British Literature

Book 1 in the thrilling new crime series, by David J. Gatward, author of the DCI Harry Grimm crime series, and set in the hauntingly beautiful Somerset countryside.

SPIDER MOUTHDI FRED FAIRSERVICE has just returned from holiday when he’s confronted with several mysterious deaths; the mutilated dead body of a junkie, the apparent suicide of a housewife, and the murder of a cannibal, kicks off the strangest investigation of his dark and brutal career. But the strangest element of the case is the connection to the deaths of several old men and women who are found with spiders placed in their mouths.

The year is 1928, and after the death of a maid at a glamorous society party, fortune heir Bryan Guinness seizes life and proposes to 18-year-old Diana, the most beautiful of the six Mitford sisters. The maid's death is ruled an accident, and the newlyweds put it behind them to begin a whirlwind life. Accompanying Diana as her lady's maid is Louisa Cannon, as well as a coterie of friends, family and hangers on, from Nancy Mitford to Evelyn Waugh. When a second victim is found in Paris in 1931, Louisa begins to see links with the death of the maid two years previously.

Jess Bright, single mum and journalist, feels her life has stalled. So when she's offered a writing job in Paris for the summer, she leaps at the chance to go. Hasn't she always felt that she left a piece of her heart in the city years before? Her subject is the iconic artist Adelaide Fox, whose personal life has been steeped in scandal and intrigue. Now approaching eighty, she's ready to tell her side of the story - and serve up some scalding-hot revenge in the process.

This anthology gathers some of the finest indie horror and zombie authors together in one amazing collection of incredible tales from all across the United Kingdom. Fifteen amazing masters of the craft entertain listeners with 15 thrilling zombie stories set in the United Kingdom.

When war breaks out in September 1939, Laura, Andy and Tim Clark are evacuated to the countryside. The Colonel's comfortable home in Dorset is a huge contrast to their cramped terraced house in London, where their loving parents struggle to put the next meal on the table. Though unused to having children around, the Colonel proves to be a kind and generous, if gruff, guardian until a terrible turn of events means the kids must move on.

Emma Makepeace is headed to Edinburgh for the global G7 Summit when her team is tipped off about a high-profile assassination the Russians are planning—but they have no idea who the target is. Surrounded by the world’s most powerful political leaders in a gridlocked city, Emma must set a trap and use herself as bait. With time running short, Emma faces the most perilous mission of her career. How far will she go to catch the killer?

A man waits at a London airport for Ingrid Ostermann, the love of his life, to arrive. Across the Atlantic, a retired NYPD cop waits in a bar in Florida’s Key West for his first date with the lady who is, without question, his soulmate. The two men are about to discover they’ve been scammed out of almost every penny they have in the world – and that neither women exist.

When the body of an old man is found lying in the ruins of St Benet’s Abbey, his throat cut, a knife resting in his open hand, DI John Tanner and DC Jenny Evans are given no choice but to accept a ruling of death by misadventure. But when the body goes missing from its tomb, after a priest is found nailed to a cross, and another impaled on a stake, everything begins to point back to the murder of a teenage girl, thrown from the top of a church tower, some 43 years before.

Thomas Pitt, mainstay of Her Majesty’s Special Branch, is summoned to Connaught Square mansion, where the body of a junior diplomat lies huddled in a wheelbarrow. Nearby stands the tenant of the house, the beautiful, notorious Egyptian woman Ayesha Zakhari, who falls under the shadow of suspicion. Pitt’s orders are to protect—at all costs—the good name of the third person in the garden: senior cabinet minister Saville Ryerson. The distinguished public servant, whispered to be Ayesha’s lover, insists that she is as innocent as Pitt himself.

Rosewater is a town on the edge. A community formed around the edges of a mysterious alien biodome, its residents comprise the hopeful, the hungry, and the helpless—people eager for a glimpse inside the dome or a taste of its rumored healing powers. Kaaro is a government agent with a criminal past. He has seen inside the biodome, and doesn't care to again—but when something begins killing off others like himself, Kaaro must defy his masters to search for an answer, facing his dark history and coming to a realization about a horrifying future.

