Add variety to your child's bedtime routine with the latest audiobook from the author of The Rabbit Who Wants to Fall Asleep, the global bestseller that parents have been raving about! Features all-new child-tested, parent-approved techniques to reclaim bedtime and provide a sweet and tender end to each day.

Your child joins Ellen the Elephant on a journey through a magical forest that leads to sleep. Along the way, children meet different fantastical characters and have calming experiences that will help your child to relax and slip into slumber quickly. The story works perfectly for either naptime or bedtime.

Children will love switching between stories about both Roger the Rabbit (The Rabbit Who Wants to Fall Asleep) and Ellen the Elephant (The Little Elephant Who Wants to Fall Asleep), and parents will appreciate the diverse ways each character will help their loved ones fall asleep quickly and easily.

This soothing audiobook edition contains a choice of male or female narrator.

http://amzn.to/2bKPKWx  

The Little Elephant Who Wants to Fall Asleep (audiobook extract) read by Rachel Bavidge

Big Oil and Gas Versus Democracy&mdash;Winner Take All &#160; In 2010, the words &ldquo;earthquake swarm&rdquo; entered the lexicon in Oklahoma. That same year, a trove of Michael Jackson memorabilia&mdash;including his iconic crystal-encrusted white glove&mdash;was sold at auction for over $1 million to a guy who was, officially, just the lowly forestry minister of the tiny nation of Equatorial Guinea. And in 2014, Ukrainian revolutionaries raided the palace of their ousted president and found a zoo of peacocks, gilded toilets, and a floating restaurant modeled after a Spanish galleon. Unlikely as it might seem, there is a thread connecting these events, and Rachel Maddow follows it to its crooked source: the unimaginably lucrative and equally corrupting oil and gas industry. With her trademark black humor, Maddow takes us on a switchback journey around the globe, revealing the greed and incompetence of Big Oil and Gas along the way, and drawing a surprising conclusion about why the Russian government hacked the 2016 U.S. election. She deftly shows how Russia&rsquo;s rich reserves of crude have, paradoxically, stunted its growth, forcing Putin to maintain his power by spreading Russia&rsquo;s rot into its rivals, its neighbors, the West&rsquo;s most important alliances, and the United States. Chevron, BP, and a host of other industry players get their star turn, most notably ExxonMobil and the deceptively well-behaved Rex Tillerson. The oil and gas industry has weakened democracies in developed and developing countries, fouled oceans and rivers, and propped up authoritarian thieves and killers. But being outraged at it is, according to Maddow, &ldquo;like being indignant when a lion takes down and eats a gazelle. You can&rsquo;t really blame the lion. It&rsquo;s in her nature.&rdquo; Blowout is a call to contain the lion: to stop subsidizing the wealthiest businesses on earth, to fight for transparency, and to check the influence of the world&rsquo;s most destructive industry and its enablers. The stakes have never been higher. As Maddow writes, &ldquo;Democracy either wins this one or disappears.&rdquo;

Blowout by Rachel Maddow, read by Rachel Maddow

Don't know about you, but we've really felt the need for a little more joy around here lately. We miss it, and as the world continues to turn upside down, we’re learning how to find it in new ways and in new places. So, Minisode Fifteen is dedicated to JOY, and the best thing about joy is that once you have a little of it you can find ways to pass it on, like a paper chain of joy spreading out across communities virtual and real. What's bringing you joy right now? Is reading a joyful act? Can finding joy be a practice? And as we get into what brings us joy, hopefully we’ll spread a little of that joy to you, and finally as usual give a few recommendations of things we’ve been into lately. This is our last show before we take our summer break in August, so we wish you all good things, and may you go to your joy.

Minisode Fifteen: Joy

The first novel from the award-winning, best-selling author of Everything I Know About Love. 

