Black Light
Stories
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
Prime members: New to Audible?Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Black Light
Buy for $13.50
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
full cast
About this listen
Longlisted for the National Book Award
“The stories in Black Light are grimy and weird, surprising, utterly lush.... I loved every moment of this book." (Carmen Maria Machado, author of Her Body and Other Parties)
With raw, poetic ferocity, Kimberly King Parsons exposes desire’s darkest hollows - those hidden places where most of us are afraid to look. In this debut collection of enormously perceptive and brutally unsentimental short stories, Parsons illuminates the ache of first love, the banality of self-loathing, the scourge of addiction, the myth of marriage, and the magic and inevitable disillusionment of childhood.
Taking us from hot Texas highways to cold family kitchens, from the freedom of pay-by-the-hour motels to the claustrophobia of private school dorms, these stories erupt in the mind with a primal howl - sharp-voiced, acerbic, and wise.
©2019 Kimberly King Parsons (P)2019 Random House AudioListeners also enjoyed...
-
Home Remedies
- Stories
- By: Xuan Juliana Wang
- Narrated by: Catherine Ho, Tim Chiou, Feodor Chin, and others
- Length: 6 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 16
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 11
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 11
Xuan Juliana Wang's remarkable debut introduces us to the new and changing face of Chinese youth. From fuerdai (second-generation rich kids) to a glass-swallowing qigong grandmaster, her dazzling, formally inventive stories upend the immigrant narrative to reveal a new experience of belonging: of young people testing the limits of who they are, in a world as vast and varied as their ambitions. In stories of love, family, and friendship, here are the voices, faces, and stories of a new generation never before captured in fiction.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Jubilant journeys
- By Leo on 05-14-19
-
Brass
- A Novel
- By: Xhenet Aliu
- Narrated by: Thérèse Plummer, Lauren Fortgang
- Length: 9 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 99
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 93
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 92
A waitress at the Betsy Ross Diner, Elsie hopes her nickel-and-dime tips will add up to a new life. Then she meets Bashkim, who is at once both worldly and naïve, a married man who left Albania to chase his dreams - and wound up working as a line cook in Waterbury, Connecticut. Seventeen years later, headstrong and independent Luljeta receives a rejection letter from NYU and her first-ever suspension from school on the same day. Instead of striking out on her own in Manhattan, she's stuck in Connecticut with her mother, Elsie - a fate she refuses to accept.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Brilliant Writing!
- By colin mcginnis on 02-10-18
By: Xhenet Aliu
-
Night of the Living Rez
- By: Morgan Talty
- Narrated by: Darrell Dennis
- Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 245
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 216
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 216
Set in a Native community in Maine, Night of the Living Rez is a riveting debut collection about what it means to be Penobscot in the twenty-first century and what it means to live, to survive, and to persevere after tragedy.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Powerful and Candid Story
- By M on 07-15-22
By: Morgan Talty
-
Bliss Montage
- Stories
- By: Ling Ma
- Narrated by: Katharine Chin
- Length: 6 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 65
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 55
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 55
In Bliss Montage, Ling Ma brings us eight wildly different tales of people making their way through the madness and reality of our collective delusions: love and loneliness, connection and possession, friendship, motherhood, the idea of home. A woman lives in a house with all her ex-boyfriends. A toxic friendship grows up around a drug that makes you invisible. An ancient ritual might heal you of anything—if you bury yourself alive.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Audiobook is defective
- By ᵔᴥᵔ on 09-22-22
By: Ling Ma
-
Out There
- Stories
- By: Kate Folk
- Narrated by: Sophie Amoss, Hannah Choi, Michael Crouch, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 71
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 64
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 64
With a focus on the weird and eerie forces that lurk beneath the surface of ordinary experience, Kate Folk’s debut collection is perfectly pitched to the madness of our current moment. A medical ward for a mysterious bone-melting disorder is the setting of a perilous love triangle. A curtain of void obliterates the globe at a steady pace, forcing Earth’s remaining inhabitants to decide with whom they want to spend eternity.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Very good! Best book I have listen to yet.
- By Anonymous User on 04-28-22
By: Kate Folk
-
The Dragons, the Giant, the Women
- A Memoir
- By: Wayétu Moore
- Narrated by: Tovah Ott
- Length: 7 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 181
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 151
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 152
When Wayétu Moore turns five years old, her father and grandmother throw her a big birthday party at their home in Monrovia, Liberia, but all she can think about is how much she misses her mother, who is working and studying in faraway New York. Before she gets the reunion her father promised her, war breaks out in Liberia. The family is forced to flee their home on foot, walking and hiding for three weeks until they arrive in the village of Lai.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Lyricism didn't translate to audio
- By Coleen Michelle Montgomery on 02-24-21
By: Wayétu Moore
-
Home Remedies
- Stories
- By: Xuan Juliana Wang
- Narrated by: Catherine Ho, Tim Chiou, Feodor Chin, and others
- Length: 6 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 16
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 11
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 11
Xuan Juliana Wang's remarkable debut introduces us to the new and changing face of Chinese youth. From fuerdai (second-generation rich kids) to a glass-swallowing qigong grandmaster, her dazzling, formally inventive stories upend the immigrant narrative to reveal a new experience of belonging: of young people testing the limits of who they are, in a world as vast and varied as their ambitions. In stories of love, family, and friendship, here are the voices, faces, and stories of a new generation never before captured in fiction.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Jubilant journeys
- By Leo on 05-14-19
-
Brass
- A Novel
- By: Xhenet Aliu
- Narrated by: Thérèse Plummer, Lauren Fortgang
- Length: 9 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 99
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 93
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 92
A waitress at the Betsy Ross Diner, Elsie hopes her nickel-and-dime tips will add up to a new life. Then she meets Bashkim, who is at once both worldly and naïve, a married man who left Albania to chase his dreams - and wound up working as a line cook in Waterbury, Connecticut. Seventeen years later, headstrong and independent Luljeta receives a rejection letter from NYU and her first-ever suspension from school on the same day. Instead of striking out on her own in Manhattan, she's stuck in Connecticut with her mother, Elsie - a fate she refuses to accept.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Brilliant Writing!
