The Best American Essays 2024
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The Best American Essays 2024
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Narrated by:
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Emily Rankin
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Cary Hite
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Jeanette Illidge
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Robert Fass
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Nancy Wu
About this listen
A collection of the year’s best essays, selected by Pulitzer Prize-winning critic Wesley Morris and series editor Kim Dana Kupperman.
“Imparting some piece of yourself—any part—is arduous and warrants some kind of commendation,” writes guest editor Wesley Morris in his introduction. Both personal and personable, the essayists in this volume use their own vulnerability to guide listeners on excursions that unfold on uncomfortable edges. From contemplating the nuances of memory to exploring the complexities of family, romance, gender identity, illness, and death, Morris’s selection of essays presents a roundup of the thinkers who masterfully grapple with the issues of our time.
The Best American Essays 2024 includes TEJU COLE • MICHAEL W. CLUNE • YIYUN LI • JAMES McAULEY • RÉMY NGAMIJE • JENNIFER SENIOR • SALLIE TISDALE • JERALD WALKER • JENISHA WATTS and others
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Johnnie Rico never really intended to join up—and definitely not the infantry. But now that he’s in the thick of it, trying to get through combat training harder than anything he could have imagined, he knows everyone in his unit is one bad move away from buying the farm in the interstellar war the Terran Federation is waging against the Arachnids. Because everyone in the Mobile Infantry fights. And if the training doesn’t kill you, the Bugs are more than ready to finish the job.
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5 out of 5 stars
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The definitive version!
- By Kristopher G. Hesson on 10-03-24
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Brain Damage
- By: Freida McFadden
- Narrated by: Megan Tusing
- Length: 9 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,277
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 2,155
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 2,154
As Charly struggles to recover from her brain injury, she begins to realize that the events of that fateful night are trapped in the damaged right side of her brain. Now, she must put the jigsaw pieces together to discover the identity of the man who tried to kill her...before he finishes the job he started.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Who Else Laughed, Cried, and Shuddered?
- By Jennifer Chichester on 09-16-22
By: Freida McFadden
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Slayers: A Buffyverse Story
- By: Christopher Golden, Amber Benson
- Narrated by: Amber Benson, Charisma Carpenter, James Charles Leary, and others
- Length: 8 hrs and 2 mins
- Original Recording
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,879
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 2,659
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 2,658
Original cast members from the beloved TV series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, reunite for an all-new adventure about connections that never die—even if you bury them. A decade has passed since the epic final battle that concluded Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV). The game-changing spell that gave power to all potential Slayers persists. With new Slayers constantly emerging, things are looking grim for the bad guys.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A dream come true
- By Anonymous User on 10-12-23
By: Christopher Golden, and others
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Ghost Stories: Stephen Fry's Definitive Collection
- By: Stephen Fry, Washington Irving, M.R. James, and others
- Narrated by: Stephen Fry
- Length: 8 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 701
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 604
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 604
As the days grow shorter and the temperature drops, Halloween approaches. Come, brave listener, pull up a chair, and spend some time with master storyteller Stephen Fry as he tells us some of his favourite ghost stories of all time, in truly terrifying spatial audio. From the headless horseman of Sleepy Hollow to the tortured spirits of M.R. James, from Edgar Allan Poe’s terrifying tale of a doppelganger to Charlotte Riddell’s Open Door that should definitely stay shut, join Stephen as he tells you some truly terrifying tales.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Wonderful narration. Mediocre stories.
- By Michael Fuchs on 11-07-23
By: Stephen Fry, and others
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1 out of 5 stars
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Slouching Towards Bethlehem
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More than perhaps any other book, this collection by one of the most distinctive prose stylists of our era captures the unique time and place of Joan Didion’s focus, exploring subjects such as John Wayne and Howard Hughes, growing up in California and the nature of good and evil in a Death Valley motel room, and, especially, the essence of San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury, the heart of the counterculture.
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Great voice for Joan Dideon. Just the right tone and cadence.
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The year 1972 saw the beginning of a five-year span in which Stevie Wonder released five groundbreaking, critically acclaimed albums, garnering him more than half a dozen Grammys and more than 10 million albums sold, securing his place as one of the most important American musicians and songwriters in history. For the first time, uncover the untold story of an extraordinary artistic journey that shaped the greatest creative era in popular music history.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Good but not great
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Weaving storylines
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