Audiobooks narrated by Emma Spurgin Hussey

The Rouse: The long-awaited masterpiece from the author of The City & The City

"'Completely without parallel' - Michael Moorcock, author of The Dancers at the End of Time 'A magisterial wonder' - Paul Tremblay, author of The Cabin at the End of the World 'An extraordinary tour de force' - Adrian Tchaikovsky, author of Children of Time 'Every page feels alive' - Xiaolu Guo, author of Call Me Ishmaelle From the bestselling, award-winning master of uncanny fiction comes a defining work, twenty years in the making - a deeply moving, decade- and continent-spanning epic of grief, global tumult, and grim conspiracy. Maur's life has been shaped by an unbearable loss. But in the aftermath of what is an apparently ordinary tragedy, deeper, stranger questions arise . . . Their answers may lie within the dark heart and darker history of an old soldier who shares Maur's obsessions - and is violently pursued by the same unknown, unquiet forces. So begins The Rouse, a masterpiece unlike any other: at once a sprawling saga of the bloody twentieth century, and the intimate story of two lives, their loves, regrets and secrets - and a terrifying journey into infinite mystery. Praise for China Miéville, author of The City & The City 'You can't talk about Miéville without using the word "brilliant"' - Ursula K. Le Guin 'One of the most interesting and freakishly gifted writers of his generation' - The Daily Telegraph 'As intelligent as he is original' - The Guardian 'The names of Kafka and Orwell tend to be invoked too easily for anything a bit out of the ordinary, but in this case they are worthy comparisons' - The Times"

China Miéville (Author), China Miéville, Colin Mace, Emma Spurgin Hussey (Narrator)

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The Woman Who Threw Her Life Away: An emotional and totally addictive family drama packed with secrets

"What if throwing everything away gave you everything back? Up in the attic, I sort through the boxes of old photos, broken airbeds and sun umbrellas. Why does my husband Giles refuse to throw anything away? Then my eyes fix upon a dusty stack of letters and a memory stabs at my chest. They’re all dated thirty years ago, but I’d recognise that handwriting anywhere, and seeing it again now makes my heart skip a beat…** Back in our bedroom, I force myself to get ready for my birthday meal. Giles’ friends – our friends – will no doubt arrive in designer dresses and expensive suits, but turning sixty has made me realise that things can’t make you happy. So maybe it’s time to see if the reverse is true… Will throwing away all the possessions I was convinced I wanted free up space to see what really matters? How will it feel to be defined by who I am, rather than what I own – or who I’m married to? This is not how I thought my life would be when I left everything behind for Giles. As I walk into my party wearing a perfectly rehearsed smile, I can’t stop thinking about the letters in the attic. So many words left unsaid. Is it too late to explain why I did what I did? And can I be trusted to do the right thing, even if it means destroying the life I’d fought so hard to build? If the truth comes out I could lose everything. Or I could get everything back... The Woman Who Threw Her Life Away is an emotional and gripping novel that is packed with family secrets. If you love Liane Moriarty or Diane Chamberlain, you won’t be able to put this down.**"

Kerry Fisher (Author), Emma Spurgin Hussey (Narrator)

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Custody: The Secret History of Mothers

"'A GREAT ROAR OF A BOOK' Sunday Times We think that our children belong to us, but families are fragile things. Every day, for over a century, children have been moved between homes because of law cases that decide their fates. Yet child custody is curiously absent from history books and from how we generally understand our world. Lara Feigel’s groundbreaking book shows the fraught, complex territory of child custody to have been one of the vital battlegrounds of modern history and culture. Custody is the story of seven women – Caroline Norton, George Sand, Elizabeth Packard, Frieda Lawrence, Edna O’Brien, Alice Walker, Britney Spears – who have fought for their children and been found wanting. It is also the story of the children who have lost the care they most need because divorce is at heart a macabre continuation of matrimony in a new setting, with the battles of the marriage stoked into new levels of acrimony by the courts. It’s a book of dramatic storytelling, and of blistering polemic and large-scale historical re-evaluation. Each chapter immerses the reader in the life and times – and struggles – of these fascinating, charismatic, complex women and their children. All of these women were mothers, but all of them wanted and needed to be other things too – writers, lovers, or activists – and they and their children were punished for these attempts. Feigel has been deep in the archives, looking into thousands of other cases in each place and time, and she’s been sitting in on the family courts in the present. So alongside these central figures, the book presents a teeming picture of fractured family life in Britain, Europe and North America across two hundred years, offering a major new interpretation of how our modern culture has evolved. And Custody is an alternative history of feminism, centring on the fraught relationship between emancipation and care. This book is of urgent interest to anyone concerned with women’s roles in the world and how institutions fail them. Ultimately it’s a book that sees custody as the nexus where motherhood, ideology and power meet. Custody cases can seem in these chapters to be quintessentially tragic, but the stories of these passionate, conflicted women also make us want to figure out how to do things better."

