Showing results by narrator "Liam Gerrard" in All Categories

This remarkable and monumental book at last provides a comprehensive answer to the age-old riddle of whether there are only a small number of "basic stories" in the world. Using a wealth of examples, from ancient myths and folk tales via the plays and novels of great literature to the popular movies and TV soap operas of today, it reveals that there are seven archetypal themes which recur throughout every kind of storytelling.

What might we dare to expect from an actor's autobiography, even one from a star as personable as George Sanders? In the case of Memoirs of a Professional Cad, we possibly get more than we deserve. George Sanders undoubtedly led a colorful, glamorous, and even action-packed life, spanning the peak years of Hollywood's golden age. But the greatest joy of his memoirs is how funny they are and how penetrating their author's wit.

A century before Britain became involved in this terrible business, whole villages and towns in European countries were being depopulated by slavers, who transported the men, women, and children to Africa, where they were sold. This is the forgotten slave trade, one which saw over a million Christians forced into captivity in the Muslim world. Starting in the ancient world, Simon Webb traces the history of slavery in Europe, showing that the numbers involved were vast and that the victims were often treated far more cruelly than black slaves in America and the Caribbean.

An immediate sensation when it was first published in two volumes in 1945, Popper's monumental achievement has attained legendary status on both the Left and Right and is credited with inspiring anticommunist dissidents during the Cold War. Arguing that the spirit of free, critical inquiry that governs scientific investigation should also apply to politics, Popper traces the roots of an opposite, authoritarian tendency to a tradition represented by Plato, Marx, and Hegel. 

Before the Romans could become masters of the Mediterranean, they had to first conquer the people of their own peninsula. This book explores the origins of Roman imperialism and the creation of Rome's early Italian empire, bringing new light and interpretations to this important but problematic period in Roman history. It explains how and why the Romans were able to expand their influence within Italy, often through the use of armed conflict, laying the foundations for their great imperial project.

Reason, we are told, is what makes us human, the source of our knowledge and wisdom. If reason is so useful, why didn't it also evolve in other animals? If reason is that reliable, why do we produce so much thoroughly reasoned nonsense? In their groundbreaking account of the evolution and workings of reason, Hugo Mercier and Dan Sperber set out to solve this double enigma.

There's a secret, that much is certain, but who knows? The missing actress? The executive producer, his eavesdropping assistant? Or the actor who portrayed her fictional brother on the Soap Opera? DCI Isaac Cook of the Murder Investigation Team at Challis Street Police Station in London is searching for the missing woman. Why has he been taken away from more important crimes to search for the woman? It's not the first time she's gone missing, and why does everyone assume she's been murdered?

Raconteurs Audio and Spoken Realms team up once again to bring this second collection of short stories by H. G. Wells to audio. Written between 1894 and 1902, this anthology of 13 stories delves into botany, flying machines, travel, distant lands and customs, virology, magic, taxidermy, journalism - and there’s even a ghost story.

The more we know about the catastrophic implications of climate change, the more fossil fuels we burn. How did we end up in this mess? In this masterful new history, Andreas Malm claims it all began in Britain with the rise of steam power. But why did manufacturers turn from traditional sources of power, notably water mills, to an engine fired by coal? Contrary to established views, steam offered neither cheaper nor more abundant energy - but rather superior control of subordinate labor.

In the newly updated third edition of The Negotiation Book: Your Definitive Guide to Successful Negotiating, distinguished commercial negotiator Steve Gates delivers a singular and practical guide to the art and science of negotiation. The book lays out the behaviors and traits associated with successful negotiation and offers a comprehensive model for how power, process, and behavior can have substantial impacts on your next negotiation. You'll also learn how you can shape these factors to optimize value for yourself, your client, or your organization.

A concise, star-studded retelling of Italy's past, from Caesar and Augustus to da Vinci and Michelangelo, tracing the story of a country with prodigious global influence—from a foremost author of historic Italy.

Streamline KPIs to craft a simpler, more effective system of performance measurement.   

An unparalleled practical training tool for investment analysis, On the Hunt for Great Companies helps listeners move beyond using rules of thumb for companies or investment hypotheses based on broad-level pattern recognition. Listeners will learn how to assess all the essential traits of a good business, including passionate management, staying power, abnormal reinvestment options, low dependency risk, and to identify emerging quality. This book is supported by a wealth of real-world examples, both contemporary and historical, and true business stories and anecdotes.

The fourth installment in the Music and Murder Mystery series, edited by Don Bruns, Bat Out of Hell is a nonstop thrill ride of engrossing mysteries from some of the best authors in the business. An anthology unlike any other, this collection includes a brand-new Jack Reacher story from Andrew Child, a never-before-seen Pignon Scorbion prequel from Rick Bleiweiss, as well as exciting new mysteries from Heather Graham, Don Bruns, John Gilstrap, Dave Bruns, C. J. Kudlacz, and Charles Todd.

Howard Norman’s The Bird Artist, the first book of his Canadian trilogy, begins in 1911. Its narrator, Fabian Vas, is a bird artist: he draws and paints the birds of Witless Bay, his remote Newfoundland coastal village home. In the first paragraph of his tale, Fabian reveals that he has murdered the village lighthouse keeper, Botho August. Later, he confesses who and what drove him to his crime—a measured, profoundly engrossing story of passion, betrayal, guilt, and redemption between men and women. The Bird Artist is a 1994 National Book Award Finalist for Fiction.

Barry der Menschenretter—a.k.a. Barry—the most famous St. Bernard dog in history, tells the story of his life for the first time. Eight-thousand feet above sea level, in the treacherous pass in the Alps between Italy and Switzerland, the monks of the hospice of St. Bernard have, since the eleventh century, kept dogs to help them rescue travelers lost in the snow. 

Solar power has come of age. Not only has it become one of the key alternatives to fossil fuels, it can now be deployed in a way that makes a viable business with a financial profit. Solarnomics describes the economics of building and operating a solar power plant today and provides a window into a future in which several technologies collaborate, and in which all participants in the electricity grid become smarter at scheduling both the supply and demand for electric power to give humanity a future that is sustainable, both environmentally and economically.

What makes us who we are? Many think that we are just complicated machines, or animals that are different from machines only by being conscious. Richard Swinburne comes to the defense of the soul and presents new philosophical arguments that are supported by modern neuroscience. When scientific advances enable neuroscientists to transplant a part of brain into a new body, he reasons, no matter how much we can find out about their brain activity or conscious experiences, we will never know whether the resulting person is the same as before or somebody entirely new.

To most, Winston Churchill remains Great Britain's greatest prime minister. Yet while he presided over his country's finest hour, he was not its most consequential leader. In this definitive new biography, John Bew reveals how that designation belongs to Clement Attlee, Churchill's successor, who launched a new era of political, economic, and social reform that would forever change Great Britain.

In twelfth-century Ireland, girls go missing—fleeing arranged marriages, carried off by outlaws, abducted by faeries. Rhiannon, treasured daughter of nobility, believes herself secure, shielded by her parents’ stone manor and friendship with the king. But as her beauty grows and suitors jostle for her dowry, she watches her father’s tenants wrung dry in order to supply the banquet for her older sister’s wedding, and realizes the marriage market is a game she does not want to win. A convent offers a life of books and learning, although it means turning her back on mortal men for good.