- By colin mcginnis on 02-10-18
By: Xhenet Aliu
-
Night of the Living Rez
- By: Morgan Talty
- Narrated by: Darrell Dennis
- Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 245
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 216
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 216
Set in a Native community in Maine, Night of the Living Rez is a riveting debut collection about what it means to be Penobscot in the twenty-first century and what it means to live, to survive, and to persevere after tragedy.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Powerful and Candid Story
- By M on 07-15-22
By: Morgan Talty
-
Bliss Montage
- Stories
- By: Ling Ma
- Narrated by: Katharine Chin
- Length: 6 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 65
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 55
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 55
In Bliss Montage, Ling Ma brings us eight wildly different tales of people making their way through the madness and reality of our collective delusions: love and loneliness, connection and possession, friendship, motherhood, the idea of home. A woman lives in a house with all her ex-boyfriends. A toxic friendship grows up around a drug that makes you invisible. An ancient ritual might heal you of anything—if you bury yourself alive.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Audiobook is defective
- By ᵔᴥᵔ on 09-22-22
By: Ling Ma
-
Out There
- Stories
- By: Kate Folk
- Narrated by: Sophie Amoss, Hannah Choi, Michael Crouch, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 71
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 64
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 64
With a focus on the weird and eerie forces that lurk beneath the surface of ordinary experience, Kate Folk’s debut collection is perfectly pitched to the madness of our current moment. A medical ward for a mysterious bone-melting disorder is the setting of a perilous love triangle. A curtain of void obliterates the globe at a steady pace, forcing Earth’s remaining inhabitants to decide with whom they want to spend eternity.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Very good! Best book I have listen to yet.
- By Anonymous User on 04-28-22
By: Kate Folk
-
The Dragons, the Giant, the Women
- A Memoir
- By: Wayétu Moore
- Narrated by: Tovah Ott
- Length: 7 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 181
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 151
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 152
When Wayétu Moore turns five years old, her father and grandmother throw her a big birthday party at their home in Monrovia, Liberia, but all she can think about is how much she misses her mother, who is working and studying in faraway New York. Before she gets the reunion her father promised her, war breaks out in Liberia. The family is forced to flee their home on foot, walking and hiding for three weeks until they arrive in the village of Lai.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Lyricism didn't translate to audio
- By Coleen Michelle Montgomery on 02-24-21
By: Wayétu Moore
-
Milkman
- By: Anna Burns
- Narrated by: Bríd Brennan
- Length: 14 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 1,978
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,763
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 1,759
In this unnamed city, to be interesting is dangerous. Middle sister, our protagonist, is busy attempting to keep her mother from discovering her maybe-boyfriend and to keep everyone in the dark about her encounter with Milkman. But when first brother-in-law sniffs out her struggle and rumours start to swell, middle sister becomes "interesting" - the last thing she ever wanted to be. To be interesting is to be noticed, and to be noticed is dangerous. Milkman is a tale of gossip and hearsay, silence and deliberate deafness. It is a story of inaction with enormous consequences.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Like the writing, not the audio issues
- By Criticalthinker on 12-31-18
By: Anna Burns
-
Rodham
- A Novel
- By: Curtis Sittenfeld
- Narrated by: Carrington MacDuffie
- Length: 13 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 565
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 469
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 469
In 1971, Hillary Rodham is a young woman full of promise: Life magazine has covered her Wellesley commencement speech, she’s attending Yale Law School, and she’s on the forefront of student activism and the women’s rights movement. And then she meets Bill Clinton. A handsome, charismatic southerner and fellow law student, Bill is already planning his political career. In each other, the two find a profound intellectual, emotional, and physical connection that neither has previously experienced.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
I felt insulted by this novel
- By Y. Scott on 05-29-20
-
If I Survive You
- By: Jonathan Escoffery
- Narrated by: Torian Brackett
- Length: 8 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 145
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 131
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 130
In the 1970s, Topper and Sanya flee to Miami as political violence consumes their native Kingston. But America, as the couple and their two children learn, is far from the promised land. Excluded from society as Black immigrants, the family pushes on first through Hurricane Andrew and later the 2008 recession, living in a house so cursed that the pet fish launches itself out of its own tank rather than stay. But even as things fall apart, the family remains motivated, often to its own detriment, by what their younger son, Trelawny, calls “the exquisite, racking compulsion to survive.”
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Good except for the ending
- By Morris Nelms on 11-20-22
-
Harlem Shuffle
- A Novel
- By: Colson Whitehead
- Narrated by: Dion Graham
- Length: 10 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,898
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 2,513
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 2,488
To his customers and neighbors on 125th street, Ray Carney is an upstanding salesman of reasonably priced furniture, making a decent life for himself and his family. He and his wife Elizabeth are expecting their second child, and if her parents on Striver's Row don't approve of him or their cramped apartment across from the subway tracks, it's still home. Few people know he descends from a line of uptown hoods and crooks, and that his façade of normalcy has more than a few cracks in it. Cracks that are getting bigger all the time.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Best Read/Listen on Audible
- By Henry Posner on 09-22-21
By: Colson Whitehead
-
The Great Believers
- By: Rebecca Makkai
- Narrated by: Michael Crouch
- Length: 18 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 3,821
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 3,399
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 3,386
In 1985, Yale Tishman, the development director for an art gallery in Chicago, is about to pull off an amazing coup, bringing in an extraordinary collection of 1920s paintings as a gift to the gallery. Yet as his career begins to flourish, the carnage of the AIDS epidemic grows around him. One by one, his friends are dying and after his friend Nico's funeral, the virus circles closer and closer to Yale himself. Soon the only person he has left is Fiona, Nico's little sister.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
A story for all time
- By Carla jo Thompson on 08-06-18
By: Rebecca Makkai
-
The Nickel Boys (Winner 2020 Pulitzer Prize for Fiction)
- A Novel
- By: Colson Whitehead
- Narrated by: JD Jackson, Colson Whitehead
- Length: 6 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 8,026
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 6,950
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 6,919
When Elwood Curtis, a black boy growing up in 1960s Tallahassee, is unfairly sentenced to a juvenile reformatory called the Nickel Academy, he finds himself trapped in a grotesque chamber of horrors. Elwood’s only salvation is his friendship with fellow “delinquent” Turner, which deepens despite Turner’s conviction that Elwood is hopelessly naive, that the world is crooked, and that the only way to survive is to scheme and avoid trouble.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Who spoke for the black boys?