Lara Feigel (Author), Emma Spurgin Hussey (Narrator)

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Proto: How One Ancient Language Went Global

"*A GUARDIAN, NEW STATESMAN, PROSPECT AND WATERSTONES BEST BOOK OF 2025* 'The fascinating story of ancient words … new revelations await' The Guardian 'A magisterial feat' New Scientist One ancient language transformed our world. This is its story. Star. Stjarna. Stare. Thousands of miles apart, people look up at the night sky and use the same word to describe what they see. Listen to these English, Icelandic and Iranic words and you can hear echoes of one of the most extraordinary journeys in humanity’s past. All three of these languages – and hundreds more – share a single ancient ancestor. Five millennia ago, in a mysterious Big Bang of its own, this proto tongue exploded, forming new worlds as it spread east and west. Today, nearly half of humanity speaks an Indo-European language. How did this happen? In Proto, acclaimed journalist Laura Spinney sets off to find out. With her we travel the length of the steppe, navigating the Caucasus, the Silk Roads and the Hindu Kush. We follow in the footsteps of nomads and monks, Amazon warriors and lion kings – the ancient peoples who spread these tongues far and wide. In the present, Spinney meets the linguists, archaeologists and geneticists racing to recover this lost world. What they have discovered has vital lessons for our modern age, as people and their languages are on the move again. Proto is a revelatory portrait of world history in its own words."

Laura Spinney (Author), Emma Spurgin Hussey (Narrator)

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In Harm’s Way: The memoir of a child protection lawyer from the most secretive court in England and Wales – the Family Court

"‘Should be required reading for those who care about how society treats our most vulnerable citizens.’ – Louise Allen When the system fails the parents, how can it protect the children? Welcome to the secretive world of the Family Court. What's it like to act for a father who has recently overcome his drug problem but risks losing his beloved son to foster care? Or to represent a young mother whose abusive childhood has left her depressed and struggling to cope, to the point where the local authority is seeking to persuade the Family Court to place her small children for adoption? The Family Court makes life-changing decisions about the most vulnerable children in England and Wales behind closed doors. It's an institution tasked with protecting the youngers most at risk, but how often does it make the right decisions? In this hard-hitting account of her work representing parents in care proceedings in the Family Court, child protection lawyer Teresa Thornhill conveys the dilemmas inherent in the job and shows how our under-resourced system of child protection – in both its social work and legal aspects – often fails to provide support that could enable the most vulnerable parents to continue to care for their children. ‘A vivid account of all the terrible things that can happen to children and all the challenges facing lawyers and social workers in our child protection system which is meant to help and protect them but which struggles to do so. It doesn’t have to be this way so what can be done about it?’ – Rt Hon Lady Hale DBE, Formerly President of the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom. ‘This timely book resonated with my experiences as a children’s social worker and probation officer; it’s a refreshingly honest account of our dysfunctional child protection system.’ – Joanna Hughes, former children’s social worker and probation officer."

Teresa Thornhill (Author), Emma Spurgin Hussey (Narrator)

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Pigeon Blood

Kapka Todorova (Author), Emma Spurgin Hussey (Narrator)

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The Secrets We Keep

"‘Truly gripping… I loved it.’ Jill Mansell, Sunday Times bestseller A heartbreakingly beautiful novel which captures the endurance and strength of ordinary people in the darkest of times, and the courage of one woman who put her life on the line to join the resistance. Perfect for fans of The Nightingale and The Secret Messenger. 1944, the Cote d’Azur. Artist Marguerite Segal is recruited by British Intelligence into befriending Etienne Valade, a local priest. Her mission is to persuade him to pass on information from the high-ranking German officers who attend his church: evidence of their war crimes. Connected by a passion for art, Marguerite and Etienne soon fall in love, but their association increasingly puts her at danger of violent reprisals. With his church frequented by Nazis, Etienne is a suspected collaborator, and distrust is high. And Marguerite is keeping her own secret too. Like the Jews whose identity cards she forges to hide them from the Third Reich, she is hiding behind a false name, her true identity and past known only to her closest friend. Marguerite must get hold of the documents that will condemn the German officers but, in a world where everything is at stake, can she truly trust anyone – even the man she loves? Praise for The Secrets We Keep: ‘I absolutely loved this… Vivid and heartbreaking.’ Lana Kortchik, USA Today bestselling author of Sisters of War ‘War, passion and tragedy unite in this atmospheric and moving tale.’ S D Sykes, author of the Oswald de Lacy Medieval Murders series ‘A wonderfully immersive, emotional read.’ Annabelle Thorpe, author of The Enemy of Love ‘I stayed up late into the night to finish… A thrilling, exciting story… You might want to have some tissues handy.’ Reader review ‘I enjoyed this novel very much!’ Reader review ‘I highly recommend reading this.’ Reader review ‘Wonderful.’ Reader review"

