The Dark Road
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.
The Dark Road
Buy for $22.79
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Tania Rodrigues
-
By:
-
Ma Jian
About this listen
Meili, a young peasant woman living in the remote heart of China, is married to Kongzi, a distant descendant of Confucius. Desperate for a son to carry on his illustrious family line, Kongzi gets Meili pregnant without waiting for official permission. When family planning officers storm the village to arrest violators of the population control policy, the family escape to the Yangtze River and begin a fugitive life.
©2013 Ma Jian (P)2013 W F Howes LtdListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Covenant of Water
- By: Abraham Verghese
- Narrated by: Abraham Verghese
- Length: 31 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 8,881
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 7,765
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 7,753
Spanning the years 1900 to 1977, The Covenant of Water is set in Kerala, on South India’s Malabar Coast, and follows three generations of a family that suffers a peculiar affliction: in every generation, at least one person dies by drowning—and in Kerala, water is everywhere. At the turn of the century, a twelve-year-old girl from Kerala’s long-existing Christian community, grieving the death of her father, is sent by boat to her wedding, where she will meet her forty-year-old husband for the first time.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Story Telling At Its Best
- By Regina on 05-06-23
By: Abraham Verghese
-
Middlesex
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Kristoffer Tabori
- Length: 21 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 11,219
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 6,890
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 6,922
In the spring of 1974, Calliope Stephanides, a student at a girls' school in Grosse Pointe, finds herself drawn to a chain-smoking, strawberry-blonde classmate with a gift for acting. The passion that furtively develops between them - along with Callie's failure to develop physically - leads Callie to suspect that she is not like other girls. In fact, she is not really a girl at all.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Anything but middle.
- By Michael on 05-04-03
-
Miss Benson's Beetle
- A Novel
- By: Rachel Joyce
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 12 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 3,085
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 2,734
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 2,720
It is 1950. London is still reeling from World War II, and Margery Benson, a schoolteacher and spinster, is trying to get through life, surviving on scraps. One day, she reaches her breaking point, abandoning her job and small existence to set out on an expedition to the other side of the world in search of her childhood obsession: an insect that may or may not exist - the golden beetle of New Caledonia. When she advertises for an assistant to accompany her, the woman she ends up with is the last person she had in mind.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
A well-written panorama of human tragedy
- By Film Fan on 07-03-21
By: Rachel Joyce
-
The White Tiger
- A Novel
- By: Aravind Adiga
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 8 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 3,516
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 2,181
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 2,176
Balram Halwai is a complicated man. Servant. Philosopher. Entrepreneur. Murderer. Balram tells us the terrible and transfixing story of how he came to be a success in life - having nothing but his own wits to help him along. Through Balram's eyes, we see India as we've never seen it before: the cockroaches and the call centers, the prostitutes and the worshippers, the water buffalo and, trapped in so many kinds of cages that escape is (almost) impossible, the white tiger.
With a charisma as undeniable as it is unexpected, Balram teaches us that religion doesn't create morality and money doesn't solve every problem.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Entertaining, thought-provoking, darkly funny
- By Mark P. Furlong on 05-29-08
By: Aravind Adiga
-
The Beekeeper of Aleppo
- A Novel
- By: Christy Lefteri
- Narrated by: Art Malik
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,885
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 2,497
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 2,482
Nuri is a beekeeper and Afra, his wife, is an artist. Mornings, Nuri rises early to hear the call to prayer before driving to his hives in the countryside. On weekends, Afra sells her colorful landscape paintings at the open-air market. They live a simple life, rich in family and friends, in the hills of the beautiful Syrian city of Aleppo - until the unthinkable happens. When all they love is destroyed by war, Nuri knows they have no choice except to leave their home. But escaping Syria will be no easy task: Afra has lost her sight.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Just TOO AWFULLY DEPRESSING WITHOUT ending with any hope
- By Abby Mamacos on 07-28-20
By: Christy Lefteri
-
The Mountains Sing
- By: Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai
- Narrated by: Quyen Ngo
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,076
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,818
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 1,806
With the epic sweep of Min Jin Lee's Pachinko and Yaa Gyasi's Homegoing and the lyrical beauty of Vaddey Ratner's In the Shadow of the Banyan, The Mountains Sing tells an enveloping, multigenerational tale of the Trần family, set against the backdrop of the Việt Nam War. Trần Diệu Lan, who was born in 1920, was forced to flee her family farm with her six children during the Land Reform as the Communist government rose in the North.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Incredible first English language novel
- By Gregory Barbee on 03-23-20
-
The Covenant of Water
- By: Abraham Verghese