- By Darwin8u on 02-06-20
By: Colson Whitehead
-
Nevada
- A Novel
- By: Imogen Binnie
- Narrated by: Imogen Binnie
- Length: 6 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall5 out of 5 stars 154
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 131
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 131
Maria Griffiths is almost thirty and works at a used bookstore in New York City while trying to stay true to her punk values. She’s in love with her bike but not with her girlfriend, Steph. She takes random pills and drinks, but doesn’t inject anything except, when she remembers, estrogen, because she’s trans. Everything is mostly fine until Maria and Steph break up, sending Maria onto a cross-country trek. She ends up in the backwater town of Star City, Nevada, where she meets James, who is probably but not certainly trans, and who reminds Maria of her younger self.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Soooo Good!!
- By storm baughman on 01-06-23
By: Imogen Binnie
-
Yellowface
- A Novel
- By: R. F. Kuang
- Narrated by: Helen Laser
- Length: 8 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 4,406
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 4,015
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 4,013
Authors June Hayward and Athena Liu were supposed to be twin rising stars: same year at Yale, same debut year in publishing. But Athena’s a cross-genre literary darling, and June didn’t even get a paperback release. Nobody wants stories about basic white girls, June thinks. So when June witnesses Athena’s death in a freak accident, she acts on impulse: she steals Athena’s just-finished masterpiece, an experimental novel about the unsung contributions of Chinese laborers to the British and French war efforts during World War I.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
I've never hated a character harder
- By ashelyn downs on 07-26-23
By: R. F. Kuang
-
Sankofa
- A Novel
- By: Chibundu Onuzo
- Narrated by: Sara Powell
- Length: 9 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 1,041
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 944
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 942
Anna is at a stage of her life when she's beginning to wonder who she really is. She has separated from her husband, her daughter is all grown up, and her mother - the only parent who raised her - is dead. Searching through her mother's belongings one day, Anna finds clues about the African father she never knew. His student diaries chronicle his involvement in radical politics in 1970s London. Anna discovers that he eventually became the president - some would say dictator - of a small nation in West Africa. And he is still alive.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Really addictive!
- By Buddy on 10-15-21
By: Chibundu Onuzo
-
The Five Wounds
- A Novel
- By: Kirstin Valdez Quade
- Narrated by: Gary Tiedemann
- Length: 15 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 415
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 362
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 361
It's Holy Week in the small town of Las Penas, New Mexico, and 33-year-old unemployed Amadeo Padilla has been given the part of Jesus in the Good Friday procession. He is preparing feverishly for this role when his 15-year-old daughter, Angel, shows up pregnant on his doorstep and disrupts his plans for personal redemption. With weeks to go until her due date, tough, ebullient Angel has fled her mother's house, setting her life on a startling new path.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
yes!
- By Ally on 03-13-22
-
Dark Places
- A Novel
- By: Gillian Flynn
- Narrated by: Rebecca Lowman, Cassandra Campbell, Mark Deakins, and others
- Length: 13 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 30,323
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 26,774
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 26,779
Libby Day was seven when her mother and two sisters were murdered in "The Satan Sacrifice of Kinnakee, Kansas". As her family lay dying, little Libby fled their tiny farmhouse into the freezing January snow. She lost some fingers and toes, but she survived, and famously testified that her 15-year-old brother, Ben, was the killer. Twenty-five years later, Ben sits in prison, and troubled Libby lives off the dregs of a trust created by well-wishers who've long forgotten her.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Riveting but brutal
- By Gray on 12-09-12
By: Gillian Flynn
-
Interior Chinatown
- A Novel
- By: Charles Yu
- Narrated by: Joel de la Fuente
- Length: 4 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 1,568
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,321
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 1,313
Willis Wu doesn’t perceive himself as a protagonist even in his own life: He’s merely Generic Asian man. Sometimes he gets to be Background Oriental Making a Weird Face or even Disgraced Son, but he is always relegated to a prop. Yet every day he leaves his tiny room in a Chinatown SRO and enters the Golden Palace restaurant, where Black and White, a procedural cop show, is in perpetual production. He’s a bit player here, too, but he dreams of being Kung Fu Guy - the most respected role that anyone who looks like him can attain. At least that’s what he has been told.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Kong Fu Guy
- By JCY on 01-30-20
By: Charles Yu
Critic reviews
"There is a reckless kind of heat to the tender, broken characters in these stories.... Parsons is both unflinching and eloquent in her portrayals of people as they burn and rage." (Lauren Kane, The Paris Review)
"Parsons’s debut crackles with the frenetic energy of the women who stalk its pages.... Parsons’s characters are sharp and uncannily observed, bound up in elastic and electrifying prose. This is a first-rate debut." (Publishers Weekly starred review)
"[An] assured debut.... Imbued with the expanses of their landscapes, Parson’s dozen tales portray characters navigating unavoidable shifts in the realities of their lives." (Leah Strauss, Booklist)
Related to this topic
-
Marlena
- A Novel
- By: Julie Buntin
- Narrated by: Emma Galvin
- Length: 9 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 609
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 554
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 557
Everything about 15-year-old Cat's new town in rural Michigan is lonely and off-kilter until she meets her neighbor, the manic, beautiful, pill-popping Marlena. Cat, inexperienced and desperate for connection, is quickly lured into Marlena's orbit by little more than an arched eyebrow and a shake of white-blond hair. As the two girls turn the untamed landscape of their desolate small town into a kind of playground, Cat catalogues a litany of firsts - first drink, first cigarette, first kiss - while Marlena's habits harden and calcify.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
A Brilliant, Agonizing Portrait of a Young Woman
- By Sudi on 06-06-17
By: Julie Buntin
-
Like Family
- Growing Up in Other People's Houses, a Memoir
- By: Paula McLain
- Narrated by: Wendy Tremont King
- Length: 9 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 78
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 71
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 72
This powerful and haunting memoir details the years Paula McLain and her two sisters spent as foster children after being abandoned by both parents in California in the early 1970s. As wards of the State, the sisters spent the next 14 years moving from foster home to foster home. The dislocations, confusions, and odd pleasures of an unrooted life form the basis of one of the most compelling memoirs in recent years - a book in the tradition of Jo Ann Beard's The Boys of My Youth and Mary Karr's The Liars' Club.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
A famous writer describes her life growing up in foster care
- By Nancy C. on 12-21-18
By: Paula McLain
-
The People We Keep
- By: Allison Larkin
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 11 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 4,924
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 4,345
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 4,326
Little River, New York, 1994: April Sawicki is living in a motorless motorhome that her father won in a poker game. Failing out of school, picking up shifts at a local diner, she’s left fending for herself in a town where she’s never quite felt at home. When she “borrows” her neighbor’s car to perform at an open mic night, she realizes her life could be much bigger than where she came from. After a fight with her dad, April packs her stuff and leaves for good, setting off on a journey to find a life that’s all hers.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Absolutely loved this book!
