Book picks similar to
Talking Heads 2 by Alan Bennett
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The Killer Next Door
Alex Marwood - 2013
23 has a secret. In this bedsit-riddled south London wreck, lorded over by a lecherous landlord, something waits to be discovered. Yet all six residents have something to hide.Collette and Cher are on the run; Thomas is a reluctant loner; while a gorgeous Iranian asylum seeker and a 'quiet man' nobody sees try to stay hidden. And watching over them all is Vesta - or so she thinks. In the dead of night, a terrible accident pushes the neighbours into an uneasy alliance. But one of them is a killer, expertly hiding their pastime, all the while closing in on their next victim...As a cloying heatwave suffocates the city, events build to an electrifying climax in this dark, original and irresistibly compelling thriller.
Lord John and the Hellfire Club
Diana Gabaldon - 1998
Soon he is mixed up in the affairs of Sir Francis Dashwood and his notorious Hellfire Club.
Fated
Benedict Jacka - 2012
And while Alex's own powers aren't as showy as some mages, he does have the advantage of foreseeing the possible future--allowing him to pull off operations that have a million-to-one-chance of success. But when Alex is approached by multiple factions to crack open a relic from a long-ago mage war, he knows that whatever's inside must be beyond powerful. And thanks to his abilities, Alex can predict that by taking the job, his odds of survival are about to go from slim to none...
Jeeves and the King of Clubs
Ben Schott - 2018
Treason is afoot in the highest social circles. The very security of the nation is in peril. Jeeves, it transpires, has long been an agent of British Intelligence, but now His Majesty's Government must turn to the one man who can help . . . Bertie Wooster.In this magnificent new homage to P. G. Wodehouse, Ben Schott leads Jeeves and Wooster on an uproarious adventure of espionage through the secret corridors of Whitehall, the sunlit lawns of Brinkley Court, and the private clubs of St James's.We encounter an unforgettable cast of characters – old and new – including outraged chefs and exasperated aunts, disreputable politicians and gambling bankers, slushy debs and Cockney cabbies, sphinx-like tailors, and sylph-like spies.There is treachery to be foiled, naturally, but also horses to be backed, auctions to be fixed, engagements to be escaped, madmen to be blackballed, and a new variety of condiment to be cooked up.'Jeeves & the King of Clubs' is essential reading for aficionados of The Master, and a perfect introduction to the joys of Jeeves and Wooster for those who have never before dipped their toe.'Impossible to read without grinning idiotically.' - Mark Sanderson, Evening StandardBibliographical note: Although the cover reads 'Jeeves and the King of Clubs' , the half-title and tile page read 'Jeeves & the King of Clubs' and this is how it is catalogued above. In addition the title page does state, separate from the actual title, 'An homage to P.G. Wodehouse authorised by the Wodehouse Estate' and adds, 'With Authorial Endnotes'.
Amadeus
Peter Shaffer - 1979
Devout court composer Antonio Salieri plots against his rival, the dissolute but supremely talented Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. How far will Salieri go to achieve the fame that Mozart disregards? The 1981 Tony Award winner for Best Play. An L.A. Theatre Works full cast performance featuring: Steven Brand as Baron van Swieten James Callis as Mozart Michael Emerson as Salieri Darren Richardson as Venticello 2 Alan Shearman as Count Orsini-Rosenberg Mark Jude Sullivan as Venticello 1 Simon Templeman as Joseph II Brian Tichnell as Count Johann Kilian Von Strack Jocelyn Towne as Constanze Directed by Rosalind Ayres. Recorded in Los Angeles before a live audience at The James Bridges Theater, UCLA in September of 2016.
Reflex
Dick Francis - 1980
Longtime jockey Philip Nore suspects that a racetrack photographer's fatal accident was really murder--and unravels some nasty secrets of corruption, blackmail, and murder.
Longbourn
Jo Baker - 2013
Sarah, the orphaned housemaid, spends her days scrubbing the laundry, polishing the floors, and emptying the chamber pots for the Bennet household. But there is just as much romance, heartbreak, and intrigue downstairs at Longbourn as there is upstairs. When a mysterious new footman arrives, the orderly realm of the servants’ hall threatens to be completely, perhaps irrevocably, upended. Jo Baker dares to take us beyond the drawing rooms of Jane Austen’s classic—into the often overlooked domain of the stern housekeeper and the starry-eyed kitchen maid, into the gritty daily particulars faced by the lower classes in Regency England during the Napoleonic Wars—and, in doing so, creates a vivid, fascinating, fully realized world that is wholly her own.