- Narrated by: Abraham Verghese
- Length: 31 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 8,881
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 7,765
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 7,753
Spanning the years 1900 to 1977, The Covenant of Water is set in Kerala, on South India’s Malabar Coast, and follows three generations of a family that suffers a peculiar affliction: in every generation, at least one person dies by drowning—and in Kerala, water is everywhere. At the turn of the century, a twelve-year-old girl from Kerala’s long-existing Christian community, grieving the death of her father, is sent by boat to her wedding, where she will meet her forty-year-old husband for the first time.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Story Telling At Its Best
- By Regina on 05-06-23
By: Abraham Verghese
-
Middlesex
- By: Jeffrey Eugenides
- Narrated by: Kristoffer Tabori
- Length: 21 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 11,219
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 6,890
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 6,922
In the spring of 1974, Calliope Stephanides, a student at a girls' school in Grosse Pointe, finds herself drawn to a chain-smoking, strawberry-blonde classmate with a gift for acting. The passion that furtively develops between them - along with Callie's failure to develop physically - leads Callie to suspect that she is not like other girls. In fact, she is not really a girl at all.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Anything but middle.
- By Michael on 05-04-03
-
Miss Benson's Beetle
- A Novel
- By: Rachel Joyce
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 12 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 3,085
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 2,734
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 2,720
It is 1950. London is still reeling from World War II, and Margery Benson, a schoolteacher and spinster, is trying to get through life, surviving on scraps. One day, she reaches her breaking point, abandoning her job and small existence to set out on an expedition to the other side of the world in search of her childhood obsession: an insect that may or may not exist - the golden beetle of New Caledonia. When she advertises for an assistant to accompany her, the woman she ends up with is the last person she had in mind.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
A well-written panorama of human tragedy
- By Film Fan on 07-03-21
By: Rachel Joyce
-
The White Tiger
- A Novel
- By: Aravind Adiga
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 8 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 3,516
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 2,181
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 2,176
Balram Halwai is a complicated man. Servant. Philosopher. Entrepreneur. Murderer. Balram tells us the terrible and transfixing story of how he came to be a success in life - having nothing but his own wits to help him along. Through Balram's eyes, we see India as we've never seen it before: the cockroaches and the call centers, the prostitutes and the worshippers, the water buffalo and, trapped in so many kinds of cages that escape is (almost) impossible, the white tiger.
With a charisma as undeniable as it is unexpected, Balram teaches us that religion doesn't create morality and money doesn't solve every problem.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Entertaining, thought-provoking, darkly funny
- By Mark P. Furlong on 05-29-08
By: Aravind Adiga
-
The Beekeeper of Aleppo
- A Novel
- By: Christy Lefteri
- Narrated by: Art Malik
- Length: 8 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,885
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 2,497
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 2,482
Nuri is a beekeeper and Afra, his wife, is an artist. Mornings, Nuri rises early to hear the call to prayer before driving to his hives in the countryside. On weekends, Afra sells her colorful landscape paintings at the open-air market. They live a simple life, rich in family and friends, in the hills of the beautiful Syrian city of Aleppo - until the unthinkable happens. When all they love is destroyed by war, Nuri knows they have no choice except to leave their home. But escaping Syria will be no easy task: Afra has lost her sight.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Just TOO AWFULLY DEPRESSING WITHOUT ending with any hope
- By Abby Mamacos on 07-28-20
By: Christy Lefteri
-
The Mountains Sing
- By: Nguyễn Phan Quế Mai
- Narrated by: Quyen Ngo
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,076
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,818
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 1,806
With the epic sweep of Min Jin Lee's Pachinko and Yaa Gyasi's Homegoing and the lyrical beauty of Vaddey Ratner's In the Shadow of the Banyan, The Mountains Sing tells an enveloping, multigenerational tale of the Trần family, set against the backdrop of the Việt Nam War. Trần Diệu Lan, who was born in 1920, was forced to flee her family farm with her six children during the Land Reform as the Communist government rose in the North.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Incredible first English language novel
- By Gregory Barbee on 03-23-20
-
The God of Small Things
- By: Arundhati Roy
- Narrated by: Sneha Mathan
- Length: 11 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 2,707
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 2,409
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 2,405
Likened to the works of Faulkner and Dickens when it was first published 20 years ago, this extraordinarily accomplished debut novel is a brilliantly plotted story of forbidden love and piercing political drama, centered on the tragic decline of an Indian family in the state of Kerala, on the southernmost tip of India. Armed only with the invincible innocence of children, the twins Rahel and Esthappen fashion a childhood for themselves in the shade of the wreck that is their family.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Worthy Booker winner!
