Showing results by narrator "Matt Addis" in All Categories

Why do you lose arguments with people who know MUCH LESS than you? Why can you recognise that woman, from that thing...but can't remember her name? And why, after your last break-up, did you find yourself in the foetal position on the sofa for days, moving only to wipe the snot and tears haphazardly from your face? Here's why: the idiot brain. For something supposedly so brilliant and evolutionarily advanced, the human brain is pretty messy, fallible and disorganised.

Written in the form of a letter to a Frenchman, Edmund Burke's Reflections on the Revolution in France is an impassioned attack on the French Revolution and its hasty destruction of the Church, the old elites, and the Crown. Burke tackles the new republic and its allegiance to principles such as liberty and equality, as well as its failure to recognize the complexities of human nature, society, and wisdom accumulated over time, contending that gradual change and adjustment is far better than immediate upheaval.  

Drawing from nearly 20 years working in the areas of neuroscience, psychology and psychiatry, international best-selling author Dr Dean Burnett (The Idiot Brain, The Happy Brain) hopes to answer these questions and more in his new audiobook Psycho-Logical (exclusive to Audible). Combining in-depth research with genuine testimonials from those who deal with their own issues on a daily basis, Psycho-Logical aims to uncover just what we think is going on with our brains when serious mental health problems occur....

On Winston Churchill’s first day as prime minister, Hitler invaded Holland and Belgium. Poland and Czechoslovakia had already fallen, and the Dunkirk evacuation was just two weeks away. For the next 12 months, the Nazis would wage a relentless bombing campaign, killing 45,000 Britons and destroying two million homes. In The Splendid and the Vile, Erik Larson gives a new and brilliantly cinematic account of how Britain’s most iconic leader set about unifying the nation at its most vulnerable moment, and teaching ‘the art of being fearless’. 

A clever reimagining of Jane Austen's novella Lady Susan by acclaimed filmmaker Whit Stillman. Jane Austen's funniest novel is also her least known - until now. A sharp comedy of manners set in the 1790s, Love & Friendship centres on Lady Susan Vernon: impossibly beautiful, charming, witty and completely self-absorbed. Recently widowed, Lady Susan arrives unannounced at her brother-in-law's estate to wait out colourful rumours about her dalliances circulating through polite society.

The enthusiasm for and expectation of happiness are so widespread today that fundamental questions about it are often overlooked. For starters, the most basic question of all: where does happiness come from? Is it your brain - a mere concoction of chemicals or network of neurons? Is it in fact your gut? (Spoiler alert: yes. Sort of) Or is it external? Is it love or sex or money or success? And what are these doing to our brains anyway? In The Happy Brain, Neuroscientist Dean Burnett delves into our most private selves to investigate what causes happiness.

When the former crusader knight Geoffrey Mappestone is ordered by King Henry to deliver a series of mysterious letters to the restless western reaches of Wales, he agrees only reluctantly. His conviction that the simple mission hides something more sinister is strengthened when the letters’ scribe is murdered before the journey begins. Then one of Geoffrey’s travelling companions is killed, and he knows he must uncover the secret behind the letters before more victims are claimed...

It is the dead of night. Sixteen-year-old Tiuri must spend hours locked in a chapel in silent contemplation if he is to be knighted the next day. But as he waits by the light of a flickering candle, he hears a knock at the door and a voice desperately asking for help. A secret letter must be delivered to King Unauwen across the Great Mountains - a letter upon which the fate of the entire kingdom depends. Tiuri has a vital role to play, one that might cost him his knighthood.

All the beloved, irascible Auntie Poldi wanted from her Sicilian retirement was time to enjoy the sunshine, a free-flowing supply of wine, and a sultry romance with Chief Inspector Vito Montana. But then her idyll is rudely disrupted by the last person she wants to see on her doorstep: John Owenya, detective inspector with the Tanzanian Ministry of Home Affairs, who is also her estranged lying cheat of a husband. Not only is John's sudden reappearance putting a kink in Poldi's dreamy love affair with Montana, but his presence also comes with a plea for help.

