War Stories

THE AFRICAN QUEEN

by C S Forester

read by Paul Moriarty

running time 7hrs

Central Africa, 1914; Rose Sayer, a thirty-three year-old English woman, is left alone when her missionary brother dies. She becomes allies with Charles Allnutt, disreputable skipper of the steam-powered launch 'African Queen'. Marooned in German Central Africa during World War I, they fight their way downriver 'to strike a blow for England'.

BATTLECRUISER

by Douglas Reeman

read by Patrick Purser

running time 10hrs 45mins

The Battle of Jutland exposed the battlecruisers’ weakness: its armour could be pierced by a single shell. In 1943, as Britain prepares to invade occupied Europe, Captain Guy Sherbrooke takes command of HMS Reliant, one of only two battlecruisers to have survived. He knows he could be her last captain.

CAPTAIN CORELLI'S MANDOLIN (X Rated)

by Louis de Bernières

read by John Leeson

running time 24hrs

When Captain Antonio Corelli, an Italian officer, is posted to the Greek island of Cephallonia in 1941 he is ostracised by the locals, but he proves to be a civilised and far from fanatical soldier and an accomplished musician. However, his attraction for the local doctor’s daughter is soon threatened as the lines are drawn between invader and defender. Contains some strong language and explicit sex.

DARKEST HOUR

by James Holland

read by Gordon Griffin

running time 16hrs

May 1940: Sergeant Jack Tanner has been posted to a training company on the southeast coast of England where the mysterious deaths of two Polish refugees lead him to believe there has been foul play. But Tanner must first deal with an enemy far more deadly than the Germans.... Book 2 of the series.

THE EAGLE HAS LANDED

by Jack Higgins

read by Christopher Cazenove

running time 12hrs

A small band of paratroopers lands on British soil, part of ‘Operation Eagle’ – Himmler’s daring plan to kidnap Winston Churchill in November 1943. When the group’s true identity is revealed the mission turns into a struggle for survival.

FAIR STOOD THE WIND FOR FRANCE

by H E Bates

read by John Leeson

running time 12hrs

John Franklin and his crew crash their aircraft in Occupied France and are taken in by a French farmer and his family who risk their lives to offer the crew protection. As the summer wears on John and the daughter of the house find themselves drawn to each other.

THE GHOST ROAD

by Pat Barker

read by Simon Russell Beale

running time 6hrs 54mins

1918, the closing months of the war. Army psychiatrist William Rivers is increasingly concerned for the men who have been in his care - particularly Billy Prior, who is about to return to combat in France with young poet Wilfred Owen. As Rivers tries to make sense of what, if anything, he has done to help these injured men, Prior and Owen await the final battles in a war that has decimated a generation. The Ghost Road is a vivid and unforgettable account of the devastating final months of the First World War.

HARVEST OF WAR

by Hilary Green

read by Penelope Freeman

running time 8hrs

Book 3 of 'Leonora Trilogy' sequel to 'Passions of War' (10889). 1916. Working as a volunteer with the Red Cross, feisty young Englishwoman Leonora Malham Brown has secretly become the lover of the dashing Colonel Sasha Malkovic. Meanwhile Leonora's fiancé Tom is engulfed in the horrors of the Somme, where he discovers a shocking secret about Leo's brother Ralph.

I CAN'T BEGIN TO TELL YOU

by Elizabeth Buchan

read by Anna Bentinck

running time 18hrs

When the Nazis invade Denmark, British-born Kay Eberstern is sickened when her husband Bror collaborates with the enemy to save his family home. As they are drawn further into danger, Kay is faced with a wrenching moral dilemma. Who will be sacrificed next for the cause? Can she and Bror ever find their way back to one another?

JOURNEY'S END

by R C Sherriff

read by Jack Richman and Freelancers

running time 2hrs

Set in World War I, this play opens in the trenches in France and concerns the lives of a group of British officers on the front line and deals with the horror and futility of trench warfare.

THE KAPPILLAN OF MALTA

by Nicholas Monsarrat

read by Richard Worland

running time 21hrs 30mins

Father Salvatore was a simple priest serving the poor in Valletta. During the Siege of Malta this humble man brought faith, hope and comfort to the homeless sheltering in the catacombs.