Theresa Howes (Author), Emma Spurgin Hussey (Narrator)

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Confetti at the Cornish Café

"Can they make this a wedding to remember? Cal and Demi are preparing to turn their beloved Kilhallon Resort into a wedding venue. With the cliff-top setting and coastal views, it's the perfect place for a magical ceremony. To launch the venue they need something special, and their first clients are no ordinary couple. The bridge and groom are internationally famous actors Lily Craig and Ben Trevone. And they have the demands to match their celebrity status. As the big day approaches and tempers soar, can Demi and Cal ensure that Kilhallon's first wedding goes off without a hitch? One thing’s for sure, this will be a Cornish celebration like no other … A gorgeous romance from Sunday Times bestselling author Phillipa Ashley. Perfect for fans of Sarah Morgan, Karen Swan and Heidi Swain. Authors and readers can’t get enough of Phillipa Ashley!: ‘Warm and funny and feel-good. The best sort of holiday read.’ Katie Fforde ‘The characters are wonderful and I felt like they were old friends by the time I got to the end of the book.’ Reader review ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ ‘Filled with warm and likeable characters. Great fun!’ Jill Mansell ‘Really well written with an excellent storyline and well-round characters.’ Reader review ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ ‘A glorious, tantalising taste of Cornwall, I could almost taste the salt of the sea air as I read it.’ Jules Wake ‘I spent every spare second reading it!. Well written, easy reading.’ Reader review ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ ‘An utterly glorious, escapist read from one of the freshest voices to emerge in women's fiction today. I loved every gorgeous page.’ Claudia Carroll ‘PLEASE read this, you won’t be disappointed if you like beautiful beaches and gentle romance.’ Reader review ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐"

Phillipa Ashley (Author), Emma Spurgin Hussey (Narrator)

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Christmas at the Cornish Café

"Christmas will be slightly less turbulent than summer, won't it? Demi and Cal are keeping their fledgling relationship under wraps for now. But then Kit Bannen, a hunky, blond – and somewhat mysterious – writer arrives at Kilhallon Resort, and not everyone is charmed. Cal is sure that Kit is hiding something. But is he the only one guarding a secret? Demi is busy baking festive treats for the newly opened Demelza’s cafe, but when Cal’s ex Isla arrives to shoot scenes for her new drama, Demi can’t help but worry that things aren’t quite over between them. Kit flirts with both women, fuelling Cal’s suspicions that Kit has hidden motives for staying on at Kilhallon. Then Cal has to go to London, leaving Demi and Kit to decorate the cafe for Christmas … all by themselves. A storm is brewing in more ways than one. As surprises unfold and truths are uncovered, can Demi and Cal finally open up to each other about their feelings? If you love this, don’t miss Summer at the Cornish Cafe and Confetti at the Cornish Cafe in the Penwith Trilogy, both available now! 'You can't help but fall in love with the characters in this book. With its determined heroine and smouldering Poldark-alike this sweeping love story grips you and doesn't let go until the very last page.' HELEN COX"

Phillipa Ashley (Author), Emma Spurgin Hussey (Narrator)

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Summer at the Cornish Café

"One summer can change everything … Demi doesn’t expect her summer in Cornwall to hold anything out of the ordinary. As a waitress, working all hours to make ends meet, washing dishes and serving ice creams seems to be as exciting as the holiday season is about to get. That’s until she meets Cal Penwith. An outsider, like herself, Cal is persuaded to let Demi help him renovate his holiday resort, Kilhallon Park. Set above an idyllic Cornish cove, the once popular destination for tourists has now gone to rack and ruin. During the course of the Cornish summer, Demi makes new friends – and foes – as she helps the dashing and often infuriating Cal in his quest. Working side by side, the pair grow close, but Cal has complications in his past which make Demi wonder if he could ever truly be interested in her. Demi realises that she has finally found a place she can call home. But as the summer draws to a close, and Demi’s own reputation as an up and coming café owner starts to spread, she is faced with a tough decision … If you loved Summer at the Cornish Cafe, don’t miss the next in the Penwith Trilogy, Christmas at the Cornish Cafe!"

Phillipa Ashley (Author), Emma Spurgin Hussey (Narrator)

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Audiobooks Narrated by Emma Spurgin Hussey

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