Listen to an excerpt from Zero K by Don DeLillo, read by Thomas Sadoski.

Jeffrey Lockhart's father, Ross, is a billionaire in his sixties, with a younger wife, Artis Martineau, whose health is failing. Ross is the primary investor in a remote and secret compound where death is exquisitely controlled and bodies are preserved until a future time when biomedical advances and new technologies can return them to a life of transcendent promise. Jeff joins Ross and Artis at the compound to say "an uncertain farewell" to her as she surrenders her body.

"We are born without choosing to be. Should we have to die in the same manner? Isn't it a human glory to refuse to accept a certain fate?"

These are the questions that haunt the novel and its memorable characters, and it is Ross Lockhart, most particularly, who feels a deep need to enter another dimension and awake to a new world. For his son, this is indefensible. Jeff, the book's narrator, is committed to living, to experiencing "the mingled astonishments of our time, here, on earth."

Don DeLillo's seductive, spectacularly observed and brilliant novel Zero K weighs the darkness of the world -terrorism, floods, fires, famine, plague - against the beauty and humanity of everyday life; love, awe, "the intimate touch of earth and sun."

https://www.panmacmillan.com/authors/don-delillo/zero-k

http://www.audible.co.uk/pd/Fiction/Zero-K-Audiobook/B01DFBMW06/ref=a_search_c4_1_1_srImg?qid=1462540758&sr=1-1

Zero K by Don DeLillo, read by Thomas Sadoski

Listen to an extract from The Silk Weaver by Liz Trenow, read by Katie Scarfe.

	1760, Spitalfields. Anna Butterfield’s life is about to change forever, as she moves from her idyllic Suffolk home to be introduced into London society. A chance encounter with a French silk weaver, Henri, draws her in to the volatile world of the city’s burgeoning silk trade. Henri is working on his ‘master piece’, to become a master weaver and freeman; Anna longs to become an artist while struggling against pressure from her uncle’s family to marry a wealthy young lawyer. 

As their lives become ever more intertwined, Henri realises that Anna’s designs could give them both an opportunity for freedom. But his world becomes more dangerous by the day, as riots threaten to tear them apart forever . . .

Inspired by real historical events and characters, The Silk Weaver is a captivating, unforgettable story of illicit romance in a time of enlightenment and social upheaval.

http://www.audible.co.uk/pd/Fiction/The-Silk-Weaver-Audiobook/B01N7G5OP3/ref=a_search_c4_1_1_srImg?qid=1484220320&sr=1-1

https://www.panmacmillan.com/authors/liz-trenow-(1)/the-silk-weaver

The Silk Weaver - Liz Trenow

For a man whose musical demeanour comes across as rough-hewn with a potency that's barely contained, Richard Dawson in person is gentle with a soft smile and opinions that are precisely worded though almost tentatively shared. He admits to a high level of everyday anxiety, yet has left a mark on contemporary folk music in England that testifies to an innate confidence in his musical vision. His albums (notably Nothing Important of 2014 and Peasant in 2017), as well as being critically acclaimed, have taken folk music into new territory that's at once ancient and avant-garde.

Speaking at his home in the north-east of England, Richard reflects on the particular qualities of his voice, the life that music has opened up to him and his ever-present companion, Trouble the cat.

First broadcast 29th June 2019, BBC Radio 4
Presented and produced by Alan Hall

The Voices Of... Richard Dawson

Listen to this extract from Empire at Black and Gold by Adrian Tchaikovsky, read by Ben Allen.

Empire in Black and Gold is the first novel in Adrian Tchaikovsky's critically acclaimed epic fantasy series, The Shadows of the Apt.

The days of peace are over . . .

The city states of the Lowlands have lived in peace and prosperity for decades: bastions of civilization and sophistication. That peace is about to end.

In far-off corners, an ancient Empire has been conquering city after city with its highly trained armies and sophisticated warmaking . . . And now it's set its sights on a new prize.

Only the ageing Stenwold Maker, spymaster, artificer and statesman, can see the threat. It falls upon his shoulders to open the eyes of his people – as soon a tide will sweep down over the Lowlands and burn away everything in its path.

But first he must stop himself from becoming the Empire's latest victim.

Empire in Black and Gold is followed by the second book in the Shadows of the Apt series, Dragonfly Falling.

Zero K by Don DeLillo, read by Thomas Sadoski

Pan Macmillan Audio

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