Professor Wong has a magical Chinese Takeaway which travels to different countries and different times. He travels with his friends to the times of King Arthur and meets Guinevere. Together, they set off on a quest to save Arthur who is locked in a dungeon. They encounter the bad knights, the nasty Crazton family and the horrible green Grippies. Can they rescue Arthur so that he can become king?

Adapted by Alex McLeod

A prince and a poor boy meet. They look very similar and become friends. They want to understand each other’s lives so they exchange clothes. But the boys’ game soon becomes a reality. No one knows who is the prince and who is the pauper. Can Prince Edward and Tom Canty ever go back to their normal lives?

Adapted by Geraldine Sweeney

Sir Charles Baskerville is found dead with the footprints of a huge dog beside his body. Everyone thinks that the hound of the Baskervilles, the terrible dog that has cursed the Baskerville family for centuries, is to blame. Sherlock Holmes and Doctor Watson go to investigate the murder. Will they find the murderer before the last surviving member of the family is killed?

Adapted by Jennifer Gascoigne

Recording in British English

Doctor Dolittle is a kind country doctor who lives with his friends Dab-Dab the duck, Jip the dog and Polynesia the parrot as well as lots of other animals. One day, he gets a message from the monkeys in Africa. There is a bad sickness and they want the doctor to go there and help them. Can Doctor Dolittle save the monkeys? Who are the Joliginki? And what is the pushmi-pullyu? Join Doctor Dolittle on his adventures and find out.

Adapted by Jennifer Gascoigne

It is a hot afternoon and Alice is bored. She follows a White Rabbit down a rabbit hole and arrives in a strange place called Wonderland. Here nothing is as it seems: animals can talk, cakes and drinks can make you bigger and smaller and the Queen of Hearts can cut off your head. Can Alice find her way home again?

Adapted by Jennifer Gascoigne

This is the much-loved story of the four March sisters. Meg is the eldest and is about to fall in love. Then there’s tomboy Jo, who wants to be a writer. Kind Beth, who always puts other people before herself, and finally there’s Amy, the youngest and most precocious. Although times are difficult and their father is away at war, they never forget their sense of fun. Growing up is not always easy, but it is very rewarding.

Adapted by Jennifer Gascoigne

Robinson Crusoe looked for adventure from an early age. He preferred life at sea and travelling to new places to an easy life at home. Then on one journey he was shipwrecked and forced to make his home on a desert island, alone. Robinson has a choice. He can give up all hope or fight to survive. What will Robinson decide and will he ever be able to escape from the island and return home to England?

Adapted by Geraldine Sweeney

Follow Sherlock Holmes in two different and exciting investigations The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle and The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet both about the theft of precious jewels. Sherlock Holmes works together with Dr Watson to stop the wrong people being arrested for the crimes. How does Sherlock Holmes find out where the Blue Carbuncle is hidden and who really steals the Beryl Coronet?

Adapted by Scott Lauder & Walter McGregor

Hank Morgan is hit on the head in America in the late nineteenth century. When he wakes up, he is in sixth century England, during the time of King Arthur and the Knights of the Round Table. Here Hank Morgan uses his knowledge of the future to escape from a series of misadventures. But can he help the people of Britain improve their lives? And does he return to his own time?

Adapted by Elspeth Rawstron

Ebenezer Scrooge is a mean and miserable man with no friends. One cold Christmas Eve three ghosts visit him and take him on a frightening journey to show him what is wrong with his life. Can Scrooge change and learn to become a better person?

Adapted by Jennifer Gascoigne

Huckleberry Finn has a hard life with his father until an adventure with Tom Sawyer changes everything. But when Huck’s dad returns and kidnaps him, he decides to escape with runaway slave Jim. Life on the run is not easy and Huck and Jim get into lots of trouble. Will Tom arrive in time to help Huck save Jim from slavery? And what will happen to Huck when his father finds him?

Adapted by David A. Hill 

When the terrible pirate Bill Bones dies, young Jim Hawkins is left with the key to a fortune: the long-lost map of Treasure Island. Jim sets off on an incredible adventure with his trusted friends to find the hidden treasure. They do not realize that their crew is made up of pirates and their leader is the most infamous and cruel pirate of them all... Long John Silver. Will Jim and his friends outwit the pirates and get the treasure?

Adapted by Janet Olearski

Born in a workhouse, the little orphan Oliver Twist survives with little food or love. He runs away to London and finds a place to stay with Fagin and his ‘family’. But Oliver soon realizes that Fagin wants him to become a thief and he tries to run away. Can Oliver escape a life of crime? Who is the mysterious Monks? And what is his connection with Oliver?

Adapted by Beverley Young

Lemuel Gulliver travels the world as a ship’s doctor. Each of his journeys brings Gulliver to strange lands with even stranger inhabitants. People smaller than his thumb and giants that can crush him as they walk. Islands floating in the sky and places where horses are more civilized than humans. Gulliver soon learns that there are many different ways of living, and that what we accept to be good is not always the only alternative.

