Search results for ""duckworth books""

A witty, fast-paced thriller with a dash of mathematics and a large dose of danger Life is not going smoothly for Tom Winscombe. His girlfriend Dorothy has vanished, taking with her all the equipment and money of the company she ran with her friend Ali. Now Tom and Ali are forced to eke out an awkward shared bedsit existence while they try to work out what she is up to. Meanwhile, Tom has other things on his mind, including how to untangle his father from a cryptocurrency scam, how to break into a hospital in order to interrogate an old acquaintance and what is the significance of the messages he’s been receiving from Rufus Fairbanks’s LinkedIn account. Tom and Ali’s investigations lead them in a host of unexpected and frankly dangerous directions, involving a pet python, an offshore stag do and an improbable application of the Fibonacci sequence. But at the end of it all, will they find Dorothy – and will she ever be able to explain just exactly what is going on?

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In Britain at Play we collect the finest of William Heath Robinson's studies of the unique British character. Here we find Britain in the garden, at the beach and on the golf course - the 9th hole played with the grim reaper, rotating sunbathing machines, a double cross tennis match 'For economising space in local tournaments and generally gingering up the game'. Heath Robinson perfectly captures the peculiar character of the great British nation at leisure.

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A deeply informed, radically hopeful manifesto for regenerating our economies and societies through the power of nature and natural capital.

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On the cusp of adulthood and stuck in a small town, Eliza Mace is thwarted by powers that conspire to protect, control and deceive her. But when her father disappears in mysterious circumstances, her determination to uncover the truth is unstoppable.

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Dickensian London is brought to real and vivid life in this Wolfson History Prize-shortlisted portrait by a rising-star historian and New Generation Thinker Until now, our view of bustling late Georgian and Victorian London has been filtered through its great chroniclers, who did not themselves come from poverty – Dickens, Mayhew, Gustave Doré. Their visions were dazzling in their way, censorious, often theatrical. Now, for the first time, this innovative social history brilliantly – and radically – shows us the city’s most compelling period (1780–1870) at street level. From beggars and thieves to musicians and missionaries, porters and hawkers to sex workers and street criers, Jensen unites a breadth of original research and first-hand accounts and testimonies to tell their stories in their own words. What emerges is a buzzing, cosmopolitan world of the working classes, diverse in gender, ethnicity, origin, ability and occupation – a world that challenges and fascinates us still.

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A dazzlingly inventive tale of troubled legacies, desire and unsung power, inspired by The Scarlet Letter. Glasgow, 1829: Isobel, a young seamstress, and her husband Edward set sail for New England, in flight from his mounting debts and addictions. But, arriving in Salem, Massachusetts, Edward soon takes off again, and Isobel finds herself penniless and alone. Then she meets Nathaniel, a fledgling writer, and the two are instantly drawn to each other: he is haunted by his ancestors, who sent innocent women to the gallows during the Salem witch trials – while she is an unusually gifted needleworker, troubled by her own strange talents. Nathaniel and Isobel grow ever closer. Together, they are dark storyteller and muse; enchanter and enchanted. But which is which?

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Two sisters become embroiled in the burgeoning Cold War in this spellbinding novel of espionage, secrets and betrayals Berlin, 1947: good Soviets Vera and Marya find themselves mired in the covert post-war conflicts that are shaping a new world order. When Marya, an interpreter liaising with the British, gets caught in secret agent Vera’s web of deceit, she must make desperate choices to survive – and to protect those she loves. Nine years later, as the Soviets confront their Stalinist past, Vera revisits that pivotal moment, unravelling shocking truths about her sister and herself. Against an epic backdrop, Anika Scott weaves a nail-biting, morally complex story of double–triple bluff and loyalty – or otherwise – to family or motherland.

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A radical and optimistic view of the future course of human development from the bestselling author ofHow to Create a Mindand who Bill Gates calls 'the best person I know at predicting the future of artificial intelligence.'