- By chatteycathi on 08-09-21
By: Allison Larkin
-
Homesick for Another World
- Stories
- By: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Narrated by: Alyssa Bresnahan, Richard Poe
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 299
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 265
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 265
There's something eerily unsettling about Ottessa Moshfegh's stories, something almost dangerous, while also being delightful and even laugh-out-loud funny. Her characters are all unsteady on their feet in one way or another; they all yearn for connection and betterment, though each in very different ways, but they are often tripped up by their own baser impulses and existential insecurities.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Funny, Dynamic Writing
- By Sofia Macht on 06-13-18
By: Ottessa Moshfegh
-
Saguaro
- By: Carson Mell
- Narrated by: Carson Mell
- Length: 3 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 31
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 27
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 27
Saguaro chronicles the life of rock legend Bobby Bird as he finds himself rolled up in barbiturates, at sea with satanic cults, finding true love, selling out, and coming back. Bird may be many things - a legend in pink cotton, a living history in tattoos, the very embodiment of rock and roll - but he isn’t a bad man. At least not all the time. He made his name as a crooner, revered as a singer with soul, a soul he quickly sold without ever considering the implications.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Animal Cruelty Warning
- By AJLecter on 02-06-23
By: Carson Mell
-
Sharks in the Time of Saviors
- By: Kawai Strong Washburn
- Narrated by: Jolene Kim, Kaleo Griffith, G. K. Bowes, and others
- Length: 10 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 596
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 525
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 522
In 1995 Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, on a rare family vacation, seven-year-old Nainoa Flores falls overboard a cruise ship into the Pacific Ocean. When a shiver of sharks appears in the water, everyone fears for the worst. But instead, Noa is gingerly delivered to his mother in the jaws of a shark, marking his story as the stuff of legends. Nainoa’s family, struggling amidst the collapse of the sugarcane industry, hails his rescue as a sign of favor from ancient Hawaiian gods - a belief that appears validated after he exhibits puzzling new abilities.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Glad This Was Free
- By Shad Huddleston on 04-01-20
-
Marlena
- A Novel
- By: Julie Buntin
- Narrated by: Emma Galvin
- Length: 9 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 609
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 554
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 557
Everything about 15-year-old Cat's new town in rural Michigan is lonely and off-kilter until she meets her neighbor, the manic, beautiful, pill-popping Marlena. Cat, inexperienced and desperate for connection, is quickly lured into Marlena's orbit by little more than an arched eyebrow and a shake of white-blond hair. As the two girls turn the untamed landscape of their desolate small town into a kind of playground, Cat catalogues a litany of firsts - first drink, first cigarette, first kiss - while Marlena's habits harden and calcify.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
A Brilliant, Agonizing Portrait of a Young Woman
- By Sudi on 06-06-17
By: Julie Buntin
-
Like Family
- Growing Up in Other People's Houses, a Memoir
- By: Paula McLain
- Narrated by: Wendy Tremont King
- Length: 9 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 78
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 71
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 72
This powerful and haunting memoir details the years Paula McLain and her two sisters spent as foster children after being abandoned by both parents in California in the early 1970s. As wards of the State, the sisters spent the next 14 years moving from foster home to foster home. The dislocations, confusions, and odd pleasures of an unrooted life form the basis of one of the most compelling memoirs in recent years - a book in the tradition of Jo Ann Beard's The Boys of My Youth and Mary Karr's The Liars' Club.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
A famous writer describes her life growing up in foster care
- By Nancy C. on 12-21-18
By: Paula McLain
-
The People We Keep
- By: Allison Larkin
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 11 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 4,924
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 4,345
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 4,326
Little River, New York, 1994: April Sawicki is living in a motorless motorhome that her father won in a poker game. Failing out of school, picking up shifts at a local diner, she’s left fending for herself in a town where she’s never quite felt at home. When she “borrows” her neighbor’s car to perform at an open mic night, she realizes her life could be much bigger than where she came from. After a fight with her dad, April packs her stuff and leaves for good, setting off on a journey to find a life that’s all hers.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Absolutely loved this book!