32-year-old Nina Dean is a successful food writer with a loyal online following, but a life that is falling apart. When she uses dating apps for the first time, she becomes a victim of ghosting, and by the most beguiling of men. Her beloved dad is vanishing in slow motion into dementia, and she's starting to think about ageing and the gendered double-standard of the biological clock. On top of this she has to deal with her mother's desire for a mid-life makeover and the fact that all her friends seem to be slipping away from her.... 

Dolly Alderton's debut novel is funny, tender and painfully relatable, filled with whip-smart observations about relationships and the way we live today.

Ghosts by Dolly Alderton, read by Holliday Grainger

Brought to you by Penguin.

Dearly: Poems is written and read by Margaret Atwood.

The collection of a lifetime from the best-selling novelist and poet. 

By turns moving, playful and wise, the poems gathered in Dearly are about absences and endings, ageing and retrospection, but also about gifts and renewals. They explore bodies and minds in transition, as well as the everyday objects and rituals that embed us in the present. Werewolves, sirens and dreams make their appearance, as do various forms of animal life and fragments of our damaged environment.

Before she became one of the world’s most important and loved novelists, Atwood was a poet. Dearly is her first collection in over a decade. It brings together many of her most recognisable and celebrated themes, but distilled – from minutely perfect descriptions of the natural world to startlingly witty encounters with aliens, from pressing political issues to myth and legend. It is a pure Atwood delight, and long-term listeners and new fans alike will treasure its insight, empathy and humour.

You can pre-order the audiobook from Audible now: https://adbl.co/2Gg1HIR 

#AtwoodNPD competition:
In celebration of National Poetry Day 1st October 2020 we would love you to listen to and respond to Margaret Atwood’s poem ‘Blackberries’ in any way that you choose – it could be another poem, a drawing or painting, some music or a dramatic reading. Share your interpretation on Twitter or Instagram by 10th October 2020 including #AtwoodNPD to be in with a chance of winning one of five hardback copies of Margaret Atwood’s poetry collection Dearly. UK only, full competition T&Cs here - http://msgfocus.com/files/amf_penguin_group/project_478/PRIZE_DRAW_T_CS.pdf

Dearly, written and read by Margaret Atwood

Listen to an excerpt from KEEP MOVING by Maggie Smith and read by Maggie Smith

KEEP MOVING Audiobook Excerpt

Listen to an excerpt from DARK TIDES by Philippa Gregory and read by Louise Brealey

DARK TIDES Audiobook Excerpt

Listen to an excerpt from LET US DREAM by Pope Francis and Austen Ivereigh and read by Arthur Morey

LET US DREAM Audiobook Excerpt

From the beginning of time, there have been many monumental questions that have perplexed the human race such as: Why are we here? What is the meaning of life? And... Who’s on first? 

In The History of Sketch Comedy, Emmy and Peabody-winning actor, writer and producer Keegan-Michael Key (Key & Peele, The Prom, Jingle Jangle) embarks listeners on an epic, insightful and utterly entertaining voyage through the annals of sketch comedy. Key takes us from the early flatulence jokes of Ancient Greece and the acting troupes of Europe in the 1500s, to the rise of The Second City in Chicago and his own comedy origins on the ball fields near Detroit’s 8 Mile. Equal parts masterclass, personal odyssey and virtuoso performance; Key dissects the landmark characters, concepts and performers that pushed the boundaries and forged new ground in the comedy pantheon, and along the way reveals his own experiences of discovering and being influenced by them. Over the course of ten half-hour chapters, one of the most beloved voices of our time treats listeners to a private, millennia-spanning interpretation of sketch comedy history, from its humble past to its immodest present.