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Beyond the patrician vision of Victorian Britain traditionally advanced in our textbooks, there always existed another, more diverse Britain, populated by people of colour marking achievements both ordinary and extraordinary. In this deeply researched and dynamic history, Woolf and Abraham reach into the archives to recentre our attention on marginalised Black Victorians, from leading medic George Rice to political agitator William Cuffay to abolitionists Henry ‘Box’ Brown and Sarah Parker Remond; from pre-Raphaelite muse Fanny Eaton to renowned composer Samuel Coleridge-Taylor. While acknowledging the paradoxes of Victorian views of race, Black Victorians demonstrates, with storytelling verve and a liberatory impulse, how Black people were visible and influential, firmly rooted in British life.

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Cheese puffs. Coffee. Sunscreen. Vapes. Hand sanitiser. George Zaidan reveals the weird science behind everyday items that may or may not kill you, depending on whom you ask. If you want easy answers, this book is not for you. But if you’re curious which health studies to trust, what dense scientific jargon really means, and how to make better choices when it comes to food and health – dive right in! Zaidan makes chemistry more fun than potions class as he reveals exactly what science can (and can’t) tell us about the packaged ingredients we buy in the supermarket. He demystifies the ingredients of life and death – and explains how we know whether something is good or bad for you – in exquisite, hilarious detail at breakneck speed.

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A SUNDAY TIMES BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR Winner of the Rubery Book Award 2020 (Non Fiction) Edith Nesbit is considered the inventor of the children’s adventure story and her brilliant children’s books influenced bestselling authors including C.S. Lewis, P. L. Travers, J.K. Rowling, and Jacqueline Wilson, to name but a few. But who was the person behind the best loved classics The Railway Children and Five Children and It? Her once-happy childhood was eclipsed by the chronic illness and early death of her sister. In adulthood, she found herself at the centre of a love triangle between her husband and her close friend. She raised their children as her own. Yet despite these troubling circumstances Nesbit was playful, contradictory and creative. She hosted legendary parties at her idiosyncratic Well Hall home and was described by George Bernard Shaw – one of several lovers – as ‘audaciously unconventional’. She was also an outspoken Marxist and founding member of the Fabian Society. Through Nesbit’s letters and deep archival research, Eleanor Fitzsimons reveals her as a prolific activist and writer on socialism. Nesbit railed against inequity, social injustice and state-sponsored oppression and incorporated her avant-garde ideas into her writing, influencing a generation of children – an aspect of her legacy examined here for the first time. Eleanor Fitzsimons, acclaimed biographer and prize winning author of Wilde's Women, has written the most authoritative biography in more than three decades. Here, she brings to light the extraordinary life story of an icon, creating a portrait of a woman in whom pragmatism and idealism worked side-by-side to produce a singular mind and literary talent.

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'Extraordinary... one of the most intelligent historical thrillers I've read in a long time.' Dean Crawford, bestselling author of Covenant Reporter Jake Wosley has seen things he never thought possible. His life changed forever after discovering classified documents showing Churchill's curious obsession with the ancient Etruscan civilisation. Now he's hiding out in Thailand, trying to put the past behind him. But when a mysterious letter arrives containing cryptic references to Napoleon Bonaparte, Jake is drawn back in to a centuries-old conspiracy. The trail leads through the Middle East, Europe and Africa to a Victorian secret that could remake the world. Will Jake crack the Napoleon complex? And can he keep one step ahead of Washington and MI6 who want this ancient lore for their own devices?