- By chatteycathi on 08-09-21
By: Allison Larkin
-
Homesick for Another World
- Stories
- By: Ottessa Moshfegh
- Narrated by: Alyssa Bresnahan, Richard Poe
- Length: 8 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 299
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 265
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 265
There's something eerily unsettling about Ottessa Moshfegh's stories, something almost dangerous, while also being delightful and even laugh-out-loud funny. Her characters are all unsteady on their feet in one way or another; they all yearn for connection and betterment, though each in very different ways, but they are often tripped up by their own baser impulses and existential insecurities.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Funny, Dynamic Writing
- By Sofia Macht on 06-13-18
By: Ottessa Moshfegh
-
Saguaro
- By: Carson Mell
- Narrated by: Carson Mell
- Length: 3 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 31
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 27
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 27
Saguaro chronicles the life of rock legend Bobby Bird as he finds himself rolled up in barbiturates, at sea with satanic cults, finding true love, selling out, and coming back. Bird may be many things - a legend in pink cotton, a living history in tattoos, the very embodiment of rock and roll - but he isn’t a bad man. At least not all the time. He made his name as a crooner, revered as a singer with soul, a soul he quickly sold without ever considering the implications.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Animal Cruelty Warning
- By AJLecter on 02-06-23
By: Carson Mell
-
Sharks in the Time of Saviors
- By: Kawai Strong Washburn
- Narrated by: Jolene Kim, Kaleo Griffith, G. K. Bowes, and others
- Length: 10 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 596
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 525
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 522
In 1995 Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, on a rare family vacation, seven-year-old Nainoa Flores falls overboard a cruise ship into the Pacific Ocean. When a shiver of sharks appears in the water, everyone fears for the worst. But instead, Noa is gingerly delivered to his mother in the jaws of a shark, marking his story as the stuff of legends. Nainoa’s family, struggling amidst the collapse of the sugarcane industry, hails his rescue as a sign of favor from ancient Hawaiian gods - a belief that appears validated after he exhibits puzzling new abilities.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Glad This Was Free
- By Shad Huddleston on 04-01-20
-
Stick
- By: Andrew Smith
- Narrated by: Josh Hurley
- Length: 7 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 34
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 31
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 31
Fourteen-year-old Stark McClellan (nicknamed Stick because he’s tall and thin) is bullied for being "deformed" - he was born with only one ear. His older brother, Bosten, is always there to defend Stick. But the boys can’t defend each other from their abusive parents. When Stick realizes Bosten is gay, he knows that to survive his father's anger, Bosten must leave home. Stick has to find his brother, or he will never feel whole again. In his search, he will encounter good people, bad people, and people who are simply indifferent to kids from the wrong side of the tracks. But he never loses hope of finding love - and his brother.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Amazing book!
- By Christopher Gaines on 02-19-18
By: Andrew Smith
-
This Raging Light
- By: Estelle Laure
- Narrated by: Sandy Rustin
- Length: 5 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 29
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 27
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 28
Lucille seems to have nothing going for her. With the bills piling in, the house falling apart around her, and her sister's growing distress, it is precisely the worst possible moment for Lucille to fall recklessly in love with her best friend's twin brother, Digby, who is practically engaged.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Amazing Loving and Sexy
- By Princess Lucy on 12-28-17
By: Estelle Laure
-
Lit
- A Memoir
- By: Mary Karr
- Narrated by: Mary Karr
- Length: 12 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 999
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 742
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 738
Lit follows Mary Karr's descent into the inferno of alcoholism and madness - and her astonishing resurrection. Karr's longing for a solid family seems secure when her marriage to a handsome, Shakespeare-quoting poet produces a son they adore. But she can't outrun her apocalyptic past. She drinks herself into the same numbness that nearly devoured her charismatic but troubled mother, reaching the brink of suicide. A hair-raising stint in "The Mental Marriott" awakens her to the possibility of joy, and leads her to an unlikely faith.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Finally! One for the "Win" column
- By Kim on 03-22-10
By: Mary Karr
-
She Got Up Off the Couch
- By: Haven Kimmel
- Narrated by: Haven Kimmel
- Length: 8 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 274
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 186
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 187
When we last saw Zippy, she was oblivious to the storm that was brewing in her home. Her mother, Delonda, had literally just gotten up off the couch and ridden her rickety bicycle down the road. Her dad was off somewhere, gambling or "working." And Zippy was lost in her own fabulous world of exploring the fringes of Moorland, Indiana.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Great fun !!
- By Kim on 04-20-11
By: Haven Kimmel
-
She's Come Undone
- By: Wally Lamb
- Narrated by: Linda Stephens
- Length: 18 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,094
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,822
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 1,838
Meet Dolores Price. She's 13, wise-mouthed but wounded, having bid her childhood goodbye. Beached like a whale in front of her bedroom TV, she spends the next few years nourishing herself with the Mallomars, potato chips, and Pepsi her anxious mother supplies. When she finally rolls into young womanhood at 257 pounds, Dolores is no stronger and life is no kinder. But this time she's determined to rise to the occasion and give herself one more chance before really going belly-up.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Really disappointing narrator!
- By Jessica Williams on 01-21-12
By: Wally Lamb
-
Face It
- By: Georgette Kaplan
- Narrated by: Anastasia Watley
- Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 63
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 60
-
Story3.5 out of 5 stars 61
In college, Elizabeth Smile shared a magical tryst with her roommate, Michelle Harlow. She had no idea the night would leave Elizabeth pining after her for the next ten years. Now Michelle is back with a strange offer: Will she pretend to be Michelle's lesbian lover to beat Michelle's cheating husband?
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Give it a chance—brilliant!
