead, Lombard discovers a wealth of secrets, grudges, and feuds in the idyllic town of Saint-Genèse-sur-Loire. He begins to suspect that the remaining members of the Comité des Fêtes know more about the death than they are letting on.

It was only by accident that Peter as a child discovered that his father, Fred Bradley, was in fact born Fritz Brandes. And it was only after his father’s death in 2004 that Peter was able to begin to piece together the family’s story and set out on the journey—literally and figuratively—that forms the basis of his book.

Competition is stiff for the position of sub-librarian in Aberdarcy Library. For John Lewis, the situation is complicated by the attentions of daunting and desirable village socialite Elizabeth Gruffyd-Williams, who is married to a member of the local Council. Pursuing an affair with her whilst keeping his job prospects alive is John's predicament, as he finds himself running down Welsh country lanes at midnight in a wig and dress, resisting the advances of local drunks and suffering the long speeches of a 'nut-faced' clergyman.

Shipcott in bleak mid-winter: a close knit community where no stranger goes unnoticed. So when an elderly woman is murdered in her bed, village policeman Jonas Holly is doubly shocked. How could someone have killed and left no trace? Jonas finds himself side-lined as the investigation is snatched away from him by an abrasive senior detective. Is his first murder investigation over before it’s begun?

A missing man leads Jack Haldean straight into danger... Mark Helston, the rising star of Hunt Coffee Limited, was successful and popular, with plenty of money and everything to live for. Yet at half past seven on the evening of the ninth of January, 1925, he walked out of his Albemarle Street flat and disappeared. Desperate to know what happened to Mark, his uncle, old Mr Hunt, appeals to Jack Haldean. Inspector Bill Rackham of Scotland Yard thinks it’s a thankless task.

In How to Listen, Thich Nhat Hanh demonstrates how deep listening is a fundamental building block of good communication. With clear and gentle guidance, we learn how truly listening – to ourselves, to each other, to Mother Earth, and to the many ‘bells of mindfulness’ that are available to us in each moment – is the foundation of our practice, an expression of love and a solution to our deepest and most urgent large-scale conflicts.

In The World for Sale, two leading journalists lift the lid on one of the least scrutinised corners of the economy: the workings of the billionaire commodity traders who buy, hoard and sell the earth's resources. It is the story of how a handful of swashbuckling businessmen became indispensable cogs in global markets: enabling an enormous expansion in international trade and connecting resource-rich countries - no matter how corrupt or war-torn - with the world's financial centres.