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Leading us through cognitive theory, neuroscience and Darwinian evolution with his trademark wit and wisdom, Michael Corballis explains what we know and don't know about our minds. How do we know if we're really the top dogs in brain power? Does our creativity stem solely from the right brain? From language to standing upright, composing music to lying, he uncovers our most common misconceptions and the fascinating habits and abilities that make us human. 'We’re fortunate to have Corballis as our learned and charming guide on this all-too-short tour of the human mind’ Steven Pinker

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In the turbulent final years of the Yuan Dynasty, Wang Meng is a minor bureaucrat in the government of the Mongol conquerors. He is also an extraordinarily gifted artist whose paintings capture the infinite expanse of China's natural beauty. But an empire in turmoil is not a place or time for sitting still. On his journeys across the realm, Wang encounters fellow master painters, a fierce female warrior known as the White Tigress who recruits him as a military strategist, and an unprepossessing young Buddhist monk who rises from beggary to extraordinary heights. John Spurling's award-winning The Ten Thousand Things seamlessly fuses the epic and the intimate with the precision and depth that the real-life Wang Meng brought to his art.

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The unforgettable introduction to the human body that continues to inspire new generations of doctors Awesome and magnificent as the body itself, here is the one book that explains the mysteries of human anatomy – from head to heart; muscles to metabolism; bones to blood and beyond – in a way certain to captivate. It cuts through jargon and transcends the ordinary to let you get to know all about your body: how it adapts, how it protects itself, how it senses the world, how it grows. An indispensable book for everyone who has ever felt a sense of wonder for the remarkable machine that remains infinitely superior to every human invention.

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How well can you ever know another person? Happily married, Reginald and Sylvia seem to lead a perfect, and perfectly quiet, life. They have more than enough money and their own country house. But when success overtakes them, and allure of London life pulls Reginald in, they find parts of themselves they never knew. Where does their happiness really lie? Reminiscent of Evelyn Waugh, this wry, intimate examination of a relationship is a gem of 1930s literature.

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Reality TV turns deadly in Cherry Hinton’s first case When Kenny Thorpe, a contestant on Expose TV’s Big Blubber, the hot new celebrity weight-loss show, is murdered on live television in front of 3 million viewers, the case seems pretty watertight. After all, everyone saw Martin do it – didn’t they? Cherry Hinton knows there’s more to this than meets the eye. As an investigative reporter, she went undercover on dating show Caravan of Love… but after getting in too deep with one of the other contestants, she was caught knickerless in front of the nation. Humiliated, fired and heartbroken, she has fled to Brentwood, where she opens a cake shop, and tries to forget all about Expose. Until Kenny Thorpe’s sister walks into her shop with a letter that turns Cherry’s world upside down. Is Martin innocent? How is infamous gangster Leon Solent involved? Is Expose to blame, and is there a killer still on the loose? Cherry is the only one in a position to find out.

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“I am in great danger … I know that murder is going to be the reward for my uncomplaining loyalty.” This letter containing heartfelt and urgent pleas for help is received by three very eminent citizens of Flaxborough, including the Chief Constable himself. So when one of the town’s most tireless charity workers, Mrs Henrietta Palgrove, is found the wrong way up in her garden pond, a connection seems likely. Yet Detective Inspector Purbright finds the case does not quite add up and it takes the acute wits of his old friend, the ever-charming Miss Lucilla Teatime, as well as the more unwitting help of Mortimer Hive, indifferent private investigator and accomplished ladies’ man, to tease out the real murderer. Witty and a little wicked, Colin Watson’s tales offer a mordantly entertaining cast of characters and laugh-out-loud wordplay.

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The Best Kept Village Competition inspires Miss Seeton's most unusual artworka burning cottageand clears the smoke of suspicion in a series of local fires. Serene amidst every kind of skullduggery, this eccentric English spinster steps in where Scotland Yard stumbles, armed with nothing more than her sketchpad and umbrella!

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A sunny summer’s day at the Hurlingham Club resounds to the thwack of ball on racket, as Britain’s young hopeful, the splendidly named Trish Thumper, seems likely to knock out her American opponent. Yet not all the eyes following Trish’s strokes belong to tennis fans – it soon emerges that her father, the notoriously stern Judge William Thumper, has made an enemy who will stop at little to harm him and his daughter. But the wrongdoers have reckoned without artistic sleuth Miss Emily Seeton, who in a series of apparently mistimed shots with torch and umbrella, defeats them game, set and match. Serene amidst every kind of skulduggery, this eccentric English spinster steps in where Scotland Yard stumbles, armed with nothing more than her sketchpad and umbrella!