- By Meredith on 01-22-23
By: Georgette Kaplan
-
Autobiography of a Fat Bride
- True Tales of a Pretend Adulthood
- By: Laurie Notaro
- Narrated by: Hillary Huber
- Length: 7 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 51
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 43
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 44
In Autobiography of a Fat Bride, Laurie Notaro tries painfully to make the transition from all-night partyer and bar-stool regular to mortgagee with plumbing problems and no air conditioning. Laurie finds grown-up life just as harrowing as her reckless youth, as she meets Mr. Right, moves in, settles down, and crosses the toe-stubbing threshold of matrimony.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Hilarious
- By MissSusie66 on 05-10-12
By: Laurie Notaro
-
The Center of Everything
- By: Laura Moriarty
- Narrated by: Julie Dretzin
- Length: 13 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 118
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 103
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 101
The Center of Everything is the fictional story of 10-year-old math prodigy Evelyn Bucknow. Living in Kansas with her single mother and deeply religious grandmother, Evelyn believes she is destined to marry Travis, the boy next door. But as she grows up, she experiences the heartbreak of a love not meant to be. Author Laura Moriarty was a recipient of the George Bennet Fellowship for Creative Writing at Phillips Exeter Academy.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
not religious fiction
- By Theresa Jameson on 04-28-14
By: Laura Moriarty
-
Make Something Up
- Stories You Can't Unread
- By: Chuck Palahniuk
- Narrated by: Chuck Palahniuk, Scott Sowers, Rich Orlow, and others
- Length: 11 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 483
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 434
-
Story3.5 out of 5 stars 431
For years Chuck Palahniuk has reserved his best storytelling for his readings, often choosing to read a new short story instead of whatever novel he is supposed to be promoting. Make Something Up compiles these previously unpublished tales for the very first time, plus the Byliner social media insta-classic "Phoenix" and Palahniuk's most notable pieces from Playboy.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Plenty of shock, just not enough Palahniuk awe
- By Darwin8u on 06-10-15
By: Chuck Palahniuk
-
Godshot
- A Novel
- By: Chelsea Bieker
- Narrated by: Lauren Ezzo
- Length: 11 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 180
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 162
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 162
Drought has settled on the town of Peaches, California. The area of the Central Valley where fourteen-year-old Lacey May and her alcoholic mother live was once an agricultural paradise. Now it's an environmental disaster, a place of cracked earth and barren raisin farms. In their desperation, residents have turned to a cult leader named Pastor Vern for guidance. He promises, through secret "assignments," to bring the rain everybody is praying for.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
flawless novel, not the best narration
- By Adrienne on 05-05-20
By: Chelsea Bieker
-
Kissing Games of the World
- By: Sandi Kahn Shelton
- Narrated by: Myra Platt
- Length: 13 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 144
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 114
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 115
What if the one person you can't bear to be with is also the one person you can't bear to be without? Jamie McClintock is a free-spirited artist and single mother who has at last found peace and freedom sharing a farmhouse with an elderly man and his young grandson. But when the old man dies suddenly her idyllic country life comes to a halt as the old man's estranged son, Nate, returns to claim the house and his child.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Great Writer, Great Narrator ! Loved it!
- By Ms. Critic on 05-30-09
-
Mecca
- By: Susan Straight
- Narrated by: Patricia R. Floyd, Frankie Corzo, Shaun Taylor-Corbett
- Length: 12 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 92
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 72
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 72
Johnny Frías has California in his blood. A descendant of the state’s indigenous people and Mexican settlers, he has Southern California’s forgotten towns and canyons in his soul. He spends his days as a highway patrolman pulling over speeders, ignoring their racist insults, and pushing past the trauma of his rookie year, when he killed a man assaulting a young woman named Bunny, who ran from the scene, leaving Johnny without a witness.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
An eye opening read
- By Anonymous User on 10-10-22
By: Susan Straight
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
Maggie Brown & Others
- Stories
- By: Peter Orner
- Narrated by: Peter Orner, Ari Fliakos, Brittany Pressley
- Length: 8 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 12
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 12
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 12
In this powerful and virtuosic collection of interlocking stories, Peter Orner, a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist, takes the short story to new heights. Through 44 compressed gems, Peter Orner chronicles people whose lives are at inflection points, gripping us with a series of defining moments.
By: Peter Orner
-
To the Edge of Sorrow
- A Novel
- By: Aharon Appelfeld, Stuart Schoffman
- Narrated by: Michael Crouch
- Length: 8 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 17
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 14
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 14
Battling numbing cold, ever-present hunger, and German soldiers determined to hunt them down, four dozen resistance fighters - escapees from a nearby ghetto - hide in a Ukrainian forest, determined to survive the war, sabotage the German war effort, and rescue as many Jews as they can from the trains taking them to concentration camps. Their leader is relentless in his efforts to turn his ragtag band of men and boys into a disciplined force that accomplishes its goals without losing its moral compass.
By: Aharon Appelfeld, and others
-
The Girl in the Flammable Skirt
- Stories
- By: Aimee Bender
- Narrated by: Jorjeana Marie, Alex McKenna, Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 4 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 9
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 7
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 7
A grief-stricken librarian decides to have sex with every man who enters her library. A half-mad, unbearably beautiful heiress follows a strange man home, seeking total sexual abandon: He only wants to watch game shows. A woman falls in love with a hunchback; when his deformity turns out to be a prosthesis, she leaves him. A wife whose husband has just returned from the war struggles with the heartrending question: Can she still love a man who has no lips?
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Lovely, Weird. Need More!
- By Erica Shanks on 03-05-24
By: Aimee Bender
-
MacArthur Park
- A Novel
- By: Judith Freeman
- Narrated by: Eva Kaminsky
- Length: 14 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall5 out of 5 stars 15
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 13
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 13
Jolene and Verna share complicated ties that have crystallized over time. Beginning when they were girls discovering their needs and desires, their ongoing stories have been inextricably linked. But when Verna marries Vincent, Jolene’s ex-husband, their paths may have finally, permanently diverged.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
An Outstanding Performance by Writer and Narrator
- By Bax on 12-11-21
By: Judith Freeman
-
Are You Enjoying?
- Stories
- By: Mira Sethi
- Narrated by: Mira Sethi
- Length: 5 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 8
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 7
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 6
From the high-stakes worlds of television and politics to the intimate corridors of home—including the bedroom—these wryly observed, deeply revealing stories look at life in Pakistan with humor, compassion, psychological acuity, and emotional immediacy. Childhood best friends agree to marry in order to keep their sexuality a secret. A young woman with an anxiety disorder discovers the numbing pleasures of an illicit love affair. A radicalized student's preparations for his sister's wedding involve beating up the groom.
