Herbert George Wells was one of the most prolific and visionary British writers of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. H. G. Wells, as he is universally known, is now best remembered for his science fiction novels, although he wrote across many genres, including nonfiction. His fiction embraces history, science fiction, horror, satire, fantasy, and social commentary. Wells was also a futurist, foreseeing air travel, tanks (as in “The Land Ironclads”—part of this anthology) s...

Richard Freiherr von Rosen was a highly decorated Wehrmacht soldier and outstanding panzer commander.After serving as a gunlayer on a Pz.Mk.III during Barbarossa, he led a Company of Tigers at Kursk. Later he led a company of King Tiger panzers at Normandy and in late 1944 commanded a battle group (12 King Tigers and a flak Company) against the Russians in Hungary in the rank of junior, later senior lieutenant (from November 1944, his final rank).Only 489 of these King Tige...

The Beetle is the celebrated Victorian horror story by Richard Marsh, originally published in serialized form in 1897, which at first enjoyed even greater popularity than Bram Stoker’s Dracula, published in the same year.The Beetle tells the tale of an evil Ancient Egyptian spirit seeking revenge on an up-and-coming British politician, Paul Lessingham. The shape-shifting creature that pursues Lessingham is possessed of hypnotic powers and takes different ...

At the end of the fifteenth century, Burgundy was extinguished as an independent state. It had been a fabulously wealthy, turbulent region situated between France and Germany, with close links to the English kingdom. Torn apart by the dynastic struggles of early modern Europe, this extraordinary realm vanished from the map. But it became the cradle of what we now know as the Low Countries, modern Belgium and the Netherlands.This is the story of a thousand years, a must-listen narra...

Raconteurs Audio and Spoken Realms team up once again to bring this second collection of short stories by H. G. Wells to audio. Written between 1894 and 1902, this anthology of thirteen stories delves into botany, flying machines, travel, distant lands and customs, virology, magic, taxidermy, journalism—and there’s even a ghost story.The collection contains:“The Dream of Armageddon” – read by Greg Wagland“The Sea Raiders” – read by Nigel Patterson“In the Avu Observatory” – ...

Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol—A Ghost Story of Christmas in Five Staves when he was 31; the first edition was published on 19th December 1843 and had sold out just four days later and by the end of 1844, there were already 13 reprints. Now with numerous adaptations for film, television, radio, stage, and indeed, audiobooks, A Christmas Carol has, for many, become an essential part of Christmas!Raconteurs Audio has created this audio anthology to...

This is the strange and fascinating life of Erwin Rommel, from his days as a youth in Imperial Germany—when he had a child out of wedlock with an early girlfriend—through his lauded military exploits during World War I to his death by suicide during World War II, after he attempted a failed coup against Hitler.Rommel was a man of contradictions: a soldier who wrote a bestselling book about World War I, a commander who went from commanding Hitler's bodyguard to trying to kill him, a...

They say you can’t catch a fish with a hook.It’s 1925, a world on the cusp of change. Hitler has published Mein Kampf and Mussolini has shut down the free press in Italy.Three friends meet on a Scottish estate for a weekend of salmon fishing and convivial conversation over brandy and cigars: Winston Churchill, future world leader, ‘Bendor’, 2nd Duke of Westminster and Coco Chanel, iconic fashion entrepreneur. The narrative develops into a ...

H.G. Wells was known as the father of science fiction—but his creative geniusencompassed far more than a single literary genre. He was also a visionary, asatirist, a sociologist, and an historian.This audio anthology contains some of Wells’ lesser-known stories and is thethird in a series produced by Raconteurs Audio in collaboration with SpokenRealms.This collection includes:The Argonauts of the Air read by Tim BruceThe Treasure in the Forest read...

This prize-winning account of the pre-Reformation church recreates lay people's experience of religion, showing that late-medieval Catholicism was neither decadent nor decayed, but a strong and vigorous tradition. For this edition, Duffy has written a new introduction reflecting on recent developments in our understanding of the period.

Metternich has a reputation as the epitome of reactionary conservatism. Historians treat him as the archenemy of progress, a ruthless aristocrat who used his power as the dominant European statesman of the first half of the nineteenth century to stifle liberalism, suppress national independence, and oppose the dreams of social change that inspired the revolutionaries of 1848. Wolfram Siemann paints a fundamentally new image of the man who shaped Europe for over four decades. He reveals Met...

Here is a lively new translation of Cornelius Tacitus's timeless history of three of Rome's most memorable emperors. Tacitus, who condemns the depravity of these rulers, which he saw as proof of the corrupting force of absolute power, writes caustically of the brutal and lecherous Tiberius, the weak and cuckolded Claudius, and "the artist" Nero. In particular, his gripping account of the bloody reigns of Tiberius and Nero brims with plots, murder, poisoning, suicide, uprisings, death, and ...