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From the small stuff like single-use plastics to major decisions like whether to have children, Rieder defines exactly how we can change our thinking and lead a decent, meaningful life in a scary, complicated world.

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A courageous and intimate memoir of China framed in ten telling words. People. Leader. Reading. Writing. Revolution. Grassroots. Through these and other common vernacular words and phrases, Yu Hua – widely regarded as one of China’s greatest living writers – tells powerful personal stories of the Chinese experience from the Cultural Revolution to the 2010s. With wit, insight and courage, he presents a refreshingly candid vision of the ‘Chinese miracle’ and its consequences, and a unique perspective on one of the world’s least understood nations.

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Three centuries ago, Voltaire published his Dictionnaire philosophique, taking in such idiosyncratic topics as adultery, mountains, nakedness, and others besides. In 1957, another French philosopher of more recent vintage, Roland Barthes, mused in his Mythologies on the masculine pursuits of wrestling, striptease and the Citroën DS. Since the dawn of philosophy, the world's great thinkers have been unable to resist the lure of applying their formidable brains not only to the meaning of life, but also to the meaning of coffee, trapped wind or efficient boiler installation. Now, from Wollstonecraft to Wittgenstein, Laozi to Locke, Aristotle to Arendt, Great Minds on Small Things brings together their varied observations, alongside delightful black and white illustrations, in a highly entertaining and eye-opening miscellany that is guaranteed to make life’s mundanities suddenly seem a lot more highbrow.

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‘Lovingly detailed and exhaustively researched – easily the most readable and comprehensive guide I've seen to this fascinating hidden history’ Tom Robinson, musician, broadcaster and long-time LGBT rights activist From Sia to Elton John, Dusty Springfield to Little Richard, LGBT voices have changed the course of modern music. But in a world before they gained understanding and a place in the mainstream, how did the queer musicians of yesteryear fight to build foundations for those who came after? Pulling back the curtain on the colourful world that shaped our musical and cultural landscape, Darryl W. Bullock reveals the inspiring and often heartbreaking stories of internationally renowned stars, as well as lesser-known names, who have led the revolution from all corners of the globe. David Bowie Made Me Gay is a treasure trove of moving and provocative stories that emphasise the right to be heard and the need to keep up the fight for equality in the spotlight.

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New York City, 1912: in downtown Greenwich Village, a group of women gathered, all with a plan to change the world. This was the first meeting of ‘Heterodoxy’, a secret social club. Its members were passionate advocates of women’s suffrage, labour rights, equal marriage and free love. They were socialites and socialists; reformers and revolutionaries; artists, writers and scientists. Hotbed is the never-before-told story of the club whose audacious ideas and unruly acts transformed an international feminist agenda into a modern way of life. For readers who loved Mo Moulton’s Mutual Admiration Society and Francesca Wade’s Square Haunting.

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SHORTLISTED FOR THE WOMEN’S PRIZE 2023 SHORTLISTED FOR THE RSL ONDAATJE PRIZE 2023 SHORTLISTED FOR THE AUTHORS’ CLUB BEST FIRST NOVEL AWARD 2023 SHORTLISTED FOR THE WILBUR SMITH PRIZE 2023 SHORTLISTED FOR THE NOTA BENE PRIZE 2023 –––––––––––– Sarajevo, spring 1992. Each night, nationalist gangs erect barricades, splitting the diverse city into ethnic enclaves; each morning, the residents – whether Muslim, Croat or Serb – push the makeshift barriers aside. When violence finally spills over, Zora, an artist and teacher, sends her husband and elderly mother to safety with her daughter in England. Reluctant to believe that hostilities will last more than a handful of weeks, she stays behind while the city falls under siege. As the assault deepens and everything they love is laid to waste, black ashes floating over the rooftops, Zora and her friends are forced to rebuild themselves, over and over. Theirs is a breathtaking story of disintegration, resilience and hope.

