Audiobooks narrated by Matthew Lloyd Davies

The Mesopotamian Riddle: An Archaeologist, a Soldier, a Clergyman and the Race to Decipher the World

A rollicking adventure starring three free-spirited Victorians on a twenty-year quest to decipher cuneiform, the oldest writing in the world—from the New York Times bestselling author of The Bad-Ass Librarians of Timbuktu. It was one of history's great vanishing acts. Around 3,400 BCE—as humans were gathering in complex urban settlements—a scribe in the mud-walled city-state of Uruk picked up a reed stylus to press tiny symbols into clay. For three millennia, wedge shape cuneiform script would record the military conquests, scientific discoveries, and epic literature of the great Mesopotamian kingdoms of Sumer, Assyria, and Babylon and of Persia's mighty Achaemenid Empire, along with precious minutiae about everyday life in the cradle of civilization. And then…the meaning of the characters was lost. London, 1857. In an era obsessed with human progress, mysterious palaces emerging from the desert sands had captured the Victorian public's imagination. Yet Europe's best philologists struggled to decipher the bizarre inscriptions excavators were digging up. Enter a swashbuckling archaeologist, a suave British military officer turned diplomat, and a cloistered Irish rector, all vying for glory in a race to decipher this script that would enable them to peek farther back into human history than ever before. From the ruins of Persepolis to lawless outposts of the crumbling Ottoman Empire, The Mesopotamian Riddle whisks you on a wild adventure through the golden age of archaeology in an epic quest to understand our past.

Joshua Hammer (Author), Matthew Lloyd Davies, Unknown (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Great Mortality: An Intimate History of the Black Death, the Most Devastating Plague of All Time

“Powerful, rich with details, moving, humane, and full of important lessons for an age when weapons of mass destruction are loose among us.” — Richard Rhodes, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The Making of the Atomic Bomb The Great Plague is one of the most compelling events in human history—even more so now, when the notion of plague has never loomed larger as a contemporary public concern. The plague that devastated Asia and Europe in the 14th century has been of never-ending interest to both scholarly and general readers. Many books on the plague rely on statistics to tell the story: how many people died; how farm output and trade declined. But statistics can’t convey what it was like to sit in Siena or Avignon and hear that a thousand people a day are dying two towns away. Or to have to chose between your own life and your duty to a mortally ill child or spouse. Or to live in a society where the bonds of blood and sentiment and law have lost all meaning, where anyone can murder or rape or plunder anyone else without fear of consequence. In The Great Mortality, author John Kelly lends an air of immediacy and intimacy to his telling of the journey of the plague as it traveled from the steppes of Russia, across Europe, and into England, killing 75 million people—one third of the known population—before it vanished.

John Kelly (Author), Matthew Lloyd Davies, Tbd (Narrator)

Audiobook

Gogmagog

Gogmagog tells the story of an epic journey through the sixty-mile long ghost of a dragon. We travel by boat, a rickety steam launch captained by Cady Meade, a veteran taxi pilot on the river Nysis. In her heyday, she carried people and goods from the thriving seaports of the estuary into Ludwich, the capital city. But that was years ago. Now she’s drunk, holed up in a rundown seaside resort, telling her bawdy tales for shots of rum. All that’s about to change, when two strangers seek her out, asking for transport, one of whom—a young girl—is very ill and in great danger and the other, an artificial being of singular character, has secrets hidden inside his crystal skull. And so begins the voyage of the Juniper. The Nysis is unlike any other river. Mysteries unfold with each port of call. Not many can navigate these channels; not many know of its whirlpools and sandbanks, of the ravenous creatures that lurk beneath the surface. Cady used to have the necessary knowledge and the powers of spectral navigation, but her glory days are well behind her now. This might well be her final journey.

Jeff Noon, Steve Beard (Author), Matthew Lloyd Davies (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Penguin Book of Pirates

Real-life accounts of the world's most notorious pirates-both men and women, from the Golden Age of Piracy and beyond-compiled by the New York Times bestselling author of A True Account: Hannah Masury's Sojourn Amongst the Pyrates, Written by Herself A Penguin Classic Spanning three centuries and eight thousand nautical miles, and compiled by a direct descendant of a sailor who waged war with pirates in the early nineteenth century, The Penguin Book of Pirates takes us behind the eye patches, the peg legs, and the skull and crossbones of the Jolly Roger and into the no-man's-land of piracy that is rife with paradoxes and plot twists. Here, in a fascinating array of accounts that include trial transcripts, journalism, ship logs, and more, are the grit and patois of real maritime marauders like the infamous Blackbeard; the pirates who inspired Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean, Stede Bonnet in Max's Our Flag Means Death, and the Dread Pirate Roberts in The Princess Bride; the astoundingly egalitarian multi-ethnic and multilingual crews that became enmeshed in historical horrors like the slave trade; and lesser-known but no less formidable women pirates, many of whom disguised themselves as men. By turns brutal, harrowing, and inspiring, these accounts of the "radically free" sailors who were citizens more of the oceangoing world than of any nation on land remind us of the glories and dangers of the open seas and the seductive appeal of communities forged in resistance.

