Showing results by publisher "BBC Audio" in Literature & Fiction

Joanna Lumley and Roger Allam play a married couple who met in the Summer of Love and have stayed together ever since. Children of the '60s, they are still free spirits, drawn together by their love for music and one another. We follow their conversations from the café to the kitchen table, taking in everyday chores, dealing with problems with long-held friendships and tackling their frustrations with each other.

When the Water Rat invites the unassuming Mole to spend his first day ever in a boat on the river, and wise Badger comes along for the ride as well, so begins a marvellous season of adventure for the three friends. Mr Toad (he of Toad Hall) completes a happy foursome, but his tendency to get into hot water leads him into some rather hair-raising scrapes of his own.

Well-meaning do-gooder Clare Barker is back, and dealing with more office politics, troublesome clients and domestic dramas. Secretly regarding herself as a cross between Mother Theresa and Wonder Woman, she's got all the right jargon for every problem, but never any practical solutions. However, in today's 'Big Society' there are plenty of challenges out there for an involved, caring social worker (or even Clare). These six series find her struggling once again to control both her professional and private life. 

Parsley Sidings ran for two highly successful series from 1971-1973 and was the only radio sitcom (other than Dad’s Army) to star the much-loved Arthur Lowe. As Horace Hepplewhite, station master of a sleepy railway station, he spends his time dealing with small crises and supervising his errant staff - including his son, ticket clerk Bert; blonde bombshell Gloria the station announcer; crafty Cockney porter Percy; and ancient signalman Bradshaw - not to mention his nemesis, Phineas Perkins, who manages the station one stop down the line.

Graham Greene was the 20th century’s master of plot, an expert chronicler of Catholic guilt, Cold War intrigue, conflict and crime. A prolific polymath, his work incorporated serious novels, thrillers, short stories, screenplays, stage plays and more. This wide-ranging box set includes the finest examples of his early work, written between 1932 and 1948, and contains over 15 hours of unmissable drama.

First broadcast in 1990, this monumental adaptation of John Galsworthy's Nobel Prize-winning novel series was a radio event. It was the most expensive drama serial ever produced, featured one of the biggest, most star-studded casts and dominated the Radio 4 schedules for more than five months, attracting more than a million listeners each week. Comprising all nine books in Galsworthy's Forsyte Chronicles, it spans 50 years - from 1886 to 1936 - and tells the irresistible story of an upper-class dynasty torn apart by a terrible feud.

Between 1947 and 1957, Ealing Studios produced a series of immensely popular, darkly funny film comedies that made the West London borough famous throughout the world. Almost 50 years later, four of these timeless films were recreated for BBC Radio 4, and are now collected together for the first time.

Simon McGrath is a nice chap - he donates blood, he recycles, he cares about the world. He just happens to work as an arms dealer - or a 'defence and security equipment system solutions broker', as he prefers to call it. It wasn’t planned, and what he really wants is to pursue is his career in electronic music, but until that takes off he’ll stay where he is. After all, he has to pay his mortgage like everyone else....

In the complete series one to four of the multi-award-winning hit show from the people who brought you Cabin Pressure and Armando Iannucci's Charm Offensive, stand-up comedian Marcus Brigstocke has been put in charge of a thing! In each episode, Marcus finds he's volunteered to be in charge of a big old thing - a hospital, a prison, the banking system.

Elizabeth Gaskell was one of Victorian England's pre-eminent female novelists. Admired by Charles Dickens, who described her as his 'dear Scheherazade', she mingled storytelling and social realism to superb effect in her highly acclaimed fiction. This comprehensive collection comprises dramas and readings of her finest works and some lesser-known pieces.

All three series of the BBC radio bittersweet comedy, narrated by Sheila Hancock, following the adventures of the residents of a small town in Northamptonshire—plus special episode 'Full Stop'. Relationships have come and gone but life continues in Wadenbrook, where Sheila Hancock takes us behind closed doors to reveal the inhabitants' heartbreak and happiness.

George Bernard Shaw - or Bernard Shaw, as he preferred to be known - was one of Ireland's foremost dramatists and thinkers. His plays range from contemporary satires to historical allegories, and are infused with ideas, insight, wit and wisdom. Included here are some of his best works, adapted for radio and brought together in reverse chronological order in one statement collection.

Delve into the world of Rosemary Timperley if you dare! In this chilling collection, discover ten chilling full-cast dramatisations of sinister stories and suspenseful tales and immerse yourself in a totally unique listening experience. Recorded with a full musical score, these standalone tales are perfect for fans of the supernatural and will raise goosebumps on even the warmest of days.

It’s the 1980s: business is big, the shoulder pads are bigger and Jimmy Bright is a tycoon on a mission… He’s got big dreams and the only thing standing between him and a millionaire lifestyle is accountant, Russell Farrow, whose attention to financial detail is unsurpassed. The two must rub along if Jimmy’s business, BrightCo, is to succeed but they seem to have very different views on what success looks like.

Dot's had quite enough of making tea in the Cabinet War Rooms. When she finds a cryptic message in the newspaper she enlists the help of her gals - will this be the big break Dot's been waiting for? Follow Dot as she gets squiffy over Agent Bertie Whiff-Whaff, concocts stirring yet pithy slogans for the war effort and goes on a mission to St Horribly Vulture’s School for Boys to enlist a teacher for...'shhhh...Bletchley Park!'

In these final four series, Anna is trying to remain calm and centred in the midst of the familial chaos that surrounds her. Her sisters, Victoria and Charlotte, are more combative than ever, and when a row blows up between them, Anna is stuck in the middle. Having graduated from university, her niece Emily is preparing for marriage and motherhood. But her wedding plans cause ructions, as Victoria and Charlotte make her celebrations all about them. The baby's birth sends Victoria into competitive granny mode - while Anna receives a heart-warming surprise.

Ted Willis began his creative life in amateur theatre and journalism before moving into writing for films, TV and radio, and was listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the world's most prolific writer for television. His best-known creation was the hit police procedural Dixon of Dock Green which he based on the stories told to him by a policeman friend. This radio anthology includes five of his best-loved crime tales from the 1960s, '70s and '80s.

One of the main movers and shakers at TS Sports Stars agency, Trevor Heslop is honest, decent and sensitive. Unfortunately, he works in a world of cutthroats and corruption, with nightmare clients and a rapacious partner with the morals of a barracuda. Add to that his dysfunctional family - estranged wife Meryl and teenage son Toby - and it’s a miracle he manages to stay afloat in the shark tank that is his life.

Miss Marple, Agatha Christie’s deceptively mild spinster sleuth, is being treated to a few days’ holiday by her niece, staying at Bertram’s Hotel, a dignified, unostentatious establishment tucked away in a back street of busy Mayfair. Here is a place where sedate upper class ladies, retired military gentlemen and the higher echelons of the clergy can indulge in the comforts of a bygone age. But Miss Marple begins to feel uneasy. Something sinister lurks beneath the polished veneer.

Based entirely on audience suggestions, this hysterically funny historical drama tells the thrilling extended story of an aristocratic family at war with itself. From ancient Rome to 1920s Hollywood, we follow the Mastersons’ turbulent history across the centuries as their fortunes wax and wane and their fates hang on objects as diverse and unlikely as a tumble dryer, a rabbit’s foot and a pair of Siamese twins.