Adapted by David A. Hill

Buck leads a good life in California, but one day he is stolen and taken to the harsh and freezing Yukon to work as a sledge dog. Here Buck must learn to fight for his survival. Can he rise above his enemies and become the master of his world once again?

Adapted by Janet Olearski

This is the story of Ichabod Crane, a superstitious schoolmaster who arrives in Sleepy Hollow. Ichabod falls in love with Katrina van Tassel, a wealthy farmer’s daughter, but he must compete with the strong, handsome Brom Bones for her hand. When Ichabod is invited to a party at Katrina’s house, will he convince  the young girl to marry him? And how does the terrifying ‘Headless Horseman’ change his life forever?

Adapted by Elspeth Rawstron

Artist Basil Hallward sees Dorian Gray at a party and suddenly feels that something bad is going to happen. But then the young and handsome Dorian becomes his friend and Basil paints the most wonderful picture of him. What does Dorian wish for when he sees his picture? And why does Dorian then hide his picture for no-one to see?

Adapted by Donatella Velluti

Recording in British English

Mr Verloc appears to be a simple shopkeeper in London who lives with his wife’s family at the back of his shop. But in reality he also works as a spy for a foreign government and has links with a group of anarchists who meet regularly at his shop. When a bomb goes off in Greenwich Park, everyone presumes it was meant to blow up the Royal Observatory nearby, as an act of terrorism. Can the police discover who was responsible for the explosion and why it didn’t reach its target?

Adapted by Donatella Velluti

One night, during a snow storm, a mysterious stranger staggers through the doors of a pub in a small English village, wrapped up from head to foot. The people in the village have a lot of questions. Who is the stranger? What is in his suitcase? Why has he come to the village? And why won’t he let anyone see his face?

Three of Oscar Wilde’s most popular short stories
THE CANTERVILLE GHOST
THE MODEL MILLIONAIRE
THE SPHINX WITHOUT A SECRET

Adapted by Janet Olearski 

The Fall of the House of Usher describes the final days of a tormented and tragic family. In The Oval Portrait a brilliant but obsessed artist sacrifices love for art. In The Masque of the Red Death Prince Prospero tries to escape with his friends from a terrible disease that is killing everyone in their land.

Adapted by Les Kirkham e Sandra Oddy

When respectable Dr Jekyll starts associating with the mysterious Mr Hyde, his friends become increasingly worried. Who is Hyde and why do all the people he meets dislike him? Stevenson’s classic tale of the human capacity for evil is retold with all the tension and Gothic drama of the original story.

Adapted by David A. Hill

Jay Gatsby is the man who has everything: money, influential friends and fabulous parties. Day and night his Long Island mansion is full of beautiful people laughing and dancing and talking about their mysterious host. But the rich and handsome Gatsby always seems to be alone in the crowd and there always seems to be something missing from his life. What is the secret from Gatsby’s past? And what does he silently hope will fill his life?

Adapted by David A. Hill

Solomon Northup was kidnapped as a free man and sold into slavery. This is his story of his twelve years as a slave. Solomon paints a clear picture of the life of a slave, the endless work and the cruel treatment, where people are treated without any humanity. Find out how Solomon was kidnapped, about his terrible journey South and his three very different masters.How did Solomon survive? And how did Solomon become a free man once more?

Othello and Desdemona fall in love and get married. But Othello is a Moor and Venetian society does not approve of the union and conspires, through the envious Iago, to destroy the match.
Enjoy this intense tragedy of love and jealousy.

Ed. Deborah Jane Ellis

Hamlet’s life is turned upside down when his father, the king, dies, and his mother Queen Gertrude marries her brother-inlaw, Claudius. When the ghost of his dead father appears to him, Hamlet embarks on a long and difficult journey for the truth. Enjoy this powerful and enduring story of revenge in Shakespeare’s original language with a carefully graded modern English translation.  

Jonathan Harker travels to Transylvania to visit his client, Count Dracula. While there, he discovers that the Count has a terrible and bloody secret. When Dracula moves to England, Jonathan’s friends and family are in danger of becoming his victims. Can they destroy the evil Count before he wins control of their lives?

This adaptation of the classic humorous novel tells the story of a mischievous boy growing up by the Mississippi river in the nineteenth century.
Tom is always looking for adventure, and he and his friend Huckleberry Finn witness a murder, run away to live as pirates, attend their own funeral, hunt for buried treasure and track down some thieves.

After a violent storm Viola is separated from her twin brother Sebastian and shipwrecked on the island of Illyria. She disguises herself as a boy and enters into the service of Duke Orsino who sends her to court Olivia for him. But Olivia falls for Viola instead while Viola becomes infatuated with the duke. Enjoy this timeless tale of mistaken identity and gender.