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Ancient as they are, the Greek myths still resonate at the core of our literature and culture, and may well reveal more about human nature and the world we have created than we like to believe. From the garden of his house in the Peloponnese overlooking the gulf of Argos, award-winning playwright and novelist John Spurling draws on a lifetime’s engagement with the classics and with Greek culture to reanimate the characters of Apollo, Herakles, Theseus, Perseus and Agamemnon, along with the gods, demi-gods, monsters and mortals who shaped their destinies. Gripping, spirited and sometimes grisly, Spurling’s fresh interpretations of these timeless tales bring both their heroes and their context vividly to life.

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The only biography of Britain's celebrated female spy – now fully updated with previously classified materials. From being raised in a Tanzanian shack, to attaining MI6's most senior operational rank, Daphne Park led a highly unusual life. Drawing on first-hand accounts of intelligence workers close to agent Park, Hayes reveals how she rose in a male-dominated world to become Britain's Cold War spy master. With intimate, nail-biting details Queen of Spies captures both the paranoia and on-the-ground realities of intelligence work from the Second World War to the Cold War, and the life of Britain’s celebrated female spy.

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Don't be reckless with you most precious asset - life. This book is your key to survival against the hordes of undead who may be stalking you right now without your even knowing it. It covers everything you need to know, from how to understand zombie behaviour to survival in any territory or terrain. The Zombie Survival Guide offers complete protection through proven tips for safeguarding yourself and your loved ones against the living dead. It might just save your life.

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William Alexander is not just a Francophile, he wants to be French. It's not enough to explore the country, to enjoy the food and revel in the ambiance, he wants to feel French from the inside. Among the things that stand in his way is the fact that he can't actually speak the language. Setting out to conquer the language he loves (but which, amusingly, does not seem to love him back), Alexander devotes himself to learning French, going beyond grammar lessons and memory techniques to delve into the history of the language, the science of linguistics, and the art of translation. Along the way, during his travels in France or following his passion at home, he discovers that not learning a language may be its own reward.

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Before becoming one of the most successful filmmakers in Hollywood, Judd Apatow was the original comedy nerd. At fifteen, he took a job washing dishes in a local comedy club-just so he could watch endless stand-up for free. At sixteen, he was hosting a show for his local high school radio station in Syosset, Long Island-a show that consisted of Q&As with his comedy heroes, from Garry Shandling to Jerry Seinfeld. Thirty years later, Apatow is still that same comedy nerd-and he's still interviewing funny people about why they do what they do. Sick in the Head gathers Apatow's most memorable and revealing conversations into one hilarious, wide-ranging and incredibly candid collection. Here are the comedy legends who inspired and shaped him, the contemporaries he grew up with in Hollywood, and the brightest stars in comedy today, from Mel Brooks, Jerry Seinfeld and Steve Martin to Chris Rock, Seth Rogen and Lena Dunham. Sick in the Head is Apatow's gift to comedy nerds everywhere.

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The Rook family run a little business: ghost hunting. And things have picked up recently. Something’s wrong. It’s been getting noticeably worse since, ooh, 2016? Bad spirits are abroad, and right now they're particularly around Coldbay Island, which isn’t even abroad, it’s only 20 miles from Skegness. The Rooks’ ‘quick call out’ to the island picks loose a thread that begins to unravel the whole place, and the world beyond. Is this the apocalypse? This might be the apocalypse. Who knew it would kick off in an off-season seaside resort off the Lincolnshire coast? I’ll tell you who knew – Brenda. She’s been feeling increasingly uneasy about the whole of the East Midlands since the 90s.

