Island Fiction

This program is read by actor Richard Armitage, best known for his role in The Hobbit film trilogy, and actress Tuppence Middleton, best known for her role in Downton Abbey. Beautiful Ugly features sound design and special effects to enhance your listening enjoyment. Listen out for the sounds of...

When his family packs up and moves from the city to a small town deep in the Wisconsin countryside, 15-year-old Wil Neuton makes an exhilarating discovery. He finds a small island on a nearby lake, a place where he can be alone and learn to know nature—and himself. On his island, he can write, paint, and watch the loons and fish in the lake. Wil can’t stay away from the outside world forever, though. Sooner or later, he must return and face the bully determined to fight him and his bickering parents, who worry when Wil decides to stay on the island indefinitely.

Life for widowed Grace Wingate Jenkins has been simple enough these past few years on Amelia Island, running a bookstore and raising a painfully shy toddler girl. But when that simple life is turned upside down, Grace realizes she’s also been given a gift in the form of a friend who has an entirely different perspective. Will that be enough as she navigates the next chapter as a single mother and bookstore owner?

Pitcairn's Island is the third and final novel in The Bounty Trilogy, a series of novels that describe the voyage, mutiny, and subsequent adventures of the officers and crew of HMS Bounty during its voyage from Spithead on the English Channel to Tahiti in the South Pacific. On April 28, 1789, disaffected crewmen led by Lieutenant Fletcher Christian seized control of the Bounty somewhere about 30 miles south of the tropical island of Tofua. After putting the ship's captain and loyal members of his crew adrift, Fletcher Christian led the crew to an uncharted island.

Ripley Todd just wants to live a quiet, peaceful kind of life. Her job as a sheriff's deputy keeps her busy and happy, and she has no trouble finding men when she wants them—which, lately, isn't all that often. She's perfectly content, except for one thing: she has special powers that both frighten and confuse her—and though she tries hard to hide them, she can't get them under control.

Ben and Mira have driven the orcs off the deer women’s island, but the question is not if the orcs will return, but when. As if the orcs weren’t bad enough, Ben spots a simultaneously new and ancient enemy on the horizon.

When Sofia meets Franz Oswald, the handsome, charming leader of a mysterious New Age movement, she’s dazzled and intrigued. Visiting his headquarters on Fog Island, Sofia’s struck by the beautiful mansion overlooking the sea, the gardens, the sense of peace and the purposefulness of the people who live there. And she can’t ignore the attraction she feels for Franz. So she agrees to stay, just for a while. But as summer gives way to winter and the dense fog from which the island draws its name sets in, it becomes clear that Franz rules the island with an iron fist.

Evie's book club friends are the people in the world she relies on most. When one of the newer members finds herself confronted with her past, the rest of the club will do what they can to help, endangering the existence of the bookshop without realizing it. When Charmaine's past comes calling, she reverts to her old way of living—running and hiding. She's not used to having friends. But on Coral Island, everyone is a friend. And this time, Charmaine will find that being part of a close-knit community is the one thing that will save her.

A NEW YORK TIMES NOTABLE BOOK OF THE YEAR From the widely acclaimed, bestselling author of American War—a beautifully written, unrelentingly dramatic, and profoundly moving novel that looks at the global refugee crisis through the eyes of a child. "Told from the point of view of two...

Auckland Island is a godforsaken place in the middle of the Southern Ocean, 285 miles south of New Zealand. With year-round freezing rain and howling winds, it is one of the most forbidding places in the world. To be shipwrecked there means almost certain death. In 1864, Captain Thomas Musgrave and his crew of four aboard the schooner Grafton wreck on the southern end of the island. Utterly alone in a dense coastal forest, plagued by stinging blowflies and relentless rain, Captain Musgrave inspires his men to take action.

The beloved author of The Bookshop on the Corner returns with a sparkling, sunny, soulful new novel perfect for fans of Elin Hilderbrand. Years ago, Flora fled the quiet Scottish island where she grew up -- and she hasn't looked back. What would have done on Mure? It's a place where everyone...

The 1935 Labor Day hurricane annihilated between four hundred and six hundred lives in the middle of the Florida Keys, and like all disasters, both exposed long-standing social and economic inequities and reminded us of the bonds that enable us to provide what rescue we can for those we cherish. In this fictional account of the storm, rooted in the record but brought to life with Shepard’s unparalleled command of interpersonal impact, Village of Islands follows a handful of residents of a small beachside town in the moments leading up to, during and after this event.

For fifteen years, Darla has been stranded alone on a deserted island. When three strange men crash-land there, she watches from the trees, terrified they'll be just as cruel as the last men who came. But these men are different. They laugh, they share, they're kind to the wildlife. And despite every instinct telling her to stay hidden, Darla finds herself drawn to them. She begins helping in secret, leaving food and small gifts, until the line between fear and curiosity begins to blur. When she must choose between staying hidden and saving their lives, the answer is clear.

Mia Devlin knows what it is like to love with your whole heart - and then watch your love walk away. Years ago, she and Sam Logan shared an incredible bond built on passion, legend, and fate. But then one day he fled Three Sisters Island, leaving her lost in memories of the magic they shared - and determined to live without love. But now Sam has returned....

The Aldens spend the summer on their own private island. There they meet a new friend with an amazing secret!

Separated by 10 years, 3,000 miles, and the unrelenting stresses of adulthood, best friends Janet and Serena plan a 40th birthday girls’ trip to reconnect. But after a massive crash, they’re the only survivors to wash ashore on an uncharted Caribbean Island. Armed with only the clothes on their backs and zero survival skills, they fight to overcome hunger, thirst, deadly wildlife—and most terrifyingly—decades of accrued resentment. Can they find their way home, or will they kill each other first?

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the Flowers in the Attic and Landry series—now popular Lifetime movies—an evocative and tender tale of star-crossed lovers on an isolated island. Off the coast of Maine, on an island shaped like a seagull in flight, shrouded by mists off the...

From #1 New York Times bestselling author James Patterson, Professor Brandt Savage and his girlfriend Kira Sunlight thought they found heaven on earth—but their paradise becomes a nightmare when they stumble on a terrifying conspiracy. When professor turned crime-fighter Brandt "'Doc'"Savage...

A chilling novel about our modern world, from the author of Empire of the Sun and Crash. An architect is driving home from his London offices when a blow-out sends his speeding Jaguar hurtling out of control. Smashing through a temporary barrier he finds himself, dazed and disorientated, on a traffic island below three converging motorways. But when he tries to climb the embankment or flag-down a passing car for help it proves impossible - and he finds himself marooned on the concrete island.

Master storyteller Stephen King presents the “powerful” (Time) #1 New York Times bestselling classic thriller about a housekeeper with a long-hidden secret from her past—one that tests her own will to survive. When Vera Donovan, one of the wealthiest and most ill-natured residents of...