Hannah Masury (Author), Jaime Lamchick, Jerome Harmann-Hardeman, Katherine Howe, Matthew Lloyd Davies, TBD (Narrator)

Audiobook

Wet Behind the Ears

Athelas never wanted housemates. Now he has three: the gumiho for whom he provided an alibi, the tea-wielding housekeeper who poisoned him, and the young human who might pose the greatest danger of all. All of Athelas's training tells him to kill small, soft things before something else does-or worse, before he grows fond of them and then something kills them. He should at least know better than to worry about the revenge-bent gumiho who is drawing the attention of every high-ranking Behindkind in Seoul Between. Hot on the tails of the gumiho who slaughtered her family, YeoWoo instead stumbles over the battered and broken body of a merman who knows just a little bit too much about her quarry. It should be simple to keep Marazul both alive and useful, but although YeoWoo is successful in the former, the latter is a different tail. YeoWoo has always taken what she wanted in blood and force. Athelas has always gained what he needed by deception and manipulation. With their usual methods failing at every turn and the investigation swiftly becoming deadly, it's time to make a few changes. Athelas has begun to fear that if he does change, his life will forever spin out of his control . . .

W.R. Gingell (Author), Matthew Lloyd Davies (Narrator)

Audiobook

Behind Closed Doors

When is a curse not a curse? How does a house become a prison? Why is a reformed murderer the only hope for a far-too-easily injured boy? Athelas has always been opposed to having a small, possibly-cursed Australian boy in the kitchen. When that small boy disappears, however, and Athelas's housekeeper Camellia strongly encourages him to do something about it, he finds himself wavering. YeoWoo wants nothing to do with the disappearing Harrow, cursed or otherwise. Caught up with her own investigation and preparations for revenge, she would prefer her housemates to remain unseen and unheard. Entirely absent is even better. But Athelas and YeoWoo have something in common: they both tread warily when it comes to their housekeeper, who runs the house with a tea-scented, magic-laced rod of iron. Camellia holds the key to Athelas's pretensions of reformation being accepted-and blames him for Harrow's disappearance. And she is determined to save Harrow, no matter what it takes. Life as a reformed murderer would be so much easier if the process didn't include so much . . . reformation.

W.R. Gingell (Author), Matthew Lloyd Davies (Narrator)

Audiobook

A Whisker Behind

Searching for redemption in the shifting realm between the human and fae worlds, not-so-reformed fae steward Athelas seems likely instead to find death, dismemberment, and deadly magic . . . Exiled, excommunicated, and with a bounty on his head, Athelas is lying low in Seoul for exactly one reason: he has a wedding to attend. Whether or not he's welcome is another matter. Luckily for Athelas, several bodies have turned up with their soft insides gnawed out, whether by magic or Behindkind-and the latest of those bodies is at the very wedding hall he has been staking out. The Behindkind investigators suspect one of Athelas's housemates: YeoWoo, a gumiho with a thirst for revenge and an even greater appetite for soft underbelly than Athelas. To buy herself time, YeoWoo barters alibis with the suspiciously quiet fae sharing her house, but to remain free, she must find the real murderer. By joining the investigation, Athelas has exactly the chance he needs to prove that he is now a repentant, changed, and selfless fae, bent on atoning for former deeds . . . no matter how many Behindkind and humans he has to cut through to confirm that impression.

W.R. Gingell (Author), Matthew Lloyd Davies (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Clot Thickens: The enduring mystery of heart disease

This is a 150-year detective story with a cast of unrecognized heroes who may, finally, become known for their work on the true causes of heart disease. Exploring the truth about cholesterol-the apparently tried, and convicted, cause of millions of deaths from heart disease-with billions spent each year on lowering cholesterol with diet and drugs. Is it possible that our villain was simply left holding the gun whilst the true culprits ran and hid? Have they escaped our clutches? Dr. Kendrick also introduces us to a range of other lesser known characters in this tale of selective reporting, data manipulation, and intrigue. The true story of heart disease is out there, and the evidence has been brought together here-a scientific mystery for our time that is ready to unfold.

Dr Malcolm Kendrick (Author), Matthew Lloyd Davies (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Confessions: Companion to the Queen

Three Sinners. Three confessions. And all the dirty little secrets you could possibly desire…Father Stuart Ballard has been Marcus Stearns' confessor since the young Jesuit was only eighteen years old. He thought he'd heard every sin the boy had to confess until Marcus uttered those three fateful words: "I met Eleanor."So begins the 40-page "The Confession of Marcus Stearns," a moving coda to the RITA® Award-winning Original Sinners series. Originally published as a limited-edition paperback for the 2014 RT Booklovers' Convention, and available worldwide for the first time.This collection also includes "The Confession of Eleanor Schreiber," a companion 36-page story written exclusively for this book.And, finally, all secrets are revealed in "The Confession of Tiffany Reisz," an exclusive, in-depth interview.