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Given a terminal diagnosis (actually two of them) thirty-five year old Miguel Padilla decides he must accomplish something meaningful before death. He seizes on the idea of donating a kidney to save someone’s life. Then he decides: why stop there? Why not donate… everything? Why not indeed?

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The year is 1940 and the British have their backs to the wall. Everyone is preparing for the battle that, as Winston Churchill said, would see the “whole fury and might of the enemy turned upon us.” Everyone including the young Miss Emily Seeton, London art teacher, who finds her strangely prophetic sketches do not go unnoticed by the secret services. At first suspected of being a fifth columnist, she soon finds herself recruited by the dashing Major Gerry Haynes and sent to carry out a very special observance task at a rural Spitfire factory. Faced with bombs, sabotage and murder, Miss Seeton must summon all her courage – it is after all her nature to Keep Calm and Carry On!

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At the roulette table an elderly, ludicrously made-up woman in dazzling diamonds is making a killing. Who would guess the bejewelled high roller is actually retired art teacher Miss Emily Seeton, in disguise to help capture a mysterious crime boss? Miss S. must get a good look at the crook’s face to produce a sketch for the police, a simple task surely. It’s not her fault things escalate, and after half-blinding one baddie with the tail of her mink stole and whacking another with her handbag, she’s soon gambling for the very highest stakes – her own life. Serene amidst every kind of skulduggery, this eccentric English spinster steps in where Scotland Yard stumbles, armed with nothing more than her sketchpad and umbrella!

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The classic British cosy mystery series – Meet Miss Emily Seeton, an art teacher with an unexpected talent… When Miss Seeton walks out after a performance of Carmen and witnesses a real-life stabbing, all she can recall is a shadowy figure. But how could she have guessed that her latest artistic endeavour is a picture-perfect portrait of the killer? Her sketch puts her in a perilous position, for back at her recently inherited cottage in Plummergen village, she’s fated to be a sitting duck . . . for murder most foul! Meet Miss Emily D. Seeton: this retired art teacher steps in where Scotland Yard stumbles. Armed with only her sketch pad and umbrella, she is every inch an eccentric English spinster and the most lovable and unlikely master of detection.

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Angela Benbow and Caledonia Wingate take to the investigative trail when one of their own is found murdered on the beach.

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Hettie Bagshot has bitten off more than any cat could chew. No sooner has she launched her No. 2 Feline Detective Agency than she's thrown into her first case. Furcross, home for senior cats, has a nasty spate of bodysnatching, and three former residents have been stolen from their graves. Hettie and her sidekick, Tilly, set out to reveal the terrible truth. Is Nurse Mogadon involved in a deadly game? Has the haberdashery department of Malkin and Sprinkle become a mortuary? And what flavour will Betty Butter's pie of the week be? In a haze of catnip and pastry, Hettie steers the case to its conclusion, but will she get there before the body count rises - and the pies sell out?

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Gentle chaos sets in when the absent-minded Mr Pim calls in to see George Marden, bearing some innocent news... George is a fine upstanding citizen and a stickler for doing the right thing. He has a devoted wife, Olivia, and is guardian to his somewhat flighty niece, Dinah.But his careful peace is broken when Mr Pim casually announces that he’s recently seen an ex-convict from Australia, Telworthy. The only thing is that the character sounds awfully like Olivia’s first, and supposedly deceased, husband… and if he’s eally still alive, then Olivia is a bigamist.

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To all appearances Joanna Emerson is a fully qualified, gold-medalled graduate of the world’s finest college of Nursery Nurses… Engaged as a nanny to Benedict, newly born heir to a vast cosmetic fortune, she becomes caught up in a complex kidnap plot. But the enigmatic portrait painter, yachtsman and former spy, Johnson Johnson is never far away – and he knows the dangerous game she’s playing. Before long, bullets are flying, and most of them in Joanna’s direction.

