Resultado narrado por "Cathy Dobson" em Todas as categorias

When Richard Hannay returns to London after an action-packed life in Rhodesia, he finds life unbearably dull. He is on the point of leaving the city in search of adventures, when mystery and intrigue turns up at his door in the shape of Franklin Scudder, Hannay’s neighbour, who turns out to be a spy trying to escape the clutches of a shady international organisation, bent on sparking a European war. When Scudder is mysteriously murdered and all the evidence seems to point to Hannay himself, he escapes to Scotland, bearing Scudder’s cryptic coded notebook, which he struggles to decipher.

'A Little Cloud' is a brilliant and evocative short story from Joyce's collection Dubliners comparing the lives of those who escaped Ireland and travelled around Europe compared to the quiet, dull existence of those who remain at home. Thomas Chandler meets an old friend, Ignatius Gallaher, for a drink. Gallaher has made a name for himself in London and has been as far as Paris and Berlin. Chandler's life by comparison is unfulfilled. His job is boring, his marriage loveless and his soul weary.

Jules Gabriel Verne (1828-1905) was a French novelist, poet, and playwright who is sometimes credited as the original 'Father of Science Fiction'. Written in 1851, 'A Drama in the Air' is one of Verne's earliest and most seminal stories, telling the dramatic adventure of a balloonist suddenly confronted with an unexpected and unpredictable passenger who climbs into his balloon at the point of take-off. Many of the themes from this tale were expanded by Verne in his later and better known works about aerial journeys around the world or to the moon.

Max Carrados is called in to investigate a mysterious ghost which haunts an empty flat in Massingham Mansions in London. Every night gaslights are seen in the apartment, even though the gas has been disconnected. Also water runs in the bath every night, even though the water supply has been turned off. Carrados quickly realises that the detectives on the case are barking up the wrong tree....

A newly qualified doctor receives a call from his first patient - a mysterious woman who is deeply distressed and who is covered in a thick black veil. She tells him a confusing story about a dying man who she wishes the doctor to visit the following day, although she assures the doctor that the patient will certainly be dead by then. The young doctor agrees that he will make the visit at nine on the next morning...and finds himself on the strangest professional call of his entire life.

Robert Barr (1849-1912) was a Scottish-Canadian short story writer and novelist, born in Glasgow, Scotland. 'The Hour-Glass' is a mysterious ghost story. An avid antique collector buys an ancient and defective hourglass from a curiosity shop. When he takes it home and starts to examine it, he is startled by a strange visitor who claims to be the real owner of the hourglass. His story is a very bizarre one.

Joseph Smith Fletcher (1863-1935) was a British journalist and author. He wrote more than 230 books on a wide variety of subjects, both fiction and nonfiction. He was one of the leading writers of detective fiction in the Victorian golden age of the short story. This collection brings together some of the finest and most diverse examples of Fletcher's genius. 'The Ivory God' is the tale of a failing writer who acquires a strange ivory carving of an Indian god. He becomes convinced that the statue is communicating with him, taking possession of him, even writing through him.

Herbert Armstrong was a Welsh solicitor who murdered his wife by administering arsenic. His life was marked by love affairs and dubious business dealings. It is also probable that his hatred of his dull, respectable existence in a tiny rural village was one of the motives for his terrible crime. This story of the crime and trial of Armstrong is told by Edgar Wallace, who reported from the courtroom. On behalf of a newspaper syndicate, Wallace offered the convicted man £5,000 for his confession. The offer was refused.

The Welsh Triads (Trioedd Ynys Prydein, 'Triads of the Island of Britain') are a group medieval manuscripts which preserve fragments of Welsh folklore, mythology and traditional history in the form of wise sayings. The triads are terse statements of three related facts - probably to make them easier to remember. The oldest triads predate Christianity, their origins lost in the dark ages. Yet they show clearly that far from being barbarians, our ancient forefathers lived according to an advanced level of philosophy and ethics.