Paris, 1943. The swastika flies from the top of the Eiffel Tower. Soldiers clad in field grey patrol the streets. Buildings have been renamed, books banned, art stolen and people disappeared. Amongst the missing is an Allied intelligence cell. Gone to ground? Betrayed? Dead? Britain's Special Operations Executive need to find out. They recruit ex-Parisian and Bletchley Park codebreaker Harry Mitchell to return to the city he fled two years ago. 

Welcome to ikigai, a Japanese mind-set that will change your life. Ken Mogi, a Japanese expert and best-selling writer, reveals all about this mysterious and fascinating miracle that is at the heart of Japan's record-breaking long life, astonishing appreciation of sensory beauty and inherent mindfulness. It is extraordinary that Japanese men's longevity ranks fourth in the world while Japanese women's ranks second. But perhaps this comes as no surprise....

Compiled in Middle Welsh during the 12th and 13th centuries, The Mabinogion is a mesmerizing panorama of fantasy, romance, tragedy and humor. Blending Arthurian romance, Welsh legend and mythology, it tells tales of heroic knights, fair maidens, dramatic battles and magical beasts across 12 fantastical stories.  

Science starts to get interesting when things don'’t make sense. Even today, there are experimental results that the most brilliant scientists can neither explain nor dismiss. In the past, similar anomalies have revolutionised our world: in the 16th century, a set of celestial irregularities led Copernicus to realise that the Earth goes around the sun and not the reverse. In 13 Things That Don'’t Make Sense, Michael Brooks meets thirteen modern-day anomalies that may become tomorrow'’s breakthroughs.

Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen was one of the most popular novels of its day, and it continues to be so, with many film and small-screen adaptations. In this series we examine all the key aspects that you will need to know and understand for GCSE English Literature, ranging from its context, major themes, character analysis and all the different chapters.

Voechenka is a city under siege. Decimated by the Battlemage War, its restless dead attack every night, begging the living to join them beyond the grave. Three survivors will fight to save the city. Tammy, whose investigation could rescue Voechenka from its grisly fate. Zannah, who must pay penance for her war crimes. And Balfruss: scholar, traveller and battlemage.

One of the King's most trusted knights has vanished in the snow, so young Sir Tiuri and his best friend Piak must journey into the shadowy heart of the forest to find him. The Wild Wood is a place of mysteries, rumors, and whispered tales. A place of lost cities, ancient curses, robbers, princesses, and Men in Green. As the darkness surrounds him and reports grow of secret plots and ruthless enemies, Tiuri finds himself alone and fighting for survival - caught in a world where good and evil wear the same face.

Sebastian has long been haunted by the disappearance of his father, Jack Messenger: celebrated travel writer, potential spy and murder victim, his absent presence and equivocal past continue to cast inescapable shadows over his son, who must also contend with his ageing mother's fragmented memory and his own dereliction of a partner. So who is the stranger that buttonholes Sebastian at an academic conference on the Welsh coast, and reveals lies and transgressions neither outgrown nor comprehended? How does he know Sebastian, and what are his connections to Jack Messenger?

Years ago, when violent purges plunged Dún Aulin into chaos, Warden Esben Berengar was sent to restore order by any means necessary. He did so with such brutal efficiency he became known throughout Fál as the High Queen’s Monster. All is not forgiven. When the hunt for a mysterious enemy leads Berengar back to Dún Aulin, an old friend’s request thrusts him headfirst into danger. In the Ceremony of the Cursed Blade, the sword used by the Lord of Shadows in his conquest of Fál will change possession, and it’s up to Berengar to keep the blade from falling into the wrong hands.

Leo Carew's debut novel The Wolf, the first book in the Under the Northern Sky series, is a masterpiece in epic historical fantasy - a new voice to rival David Gemmell or George R. R. Martin. Violence and death have come to the land under the Northern Sky. The Anakim dwell in the desolate forests and mountains beyond the black river, the land under the Northern Sky. Their ancient ways are forged in Unthank silver and carved in the grey stone of their heartland.

Roy Smiles' celebration of the 'Beyond the Fringe' team takes a funny and affectionate look at how four young men from Oxbridge changed the face of British comedy. Starring Matt Addis as Alan Bennett, Rory Kinnear as Peter Cook, Jonathan Aris as Jonathan Miller and Benedict Cumberbatch as Dudley Moore. A CPL production for BBC Radio 4.