By: Mira Sethi
-
Inheritors
- By: Asako Serizawa
- Narrated by: Feodor Chin, Ren Hanami, Catherine Ho, and others
- Length: 9 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 8
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 6
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 6
Spanning more than 150 years, and set in multiple locations in colonial and postcolonial Asia and the United States, Inheritors paints a kaleidoscopic portrait of its characters as they grapple with the legacies of loss, imperialism, and war. Written from myriad perspectives and in a wide range of styles, each of these interconnected stories is designed to speak to the others, contesting assumptions and illuminating the complicated ways we experience, interpret, and pass on our personal and shared histories.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
moving, deep, expansive
- By Mack Eulet on 12-30-20
By: Asako Serizawa
-
Maggie Brown & Others
- Stories
- By: Peter Orner
- Narrated by: Peter Orner, Ari Fliakos, Brittany Pressley
- Length: 8 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 12
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 12
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 12
In this powerful and virtuosic collection of interlocking stories, Peter Orner, a National Book Critics Circle Award finalist, takes the short story to new heights. Through 44 compressed gems, Peter Orner chronicles people whose lives are at inflection points, gripping us with a series of defining moments.
By: Peter Orner
-
To the Edge of Sorrow
- A Novel
- By: Aharon Appelfeld, Stuart Schoffman
- Narrated by: Michael Crouch
- Length: 8 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 17
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 14
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 14
Battling numbing cold, ever-present hunger, and German soldiers determined to hunt them down, four dozen resistance fighters - escapees from a nearby ghetto - hide in a Ukrainian forest, determined to survive the war, sabotage the German war effort, and rescue as many Jews as they can from the trains taking them to concentration camps. Their leader is relentless in his efforts to turn his ragtag band of men and boys into a disciplined force that accomplishes its goals without losing its moral compass.
By: Aharon Appelfeld, and others
-
The Girl in the Flammable Skirt
- Stories
- By: Aimee Bender
- Narrated by: Jorjeana Marie, Alex McKenna, Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 4 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 9
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 7
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 7
A grief-stricken librarian decides to have sex with every man who enters her library. A half-mad, unbearably beautiful heiress follows a strange man home, seeking total sexual abandon: He only wants to watch game shows. A woman falls in love with a hunchback; when his deformity turns out to be a prosthesis, she leaves him. A wife whose husband has just returned from the war struggles with the heartrending question: Can she still love a man who has no lips?
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Lovely, Weird. Need More!
- By Erica Shanks on 03-05-24
By: Aimee Bender
-
MacArthur Park
- A Novel
- By: Judith Freeman
- Narrated by: Eva Kaminsky
- Length: 14 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall5 out of 5 stars 15
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 13
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 13
Jolene and Verna share complicated ties that have crystallized over time. Beginning when they were girls discovering their needs and desires, their ongoing stories have been inextricably linked. But when Verna marries Vincent, Jolene’s ex-husband, their paths may have finally, permanently diverged.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
An Outstanding Performance by Writer and Narrator
- By Bax on 12-11-21
By: Judith Freeman
-
Are You Enjoying?
- Stories
- By: Mira Sethi
- Narrated by: Mira Sethi
- Length: 5 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 8
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 7
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 6
From the high-stakes worlds of television and politics to the intimate corridors of home—including the bedroom—these wryly observed, deeply revealing stories look at life in Pakistan with humor, compassion, psychological acuity, and emotional immediacy. Childhood best friends agree to marry in order to keep their sexuality a secret. A young woman with an anxiety disorder discovers the numbing pleasures of an illicit love affair. A radicalized student's preparations for his sister's wedding involve beating up the groom.
By: Mira Sethi
-
Inheritors
- By: Asako Serizawa
- Narrated by: Feodor Chin, Ren Hanami, Catherine Ho, and others
- Length: 9 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 8
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 6
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 6
Spanning more than 150 years, and set in multiple locations in colonial and postcolonial Asia and the United States, Inheritors paints a kaleidoscopic portrait of its characters as they grapple with the legacies of loss, imperialism, and war. Written from myriad perspectives and in a wide range of styles, each of these interconnected stories is designed to speak to the others, contesting assumptions and illuminating the complicated ways we experience, interpret, and pass on our personal and shared histories.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
moving, deep, expansive
- By Mack Eulet on 12-30-20
By: Asako Serizawa
-
Silent Winds, Dry Seas
- A Novel
- By: Vinod Busjeet
- Narrated by: Mahesh Jadu
- Length: 8 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 21
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 20
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 20
In the 1950s, Vishnu Bhushan is a young boy yet to learn the truth beyond the rumors of his family's fractured histories - an alliance, as his mother says, of two bankrupt families. In evocative chapters, the first two decades of Vishnu's life in Mauritius unfolds with heart wrenching closeness as he battles to experience the world beyond, and the cultural, political, and familial turmoil that hold on to him.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Reminiscent of VS Naipaul
- By CFK on 09-20-22
By: Vinod Busjeet
-
Love and Other Thought Experiments
- By: Sophie Ward
- Narrated by: Sophie Ward
- Length: 7 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 13
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 11
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 11
This impressive debut novel, long-listed for the 2020 Booker Prize, takes its premise and inspiration from 10 of the best-known thought experiments in philosophy - the what-ifs of philosophical investigation - and uses them to talk about love in a wholly unique way.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
One of my new favorites
- By A.W on 08-15-22
By: Sophie Ward
-
A Song Everlasting
- A Novel
- By: Ha Jin
- Narrated by: Feodor Chin
- Length: 11 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 20
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 17
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 17
At the end of a US tour with his state-supported choir, popular singer Yao Tian takes a private gig in New York to pick up some extra cash for his daughter’s tuition fund, but the consequences of his choice spiral out of control. On his return to China, Tian is informed that the sponsors of the event were supporters of Taiwan’s secession, and that he must deliver a formal self-criticism. When he is asked to forfeit his passport to his employer, Tian impulsively decides instead to return to New York to protest the government’s threat to his artistic integrity.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Wonderful Story
- By Amazon Customer on 10-07-22
By: Ha Jin
-
Heaven and Earth
- A Novel
- By: Paolo Giordano, Anne Milano Appel - translator
- Narrated by: Jane McDowell
- Length: 14 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 17
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 15
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 15
Every summer Teresa follows her father to his childhood home in Puglia, down in the heel of Italy, a land of relentless, shimmering heat. Everything changes the summer she meets the three boys who live on the farm next door: Nicola, Tommaso, and Bern - the man Teresa will love for the rest of her life. Raised like brothers on a farm that feels to Teresa almost suspended in time, the three boys share a complex, intimate, and seemingly unassailable bond. But there is resentment underneath the surface of that strange brotherhood, a twisted kind of love that protects a dark secret.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Definitely not a mystery
- By Mark D on 07-23-20
By: Paolo Giordano, and others
-
Bewilderness
- By: Karen Tucker
- Narrated by: Brittany Pressley
- Length: 7 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 32
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 29
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 29
Irene, a lonely 19-year-old in rural North Carolina, works long nights at the local pool hall, serving pitchers and dodging drunks. One evening, her hilarious, magnetic coworker Luce invites her on a joyride through the mountains to take revenge on a particularly creepy customer. Their adventure not only spells the beginning of a dazzling friendship, it seduces both girls into the mysterious world of pills and the endless hustles needed to fund the next high.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
I was wowed.