DS Kat Ballantyne is still reeling from a revelation that turned life as she knew it upside down. But when a dog walker discovers the body of a woman among the standing stones known locally as the Three Sisters, there’s no time to focus on her own troubles. Kat is drawn back to work to investigate. At first, the death appears to be an accident. But then Kat discovers an infinity symbol branded onto the dead woman’s abdomen.

Pity poor Captain Alan Lewrie, Royal Navy! He's been wind-muzzled for weeks in Portsmouth, snugly tucked into a warm shore bed with lovely, and loving, Lydia Stangbourne, a Viscount's daughter, and beginning to enjoy indulging his idle streak, when Admiralty tears Lewrie away and order him to the Bahamas, into the teeth of ferocious winter storms. It's enough to make a rakehell such as he weep and kick furniture!

As a favor to her rock journalist boyfriend, Thai-boxing, rock-and-roll private detective Kate Brannigan agrees to track down a missing song-writer Moira Pollock, a search that takes her into some of the seediest parts of Leeds and Bradford. But little does she realize that finding Moira is only a prelude to murder. Juggling her other cases, including a search to uncover the source of counterfeit luxury goods, Brannigan finds herself for the first time on the trail of a killer.

A body caught on the end of a mast, another skewered by a rhond hook, and a chain of evidence Tanner simply cannot accept. As a twisting gale howls its way over Barton Broad, DS Jenny Evans joins a handsome old friend to help rescue the crew of an overturned boat. But when they discover a body, snagged on the end of the mast, one murder soon follows another, leaving DI John Tanner facing a race against time, desperate to prove that the most obvious suspect isn’t who everyone seems to think it is.

Since the first ‘Best of Young British Novelists’ issue in 1983, Granta has championed the work of authors who have changed the landscape of British literature. In 1983, featured writers included Kazuo Ishiguro, Salman Rushdie, Julian Barnes, Martin Amis and Pat Barker, among many others. Subsequent editions have highlighted the work of Zadie Smith, Nicola Barker, Ben Okri, Jeanette Winterson and others. In 2023, they will introduce listeners around the world to a cohort of outstanding new British voices.

Als Damon nach Cornwall zieht, weiß Beverly zunächst nicht, was sie von ihm halten soll: Er trägt Designerkleidung und fährt Luxusautos – was verschlägt so jemanden in ihr idyllisches Dorf, und das kurz vor Weihnachten? Ist Damon von Beruf CEO und hat sich überarbeitet? Unter oberflächlichen Snobs, die nur an die Karriere denken und nie genug bekommen, soll das ja vorkommen. Doch als Beverly Damon näher kennenlernt, merkt sie, dass sie sich geirrt hat: Er ist überaus einfühlsam und hat sich aus freien Stücken für ein entschleunigtes Leben am Meer entschieden.

West Country beauty Hannah Heywood may be quiet with fashionable strangers, but when it comes to animals in need, she has no trouble finding her voice. Newly arrived in Bath for her very first season, all she desires is to find one like-minded gentleman. A man of warmth and compassion, as sensitive to animals as he is to people. But if such a man exists, he dare not approach her. Not with the tall, blond, and menacing Viscount St. Clare standing in the way.

When Trystan Cartwright, the Earl of Zennor, is bored, he makes wagers…dangerous ones. One night, in a grimy little tavern in Penzance, he and his friends stumble upon a wild, hellcat of a woman masquerading as an ill-tempered lad. Unable to resist the temptation of such a challenge, Trystan wagers he can turn the little hellion into a lady in less than one month. To win, he’ll have to present her at a ball in London and fool the beau monde. But he never imagines that his lady lessons will lead to love....

For a fellow like Captain Alan Lewrie, Royal Navy, who despises the French worse than the Devil hates Holy Water, it's hellish-hard to gain a reputation for saving them, not once but twice, when the French refugees from Haiti surrender to England rather than the vengeful ex-slave armies in November of 1803! After that, it could be "all claret and cruising" in the Caribbean, but for a home-bound sugar convoy, one so frustrating as to make even the happy-go-lucky Alan Lewrie tear his hair out, kick furniture, and curse like...well, like a sailor!