Just One Damned Thing After Another
Jodi Taylor - 2013
They don't do 'time-travel' - they 'investigate major historical events in contemporary time'. Maintaining the appearance of harmless eccentrics is not always within their power - especially given their propensity for causing loud explosions when things get too quiet.Meet the disaster-magnets of St Mary's Institute of Historical Research as they ricochet around History. Their aim is to observe and document - to try and find the answers to many of History's unanswered questions...and not to die in the process. But one wrong move and History will fight back - to the death. And, as they soon discover - it's not just History they're fighting.Follow the catastrophe curve from 11th-century London to World War I, and from the Cretaceous Period to the destruction of the Great Library at Alexandria. For wherever Historians go, chaos is sure to follow in their wake....
The American Heiress
Daisy Goodwin - 2010
Traveling abroad with her mother at the turn of the twentieth century to seek a titled husband, beautiful, vivacious Cora Cash, whose family mansion in Newport dwarfs the Vanderbilts', suddenly finds herself Duchess of Wareham, married to Ivo, the most eligible bachelor in England. Nothing is quite as it seems, however: Ivo is withdrawn and secretive, and the English social scene is full of traps and betrayals. Money, Cora soon learns, cannot buy everything, as she must decide what is truly worth the price in her life and her marriage. Witty, moving, and brilliantly entertaining, Cora's story marks the debut of a glorious storyteller who brings a fresh new spirit to the world of Edith Wharton and Henry James.
The Tower, The Zoo, and The Tortoise
Julia Stuart - 2010
That’s right, he is a Beefeater (they really do live there). It’s no easy job living and working in the tourist attraction in present-day London. Among the eccentric characters who call the Tower’s maze of ancient buildings and spiral staircases home are the Tower’s Rack & Ruin barmaid, Ruby Dore, who just found out she’s pregnant; portly Valerie Jennings, who is falling for ticket inspector Arthur Catnip; the lifelong bachelor Reverend Septimus Drew, who secretly pens a series of principled erotica; and the philandering Ravenmaster, aiming to avenge the death of one of his insufferable ravens. When Balthazar is tasked with setting up an elaborate menagerie within the Tower walls to house the many exotic animals gifted to the Queen, life at the Tower gets all the more interesting. Penguins escape, giraffes are stolen, and the Komodo dragon sends innocent people running for their lives. Balthazar is in charge and things are not exactly running smoothly. Then Hebe decides to leave him and his beloved tortoise “runs” away. Filled with the humor and heart that calls to mind the delightful novels of Alexander McCall Smith, and the charm and beauty of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, The Tower, the Zoo, and the Tortoise is a magical, wholly original novel whose irresistible characters will stay with you long after you turn the stunning last page. Published in the UK in August 2010 as Balthazar Jones and the Tower of London Zoo.
My Uncle Oswald
Roald Dahl - 1979
Here, many famous names are mentioned and there is obviously a grave risk that families and friends are going to take offence... Uncle Oswald discovers the electrifying properties of the Sudanese Blister Beetle and the gorgeous Yasmin Howcomely, a girl absolutely soaked in sex, and sets about seducing all the great men of the time for his own wicked, irreverent reasons.
Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow
Jerome K. Jerome - 1886
This book wouldn't elevate a cow. I cannot conscientiously recommend it for any useful purposes whatever. All I can suggest is that when you get tired of reading 'the best hundred books, ' you may take this up for half an hour. It will be a change." (from the Preface to "Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow by Jerome Jerome)
Wilt
Tom Sharpe - 1976
Ahead of him at the Polytechnic stretch years of trying to thump literature into the heads of plasterers, joiners, butchers and the like. And things are no better at home where his massive wife, Eva, is given to boundless and unpredictable fits of enthusiasm -for transcendental meditation, yoga or the trampoline. But if Wilt can do nothing about his job, he can do something about his wife, in imagination at least, and his fantasies grow daily more murderous and more concrete. After a peculiarly nasty experience at a party thrown by particularly nasty Americans, Wilt finds himself in several embarrassing positions: Eva stalks out in stratospheric dudgeon, and Wilt, under the inspiration of gin, puts one of his more vindictive fantasies into effect. But suspicions are instantly aroused and Wilt rapidly achieves an unenviable notoriety in the role of The Man Helping Police With Their Enquiries. Or is he exactly helping? Wilt's problem -although he's on the other side of the fence -is the same as Inspector Flint's: where is Eva Wilt? But Wilt begins to flourish in the heat of the investigation, and as the police stoke the flames of circumstantial evidence, Wilt deploys all his powers to show that the Law can't tell a Missing Person from a hole in the ground.