Showing results by narrator "Chris MacDonnell" in All Categories

Set in rural Victorian England, Far from the Madding Crowd describes the life and relationships of a woman Farmer, Bathsheba Everdene. First with the faithful shepherd Gabriel Oak, then her lonely neighbor William Boldwood, and finally, the prodigal soldier Sergeant Frank Troy.

Our world has fallen still. One half lies drenched in eternal daylight, the other cloaked in endless night. Our people are divided, some living under the sun, the others hidden in shadow. All is light or darkness. All is the sun or the moon. All but me. My father was born in the never-ending sunlight of the West. My mother is a daughter of darkness. I am split in two. Like the moth of our forests, one wing white and the other black, I am torn.

Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas is a classic science-fiction novel by French author Jules Verne. First serialized in 1870, the plot is straightforward. There is believed to be a monster terrorizing ships on the oceans of the world and an expedition is organized to hunt it and eradicate it from the seas. At the first encounter, marine biologist M. Arronax and his servant Conseil along with a Canadian harpooner (Ned Land) are washed overboard and are picked up by the submarine vessel Nautilus, which is the actual perpetrator of the terrorizing incidents.

For countless years, Moth has been frozen still, one half drenched in eternal daylight, the other cloaked in endless night. For countless years, the soldiers of sunlight and the dwellers of darkness have lived in isolation. We are the children of Moth. We were born in sunlight or in shadow. We can stop the fire, or we can watch our world burn. This is our story.

Our world burns with war. In the west, the people of eternal sunlight invade the darkness, armed with swords, arrows, and torches. In the east, the children of endless night fight from the shadows. Soldiers of sunlight and dwellers of darkness. Their war flares across the world of Moth.

The sun no longer rises. Evening no longer falls. In the lands of endless sunlight, we fear the darkness, we forge swords, we march to war. In the shadows of eternal night, we hide, we pray, we die. Soldiers of sunlight and children of darkness - we were once one. We were torn apart. We must be one again.

A Tale of Two Cities (1859) is set in Paris and London, firmly placed in the period leading up to and including the French Revolution to the subsequent Reign of Terror. It's primarily the tale of Doctor Alexandre Manette, who is unjustly imprisoned in the Bastille for 18 years; his daughter, Lucie Manette, who believes him to be dead; two men who both fall in love with her; and the supporters or foes of the family who, for their own reasons, love or despise them.

1991: A plan to destabilise Hong Kong is emerging; the key players are being put into place, the wheels are in motion and innocent people will die. Frank Bowen is a Londoner on holiday in tropical Thailand. Half drunk and strapped for cash, he’s the perfect bait for a political plot that will leave him running for his life, with nowhere to turn.

The novel is the story of a scientist who, through the study of optics finds a way to make things invisible. In a desire for recognition, fame, and the advantages of being invisible, he subjects himself to the process. But being unseen isn't as positive as he had hoped, and he soon finds himself regretting his condition, and his mind also becomes warped. He becomes mentally unhinged. Later, he embraces his invisibility and begins to spiral into a lust for power and control, and he reveals a plan he has hatched to unleash his personal "terror" on the world.

Nine-year-old Jenny Carson is brutally murdered in Kenton Wood on her way from school. Then Charles Lendon is found stabbed to death with a skewer through his heart. He was a ruthless lawyer and something of a womanizer. Jenny's father blamed him for her murder. As the local police struggle, Inspector Crow is called in. Can he connect the two killings? He discovers that several of those closest to Charles Lendon had good reason to hate him: his housekeeper lover, her unstable brother, even the boyfriend of his attractive young colleague Cathy Tennant.

When eminent climatologist Dr. Dale Stanton - in the process of studying the Atlantic Ocean's thermohaline circulation - is found dead in his London apartment, environmental lawyer Robert Spire is given the task of administering a large legacy left to global warming organizations. The job is straightforward until a second climatologist, Dr. Jack Bannister, drops dead on the other side of the Atlantic.

For the past six months, since solving the thefts of England's subsidies meant for its war allies, Lady Cecilia and Sir James Branstoke have concentrated on renovating their estate in Kent. When David Thornbridge sends word to them that someone has kidnapped a child from The East India Company dock, Cecilia and James immediately return to London to investigate. Their investigation leads them from warehouses, to a society musical entertainment, and to the rooftops and chimneys of London. And just when they rescue the child, murder occurs.

After a long journey, Jax finds himself abandoned far from home in the desert nation of Kalicodon. When any infraction to tribal honor will land him in chains as a slave, he must learn quickly to adapt in a foreign land in hopes of maintaining his freedom. In his struggles to liberate Daren from slavery, he meets Jesnia, a woman from his homeland, who has hunted fugitives from justice to the eastern edge of the desert. Without his own cunning and her talents, Jax may very well meet his end, fighting for his life in the arena.

Given the time and location in which it was written, the original Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi contains many events and episodes which, today, many consider unsuitable for a modern children's audience. The Disney animated version was changed in many ways to reflect this - and so is this adaptation. Chris MacDonnell and Spoken Realms have re-imagined and re-written the more unsuitable sections to reflect contemporary expectations of children's literature. However, it is still truly a children's classic and the story is largely unchanged.

Down for the Count explores the tawdry history of elections in the United States - a chronicle of votes bought, stolen, suppressed, lost, miscounted, thrown into rivers, and litigated up to the US Supreme Court - and uses it to explain why we are now experiencing the biggest backslide in voting rights in more than a century. This thoroughly revised edition, first published to acclaim and some controversy in 2005 as Steal This Vote, reveals why America is unique among established Western democracies in its inability to run clean, transparent elections.

Scrooge! His name has become synonymous with being miserly and miserable, especially at Christmas! A Christmas Carol is the much-loved novella by Charles Dickens which tells Scrooge's story. This mean, misanthropic man is visited by the ghost of his former partner, Jacob Marley, and then three spirits: the ghosts of Christmas Past, of Christmas Present, and of Christmas Yet to Come.

Adolf Verloc is a secret agent who provides information and takes care of arriving undercover agents of an un-named government through their embassy. He also runs a shady business selling pornography, comic books, contraceptives, and the like. As well as this, he’s a confidential informant to Chief Inspector Heat of the London police. His family consists of his wife, Winnie, her Mother, and his (presumably) autistic brother-in-law, Stevie.

Retired from the force, Detective Superintendent Jeffrey Brandt goes native. He stabs a woman but holds back from killing her. Frustrated that no one takes any notice, he ups his game. Next time, he'll kill. Brandt fully knows how the police work. He'll use this knowledge to win a sick game; after all, he's chosen the rules. The crime scenes are spotless, Brandt's covered his tracks. There is no forensic evidence. Yet each killing has his unmistakable print. Faced with the challenge of discovering his identity is DCI Stella Johnson. She rises to Brandt's macabre challenge.

London, 1888. A madman has begun the most notorious series of murders in history. With each new discovery of a woman's mutilated body, the citywide panic grows. The police seem unable to stop the killer, even when he taunts them with letters. Letters signed...Jack the Ripper. In another part of London, the reign of terror has touched a young writer and theater manager named Bram Stoker. The police have closed his theater's production of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde and suspect its star of being Jack the Ripper. His livelihood endangered, Stoker sets out to find the real killer.

When newlyweds Sir James and Lady Cecilia Branstoke come to console a widow on the death of her husband, they discover some things don't add up about the death of the young Lord. Worse, a man who won't state his purpose, but is obviously military, wants a carte blanche to search the dead man's library! The sheer effrontery!