'The Bronze Ring' is a story in which a princess falls in love with the son of the palace gardener, although her father wishes her to marry the son of his Prime Minister. The King devises a quest for the two suitors and attempts to engineer the situation so that the rich youth will win. But the gardener's son does a good deed to an old woman, who in return helps him win a magic ring which will grant wishes. But the youth's adventures are not over when he marries the princess. The ring is stolen, and he must enlist the aid of some very clever mice to get it back.

Maurice Baring (1874-1945) was an English short story writer, children's writer, novelist, travel writer and war correspondent during the First World War. The Blue Rose is a fairy tale about a Chinese princess who is as clever as she is beautiful. When her father sets out to find her a husband, she determines to make her own choice. The Emperor declares that whoever can find and bring his daughter a blue rose shall wed her. But the wise princess is able to debunk all the blue roses proffered and at the same time works out a way to favour her own lover.

Arthur Machen (1863-1947) was a Welsh author and mystic, best known for his influential supernatural, fantasy and horror fiction. The Red Hand is a mysterious horror story which tells the peculiar tale of the strange murder of Sir Thomas Vivian, the famous heart surgeon. Why was he murdered with an ancient flint weapon when there was an unused, brand-new knife at the scene? What was the meaning of the bizarre letter in the dead man's pocket, written in a very strange hand? And what could be the meaning of the peculiar symbol of a red hand chalked on the wall above the corpse?

Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923) was a prominent modernist writer of short fiction and a close associate of D. H. Lawrence and Virginia Woolf. Set in 1915 in France, 'An Indiscreet Journey' is a tale of travelling behind the lines in war-torn Europe, where soldiers and civilians are living a strange precarious existence.

Katherine Mansfield (1888-1923) was a prominent modernist writer of short fiction and a close associate of D. H. Lawrence and Virginia Woolf. The Little Girl and Other Stories was first published in 1921 and includes 'The Tiredness of Rosabel', 'How Pearl Button Was Kidnapped', 'The Journey to Bruges', 'A Truthful Adventure', 'New Dresses', 'The Woman at the Store', 'Ole Underwood', 'The Little Girl', 'Millie', 'Pension', 'Séguin', 'Violet', 'Bains Turcs', 'Something Childish but Very Natural', 'An Indiscreet Journey', 'Spring Pictures', 'Late at Night' and more.

Robert Browning's classic adventure ballad. Three riders set off from Ghent to bring urgent news to Aix. They ride furiously through the night and the next day. Only one completes the journey and saves the fate of the town.

A couple of law students, Tom Donague and Jack Turnbull, who have run out of money, set off for South Africa to make their fortune. For three years, they fail to make any money, but then one day, as they are up country in a remote spot, their luck changes. A friend, Dick Wharton appears unexpectedly one night during heavy rain, telling a strange tale of having seen a ghost in the cursed Sasassa Valley. Tom Donague is particularly excited by the story, and determines to uncover the mystery of the apparition.

Herbert George Wells (1866-1946) was a prolific English writer of science fiction stories and novels and is frequently credited as being the father of science fiction. 'The Hammerpond Park Burglary' is a tongue in cheek story about a burglary which initially goes badly wrong...but then unexpectedly goes extraordinarily right.

Twilight in Italy describes Lawrence’s time as an educated working-class Englishman living among the Italian working men and women in the region around Lake Garda, from the Austrian Alps to the North, to Switzerland and finally Como and Milan. He captures the psyche of Italian peasants without ever romanticising or patronising them.

The magic Psammead is back! This time the four children, Cyril, Robert, Anthea and Jane are stuck in London for the Summer, when they come across the Psammead (or wish-giving sand-fairy), imprisoned in a pet shop. They manage to free him, and he tells them where they can get hold of a magic amulet which will bring them their hearts' desire. Unfortunately when the amulet is secured, it is incomplete. They and the Psammead must travel back into ancient history to see the part of the amulet which was lost.

First published in 1899, The Story of the Treasure Seekers tells the tale of the Bastable children, Dora, Oswald, Dickie, Noel, Alice and H.O. (short for Horace Octavius) and their attempts to restore the fallen fortunes of their family. They devise a series of plans to find or make money, varying from digging for treasure to being bandits, from going into business to rescuing rich elderly gentlemen from deadly peril.