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If Ruth had stayed on leave, none of it might have happened. An astronomer working at the Maurice Frazer Observatory, Ruth Russell is enjoying her time in Rome. That is until Charles Digham, top fashion photographer and Ruth’s lover, has his camera stolen and the thief ends up a headless corpse in the zoo park toletta. The enigmatic Johnson Johnson, in Rome to paint a portrait of the Pope, is on hand to unravel the mystery. But as Johnson and Ruth begin the search for clues it soon becomes clear that more is at stake than the secrets of a couture house… something far more deadly.

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Tina Rossi, the world’s leading coloratura soprano, has travelled to Edinburgh, ostensibly to sing in the Festival, in reality to meet her lover, top scientist Kenneth Holmes. But instead of finding Kenneth at their rendezvous, she discovers an unknown corpse. Enter Johnson Johnson, a famous but enigmatic portrait painter whose yacht Dolly is about to sail in a race to the Hebrides where Holmes was conducting his top-secret research. Soon Tina and Johnson are sailing the high seas to investigate Holmes' disappearance, but as Dolly nears Rum, the race has become one for life rather than prize money…

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The only thing harder to win than a war is the peace that follows it… A year on from the human-machine war, both sides are struggling to share custody of the solar system. Prime Minister Fuji Itsu should be fighting Carin Parkeon, the parking meter determined to become the planet’s new manager. But no one has seen Fuji since she fell through the Earth’s crumbling concrete crust. Janice, the First Minister Janice of the Battlestar Suburbia has learned two truths. Humankind is only two meals from anarchy, and you should think twice before giving planning approval to a new supermarket. Somewhere in between, breadmaker turned secret agent Pamasonic Teffal is trying to bring the sides together without curdling them. In this hilarious successor to Battlestar Suburbia and Battle Beyond the Dolestars, humans and robots alike will learn the solutions to their problems lie not in the stars but in the ground beneath their castors. It’s time to Sashay to the Centre of the Earth.

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A collection of theatrical misfits goes on tour across the Atlantic in this nostalgic post-war novel sure to delight fans of P. G. Wodehouse

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Titus Llewellyn-Gwlynne, actor/manager of the Red Lion Theatre, has lost a backer who was going to fund a theatrical tour – when unexpected salvation appears. Their home theatre in the East End of London having been bombed during the war, The Red Lion Touring Company embarks on a tour of Britain to take a play written by their new benefactress into the provinces. As they make their vagabond, singing way, they remain unaware that they leave behind in London a man consumed with thoughts of revenge. Revenge which follows them obsessively from town to town, ending in its final act before the last curtain. This charming series transports the reader to a lost post-war world of touring rep theatre and once-grand people who have fallen on harder times, smoggy streets, and shared bonhomie over a steaming kettle.

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Join Hettie and Tilly as they tune in to a world of blackmail, obsession and murderous pies. As the Easter weekend approaches, feline detectives Hettie Bagshot and Tilly Jenkins are called to investigate the murder of local radio DJ Hartley Battenberg. Bowled over by the prospect of a bake-off competition, a cricket match and an outdoor screening of The Sound of Music, Hettie and Tilly struggle through a sea of trifle to catch out a killer. Will Bunty Basham’s eleven be triumphant? Has Whisker FM played its final jingle? And will celebrity cook Fanny Haddock get her just desserts?

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Mr Edgar Finchley, unmarried clerk, aged 45, is told to take a holiday for the first time in his life. He decides to go to the seaside. But Fate has other plans in store… From his abduction by a cheerful crook, to his smuggling escapade off the south coast, the timid but plucky Mr Finchley is plunged into a series of the most astonishing and extraordinary adventures. His rural adventure takes him gradually westward through the English countryside and back, via a smuggling yacht, to London. This gentle comedy trilogy was a runaway bestseller on first publication in the 1930s and retains a timeless appeal today. It has been dramatized twice for BBC Radio, with the 1990 series regularly repeated.

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