Showing results by narrator "John Banks" in All Categories

Greymane believed he'd outrun his past. With his school for swordsmanship in Falar, he was looking forward to a quiet life, although his colleague, Kyle, wasn't as enamoured with life outside the mercenary company, the Crimson Guard. However, it seems it is not so easy for an ex-Fist of the Malazan Empire to disappear, especially one under sentence of death from that same Empire.

Tens of thousands of years of ice is melting, and the land of Assail, long a byword for menace and inaccessibility, is at last yielding its secrets. Tales of gold discovered in the region's north circulate in every waterfront dive and sailor's tavern, and now adventurers and fortune seekers have set sail in search of riches. And all they have to guide them are legends and garbled tales of the dangers that lie in wait - hostile coasts, fields of ice, impassable barriers and strange, terrifying creatures.

After the destruction of the Infidus Imperator, Kor Phaeron of the Word Bearers brought his followers to supposed safety in the Eye of Terror. However, their newly adopted home, the daemon world Sicarus, is far from the sanctuary they imagined - the twisted hordes of the Kairic Adept Larazzar seek to crush these newcomers and all who would ally with them. Only in the ancient legends of Sicarus can their salvation be found, but is Kor Phaeron the one to lead them to it?

January 1474, in the deep cold of an ice-bound Danzig: a man is spending a frivolous winter not facing up to his responsibilities.... It is the merchant Niccolo, diviner, soldier, banker to kings; shunned by all who know him after revelations of his murderous mischief-making. But his talents are too great to be squandered, and a subtle political dance ensues as rivals in Poland, Venice, and Persia bid for his services in trade and war and diplomacy. Niccolo has lost his family, but he will discover a new purpose in life....

Penguin presents the audiobook edition of Race of Scorpions by Dorothy Dunnett, read by John Banks. This is the third book in the House of Niccolo series. Set in 15th-century Cyprus, this novel continues the saga of Nicholas van der Poel, international mercenary who started out as a dyer's apprentice, as he plays for the highest stakes with the greatest superpowers in Europe.

Merchant-banker Nicholas de Fleury, having wrested his infant son from the boy's formidable mother, pauses en route to the land of golden light to set in train a deception that will ensnare nations in the triumphant ruin of his enemies. This is volume six in the House of Niccolo.

Gemini represents the final appearance of Nicholas de Fleury, who opened this series as a carefree, clumsy 18-year-old apprentice in Flanders. Now he is in his 30s. The culmination of this amazing series sees Niccolo face his toughest battle yet, against an enemy who will tax every skill he has acquired over the course of the last few years....

"Dear Mervyn. If you want to prevent a murder, then you must attend the recording at the Sounderama studios on Thursday. Signed: a friend." Vixens from the Void is back! After twenty-five years, the popular leather-clad astro-erotic sci-fi television show is returning! Well, sort of. Actually, some devoted Vixens fans have got the licence to do some audios featuring the original cast, and they've invited Mervyn Stone to write an episode. But that's not the only thing he's been invited to do.

Imprisoned in a Tsarran mine, Cam dreams of escape. When he unexpectedly becomes a gang boss, his unorthodox leadership and healing skills earn him the loyalty of his miners. His big mouth and penchant for sass, however, earn the ire of others who want him punished or dead. As the miners suffer from privation and barbaric cruelty, Cam and his gang suspect a darker plot is at work, a plot that might get them all killed. Will anyone listen? Is there any way out? And who is the mysterious prisoner locked away in the apothecary’s clinic?

The Nausch invasion is imminent. Cam must face Molne, Horrors, and the King of Horrors itself to save the world from certain destruction. As Cam’s body, heart, and mind are broken, he must anchor to the healer within himself to push through violence and sorrow. In him is the power to cross the threshold of death, learn the secrets of his enemies, and push the darkness back. When the King of Horrors comes to take the skins and spirits of the world to fashion an alien kingdom, Cam and his allies fight and fall together in a last stand to save what’s left of the world.

With his acclaimed debut, The Gutter Prayer, Gareth Hanrahan introduced a world of sorcerers and thieves, broken gods and dangerous magic. Now, this epic tale continues in The Shadow Saint, the gripping second novel in the Black Iron Legacy. As the Godswar draws ever closer and tensions within the city escalate, how long will the people of Guerdon be able to keep their enemies at bay?

It's not easy to live in a world ruled by dragons. The taxes are high, and their control is complete. But for one group of bold misfits, it's time to band together and steal back some of that wealth. No one said they were smart.

Henry Kyllo is a Runner, a member of a secret society called the Inferne Cutis. Every day he is chased through the city by Hunters whose goal is to fill him with bullets. It is a secret war steeped in history, tradition, and mutual fear. Rumours abound about what happens when a Runner achieves ascension, but it has supposedly never happened before, so no one knows for sure. Except that it has happened before. And it is happening again. This time to Henry Kyllo.

Berkeley Silver, one of the richest men in the Earth empire, lies dead in the penthouse suite of the Galileo space-hotel. Law enforcement officers Detective Captain McGinnis and Detective Sergeant Mead are called in to investigate - but it seems to have been the perfect crime. Even when subjected to a memory scan, everybody in the space-hotel has an alibi for the murder. Which means it can have been the work of only one woman.

A global pandemic forces Poe and Tilly to self-isolate together. Things don't go well. They're bickering and on the verge of falling out until Poe finds an old case file: a locked-room mystery he's been mulling over for years. Step forward, Tilly Bradshaw.

Whilst on a murder-mystery evening in deepest darkest Northumberland, Poe manages to annoy everyone whilst simultaneously solving a mystery - what happened to a five-carat red diamond called the Red Moon of Coonowrin.

The sharp, funny, entirely original and explosive debut novel by Adam Thirlwell – twice named one of the Best Young British Novelists by Granta magazine. In case you had not noticed, writes Adam Thirlwell in his first novel, Politics, in this book I am not interested in anything so small as the history of the USSR. I am not writing anything so limited. In this epic miniature, therefore, Politics tells the story of three kids in their twenties falling in love with each other in London.

Mondo Bizzarro sees Tilly drag Poe to Durham to meet her favourite fantasy author, Aldridge Fowler, but when they arrive, he's already dead - killed by his own hand. Despite the overwhelming evidence though, Poe suspects the bookshop staff might be hiding a terrible secret.

The more I knew of Haffner, writes Adam Thirlwell in The Escape, the more real he became, this was true. And, simultaneously, Haffner disappeared. In a forgotten spa town snug in the Alps, at the end of the twentieth century, Haffner is seeking a cure, more women, and a villa that belonged to his late wife. But really he is trying to escape: from his family, his lovers, his history, his entire Haffnerian condition. For Haffner is 78. Haffner, in other words, is too old to be grown up.

Ignored by his dad, bullied by the teachers at his posh school, and picked on by the gang of kids who roam the stairways of his tower block home, Roland Wright thinks he has it pretty bad. Then, a broken lift hurls him into a strange kingdom where fantasy and reality meet, and Roland finds that his nightmare has only just begun. Who can Roland trust in this bizarre new world? The obsequious caretaker with his rattling keys and cryptic advice? The enchanting Lady who just wants to care for him? The King of the Castle himself?