LAND GIRLS

by Angela Huth

read by Maureen Marshall

running time 14hrs

Three very different girls join the Womens' Land Army in the West Country. They build lifelong friendships and find life on the land has its drama.

MANSFIELD: A NOVEL

by C K Stead

read by Angela Holland

running time 8hrs

Spanning three years in the life of the writer Katherine Mansfield during the First World War, this novel follows the ups and downs of her relationship with Jack Middleton Murry and her struggle to write the "new kind of fiction" which she felt the times demanded.

NEVER SAY GOODBYE

by Hilary Green

read by Julia Franklin

running time 10hrs

Diana Escott-Stevens is young, brave and speaks fluent French so that when she applies to become a Special Operations agent she is readily accepted. Soon she is flying to occupied France where any mistake could lead to disaster.

THE OCCUPATION

by Deborah Swift

read by Ann Clark

running time 11hrs 30mins

When Nazi forces occupy Jersey in the English Channel Islands, Céline Huber, who is married to a German, must decide where her loyalty lies. Love for her island, and fear for her Jewish friend Rachel, soon propel her into a dangerous double life. How far will Céline go for her best friend and her husband? Or will their lives be changed forever by the brutality of war?

PARADE'S END: A MAN COULD STAND UP

by Ford Madox Ford

read by John Fidell

running time 10hrs

Book 3 in the 'Parade's End' series, sequel to 'Parade's End: No More Parades' (9922). When the end of the war comes, Christopher Tietjens is suffering from shellshock. Valentine Wannop, hearing that Tietjens has returned to England, decides to go to him and look after him.

RANDOM ACTS OF HEROIC LOVE

by Danny Scheinmann

read by Terrence Hardiman

running time 11hrs 25mins

This novel tells the story of how two men, decades apart, sustain themselves through the memory of love. In 1917 Moritz Daniecki survived the Great War, but had to make a dangerous journey across the Russian Steppes to get back to his sweetheart. Whilst in 1992 Leo Dakin wakes up in a South American hospital to be told that his girlfriend is dead. Richard & Judy Bookclub

SAFFRON'S ARMY

by Frederick E Smith

read by Douglas Barber

running time 9hrs 45mins

A member of a group of army misfits serving in the East African jungle during the Second World War realises, after a native boy is found murdered, that he must fight not just the enemy but his own men.

THEIR FINEST HOUR AND A HALF

by Lissa Evans

read by Anne Marlow

running time 16hrs 20mins

It is 1940. France has fallen, the war could go either way and everyone must do their bit. Young copy writer Catrin Cole is drafted into the Ministry of Information to help write women in propaganda films - something that the men aren't very good at.

UNCONDITIONAL SURRENDER

by Evelyn Waugh

read by Christian Rodska

running time 8hrs 20mins

Book 3 of ‘Sword of Honour' trilogy, sequel to 'Officers and Gentlemen' (1149). A desk job in London gives Guy Crouchback the chance of reconciliation with his former wife. Then, in Yugoslavia, as a liaison officer with the partisans, he finally becomes aware of the futility of a war he once saw in terms of honour.

VESSEL OF SADNESS

by William Woodruff

read by Sam Kelly

running time 4hrs

One of the most convincing and quietly magnificent stories about man and war. It could be any battlefield where men face death, but it is set in Italy in 1944, and is about the people who fought for their lives in Anzio.

WAITING FOR THE DAY (X Rated)

by Leslie Thomas

read by Terrence Hardiman

running time 12hrs 30mins

In midwinter of 1943 Britain is gripped by intense cold and experiencing its darkest days of the war. For four men this is a period of relative calm before each man finds himself heading for the beaches of France. X rated, contains offensive language and explicit sex.

THE YOUNG LIONS

by Irwin Shaw

read by Ray Adamson

running time 28hrs 30mins

Told from the viewpoints of a young Nazi, an American film producer and a shy, recently married Jewish boy, the novel portrays the experiences of ordinary soldiers fighting World War II and the confusion and complexity of war.

THE ZOOKEEPER'S WAR (X Rated)

by Steven Conte

read by Rosemary Graham

running time 11hrs 30mins

In Berlin Zoo during the last years of WW2, Vera – an Australian, and her husband are struggling to look after the animals with the help of forced labourers. Tensions rise as war ravages the city, and it becomes clear that no-one can be trusted. X rated, contains graphic violence and explicit sex.