Tiffany Reisz (Author), Matthew Lloyd Davies (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Reveries of the Solitary Walker

The Reveries of the Solitary Walker was one of the last works written by the French philosopher Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1712-1778) and was, in fact, not quite complete. It was published four years after his death and came quickly to be regarded as one of his most poetic works. It consists of 10 Walks (only the final ‘Walk' was unfinished) during which he muses on a variety of topics including thoughts on issues which featured strongly in his notable life as a philosopher and commentator, including education and political philosophy. However, interwoven into the reflective narrative are personal observations and memories—some painful, concerning times when he felt attacked and severely criticised for his writings. There are also comments on nature particularly the plants he encounters which, placing the writer in the countryside, balances the darker inner musings. This puts the tone beyond nostalgia, and if there is undoubtedly a feeling of resignation, the essays emanate a sense of end-of-life understanding and acceptance. The First Walk sets the scene: “BEHOLD me then as if alone upon the earth, having neither brother, relative, friend or society but my own thoughts; the most social and affectionate of men proscribed as it were by unanimous consent. They have sought in the refinement of their hatred what would be the most cruel torment to my susceptible soul and have rent asunder every bond which attached me to them. I should have loved mankind in spite of themselves and it was only by throwing off humanity that they could avoid my affection. At length, then, behold them strangers, unknown, as indifferent to me as they desired to be; but thus detached from mankind, and everything that relates to them, what am I? This remains to be sought. Unhappily the search must be preceded by casting a glance on my own situation, since I must necessarily pass through this examination, in order to judge between them and myself.” Matthew Lloyd Davies reads the first translation into English which appeared in 1796, less than 20 years after Rousseau's death.

Jean-Jacques Rousseau (Author), Matthew Lloyd Davies (Narrator)

Audiobook

Diana, William and Harry

Brought to you by Penguin. Twenty-five years after her tragic death, James Patterson tells the heartbreaking true story of Princess Diana's life as a mother and a global icon At the age of thirteen, she became Lady Diana Spencer. At twenty, Princess of Wales. At twenty-one, she earned her most important title: Mother. As she fell in love, first with Prince Charles and then with her sons, William and Harry, the world fell in love with the young royal family - Diana most of all. With one son destined to be King and one needing to find his own way, she taught them lessons about royal tradition and also real life. 'William and Harry will be properly prepared,' Diana once promised. 'I am making sure of this.' Even after her tragic death, the strength of her love for her sons remains an enduring inspiration, not only for the two princes, but for the entire world. © James Patterson 2022 (P) Penguin Audio 2022

James Patterson (Author), Matthew Lloyd Davies (Narrator)

Audiobook

Bones Takes a Holiday: A Romantic Wartime Cozy Mystery

The third book in the Dr. Bones Mystery Series, BONES TAKES A HOLIDAY, is a change-of-pace from the usual whodunit. The holidays in question are Christmas 1939 and Valentine’s Day 1940. The world is at war, and the first of many hard winters has begun. But for Dr. Benjamin Bones and Lady Juliet Linton, love has bloomed amid the fear of an uncertain future. Part One: Dr. Bones and the Christmas Wish A few days before Christmas 1939, Dr. Benjamin Bones is in a 'Bah, Humbug,' sort of mood. It's the coldest winter on record, his country is at war, and his love life has run aground. But magic as well as mysteries abound in Cornwall. When Ben makes a bargain with an elfin little man, it leads him to an old woman who longs to make amends--and a chance for Ben to show that certain someone how much he cares. Part Two: Dr. Bones and the Lost Love Letter There's no such thing as privacy in the tiny village of Birdswing. Everywhere Dr. Benjamin Bones turns, someone is spying from a window, listening through a wall, or gossiping over a garden fence. 'The birds sing in Birdswing,' says the vicar, Father Cotterill, and in February 1940 this is more true than ever. Waiting for Hitler to make his move and turn this 'Phony War' into the real thing, Ben's fellow villagers are desperate for a distraction. But his blossoming affair with Lady Juliet must remain absolutely secret. So when a seemingly trifling 'case' arises--a love letter misplaced for almost thirty years, still in search of its intended recipient--Ben and Juliet jump at the chance to investigate, simply to steal a bit of time together. But as they try to deliver the letter, they discover two lonely people who might get a second chance at love... through the magic of Cornwall. NOTE: This book was originally published as two separate novellas: DR. BONES AND THE CHRISTMAS WISH and DR. BONES AND THE LOST LOVE LETTER.

Emma Jameson (Author), Matthew Lloyd Davies (Narrator)

Audiobook

Audiobooks Narrated by Matthew Lloyd Davies