- By elletee on 06-07-21
By: Karen Tucker
-
A Flaw in the Design
- A Novel
- By: Nathan Oates
- Narrated by: David Pittu
- Length: 10 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 18
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 15
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 15
Gil is living a quiet life as a creative writing professor in a bucolic Vermont town, when he receives some shocking news: His sister and her husband have been killed in a car accident, and their only son is coming to live with him and his family.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Captivating
- By Katia Passerini on 04-06-23
By: Nathan Oates
-
The Cheffe
- A Cook's Novel
- By: Marie NDiaye, Jordan Stump - translator
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini
- Length: 7 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 19
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 17
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 16
Continuing her tradition of writing provocative fiction about fascinating women, here Marie NDiaye gives us the story of a Great Female Chef - a chef who was celebrated as one of the best in a world where men dominate, and the way that her pursuit of love, pleasure, and gustatory delights helped shape her life and career. Told from the perspective of her former assistant (and unrequited lover), now an aged chef himself, here is the story of a woman's quest to the front of the kitchen - and the extraordinary journey she takes along the way.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Simply brilliant, and well-performed by Edoardo!
- By Ogheneruno Okiomah on 03-18-20
By: Marie NDiaye, and others
-
Strangers I Know
- A Novel
- By: Claudia Durastanti
- Narrated by: Lisa Flanagan
- Length: 6 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 9
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 8
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 8
Descriptive copy is not yet available from the publisher.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Boring
- By lin on 09-18-24
-
Build Your House Around My Body
- A Novel
- By: Violet Kupersmith
- Narrated by: Quyen Ngo
- Length: 15 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 163
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 139
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 140
Two young women go missing decades apart. Both are fearless, both are lost. And both will have their revenge. Build Your House Around My Body takes us from colonial mansions to ramshackle zoos, from sweaty nightclubs to the jostling seats of motorbikes, from ex-pat flats to sizzling back-alley street carts. Spanning more than fifty years of Vietnamese history and barreling toward an unforgettable conclusion, this is a time-traveling, heart-pounding, border-crossing fever dream of a novel that will haunt you long after the last minute.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Epic, Horrifying & Mystical
- By Jonathan T. Jefferson on 07-20-21
-
Holler, Child
- Stories
- By: LaToya Watkins
- Narrated by: Joniece Abbott-Pratt, Aaron Goodson, JD Jackson, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 10
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 7
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 7
In Holler, Child’s eleven brilliant stories, LaToya Watkins presses at the bruises of guilt, love, and circumstance. Each story introduces us to a character irrevocably shaped by place and reaching toward something—hope, reconciliation, freedom. In “Cutting Horse,” the appearance of a horse in a man’s suburban backyard places a former horse breeder in trouble with the police. In “Holler, Child,” a mother is forced into an impossible position when her son gets in a kind of trouble she knows too well from the other side.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Great book and readers
- By Paula C. Brancato on 08-10-24
By: LaToya Watkins
-
Daughters of the Dust
- A Gullah-Geechee Novel
- By: Julie Dash
- Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
- Length: 15 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall5 out of 5 stars 65
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 62
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 62
Drawing from the magical world of her iconic Sundance award-winning film, Julie Dash’s stand-alone novel tells another rich, historical tale of the Gullah-Geechee people: a multigenerational story about a Brooklyn College anthropology student who finds an unexpected homecoming when she heads to the South Carolina Sea Islands to study her ancestors.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
My BFF Bahni...
- By Lillian Collins on 12-31-22
By: Julie Dash
-
Between Two Moons
- A Novel
- By: Aisha Abdel Gawad
- Narrated by: Suehyla El-Attar Young
- Length: 11 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 19
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 15
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 15
It’s the holy month of Ramadan, and twin sisters Amira and Lina are about to graduate high school in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. On the precipice of adulthood, they plan to embark on a summer of teenage revelry, trying on new identities and testing the limits of what they can get away with while still under their parents’ roof. But the twins' expectations of a summer of freedom collide with their older brother's return from prison, whose mysterious behavior threatens to undo the delicate family balance.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
One of the very few books i would give a 5 star .
- By Mystic Madness on 09-02-23
What listeners say about Black Light
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall5 out of 5 stars
-
Performance2 out of 5 stars
-
Story5 out of 5 stars
- Steven Cain
- 10-01-24
wow
Hands down the best collection of short stories I have ever read/listened to. The narration, too ...spectacular.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!