The History of Sketch Comedy Trailer

A tense, page-turning psychological drama about the making and breaking of a family, about a woman whose experience of motherhood is nothing at all what she hoped for--and everything she feared Blythe Connor is determined that she will be the warm, comforting, supportive mother to her new baby Violet that she herself never had. But in the thick of motherhood's exhausting early days, Blythe becomes convinced that something is wrong with her daughter--Violet rejects her mother, screams uncontrollably, and becomes a disturbing, disruptive presence at her preschool. Or is it all in Blythe's head? Her husband, Fox, says she's imagining things. What he sees is an overwhelmed wife who can't cope with the day-to-day grind. The more Fox dismisses her fears, the more Blythe begins to question her own sanity, and the more we begin to question what Blythe is telling us about her life as well. Then their son Sam is born--and with him, Blythe has the natural, blissful connection she'd always imagined with her child. Even Violet seems to love her little brother. But when life as they know it is changed in an instant, the devastating fall-out forces Blythe to face the truth. Here, we see the making and breaking of a family in crystalline detail, and what it feels like when women are not believed. The Push is a tour de force you will read in a sitting, an utterly immersive pageturner that will challenge everything you think you know about motherhood, about our children, and about what happens behind the doors of even the most perfect-looking families. . . Available for purchase at: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B087BL9MML?tag=randohouseinc7911-20">Amazon</a><a href="https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/?ean=9781984881670">Barnes & Noble</a><a href="http://www.tkqlhce.com/click-8373827-10747236?SID=PRHD39095A662--9781984881670&url=http://www.booksamillion.com/p/9781984881670">Books A Million</a><a href="https://bookshop.org/a/2186/9781984881663?prhc=PRHD39095A662">Bookshop.org</a><a href="http://www.hudsonbooksellers.com/book/9781984881663?utm_source=prh&utm_medium=affiliate&utm_term=301&utm_content=PRHD39095A662--9781984881663&utm_campaign=9781984881663">Hudson Booksellers</a><a href="http://www.indiebound.org/book/9781984881663?aff=penguinrandom">IndieBound</a><a href="http://www.powells.com/book/-9781984881663?utm_source=randomhouse&utm_campaign=randomhouse&utm_content=PRHD39095A662--9781984881663">Powell's</a><a href="http://goto.target.com/c/128773/81938/2092?subId1=PRHD39095A662--9781984881663&u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.target.com%2Fs%3FsearchTerm%3D9781984881663">Target</a><a href="https://www.walmart.com/search/?query=9781984881663">Walmart</a><a href="https://itunes.apple.com/us/book/id1508884455?at=11l3IH&ct=PRHD39095A662--9781984881670">Apple Books</a><a href="https://google.prf.hn/click/camref:1011ld4r/pubref:PRHD39095A662--9781984881670/destination:https://play.google.com/store/search?q=9781984881670&c=books">Google Play Store</a><a href="http://click.linksynergy.com/link?id=VD9*lkiWNd8&offerid=258185.12829781935712206&type=2&u1=PRHD39095A662--9781984881670}&murl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.kobo.com%2Fsearch%3FQuery%3D9781984881670">Kobo</a>

The Push by Ashley Audrain, read by Marin Ireland

Twelve early pieces never before collected that offer an illuminating glimpse into the mind and process of Joan Didion. Mostly drawn from the earliest part of her astonishing five-decade career, the wide-ranging pieces in this collection include Didion writing about a Gamblers Anonymous meeting, a visit to San Simeon, and a reunion of WWII veterans in Las Vegas, and about topics ranging from Nancy Reagan to Robert Mapplethorpe to Martha Stewart. Here are subjects Didion has long written about -- the press, politics, California robber barons, women, the act of writing, and her own self-doubt. Each piece is classic Didion: incisive and, in new light, stunningly prescient.

Let Me Tell You What I Mean by Joan Didion, read by Kimberly Farr

Penguin Books publishes blockbusting, prize-winning, celebrated, controversial, heart-warming, thought-provoking and inspiring books by a range of authors from Ali Smith to Zadie Smith, Jeremy Clarkson to Jeremy Paxman and Jamie Oliver to Oliver Goldsmith.

Dearly, written and read by Margaret Atwood

Penguin Books UK