- By Saman on 08-10-17
By: Arundhati Roy
-
Street Without a Name
- Childhood and Other Misadventures in Bulgaria
- By: Kapka Kassabova
- Narrated by: Emily Gray
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 60
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 53
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 53
Kassabova was born in Sofia, Bulgaria, and grew up under the drab, muddy, gray mantle of one of communism’s most mindlessly authoritarian regimes. Escaping with her family as soon as possible after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, she lived in Britain, New Zealand, and Argentina, and several other places. But when Bulgaria was formally inducted to the European Union she decided it was time to return to the home she had spent most of her life trying to escape. What she found was a country languishing under the strain of transition. This two-part memoir of Kapka’s childhood and return explains life on the other side of the Iron Curtain.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Good start, but ended up not liking the author
- By Giselle on 11-02-21
By: Kapka Kassabova
-
Pearl in a Cage
- By: Joy Dettman
- Narrated by: Deidre Rubenstein
- Length: 20 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 38
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 30
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 30
On a balmy midsummer's evening in 1923, a young woman - foreign, dishevelled and heavily pregnant - is found unconscious just off the railway tracks in the tiny logging community of Woody Creek. The town midwife, Gertrude Foote, is roused from her bed when the woman is brought to her door. Try as she might, Gertrude is unable to save her, but the baby lives.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Pearl in a Cage
- By Verita on 06-16-17
By: Joy Dettman
-
The Unknown Errors of Our Lives
- Stories
- By: Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni
- Narrated by: Deepti Gupta
- Length: 6 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 69
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 60
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 59
In nine poignant stories spiked with humor and intelligence, Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni captures lives at crossroad moments - caught between past and present, home and abroad, tradition, and fresh experience. A widow in California, recently arrived from India, struggles to adapt to a world in which neighbors are strangers and her domestic skills are deemed superfluous in the award-winning "Mrs. Dutta Writes a Letter".
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Catalyst for introspection on life.
- By amanda shelton on 11-14-21
-
The Ministry of Utmost Happiness
- A Novel
- By: Arundhati Roy
- Narrated by: Arundhati Roy
- Length: 16 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 657
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 585
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 584
The Ministry of Utmost Happiness transports us across a subcontinent on a journey of many years. It takes us deep into the lives of its gloriously rendered characters, each of them in search of a place of safety - in search of meaning and of love.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Author narration does not work for me
- By Amazon Customer on 06-18-17
By: Arundhati Roy
-
Ghostwritten
- By: David Mitchell
- Narrated by: William Rycroft
- Length: 15 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 598
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 522
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 518
Oblivious to the bizarre ways in which their lives intersect, nine characters - a terrorist in Okinawa, a record-shop clerk in Tokyo, a money-laundering British financier in Hong Kong, an old woman running a tea shack in China, a transmigrating "noncorpum" entity seeking a human host in Mongolia, a gallery-attendant-cum-art-thief in Petersburg, a drummer in London, a female physicist in Ireland, and a radio deejay in New York - hurtle toward a shared destiny of astonishing impact.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
An Embryonic Version of Cloud Atlas
- By Darwin8u on 05-29-13
By: David Mitchell
-
The Buddha in the Attic
- By: Julie Otsuka
- Narrated by: Samantha Quan, Carrington MacDuffie
- Length: 3 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 547
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 473
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 475
In eight incantatory sections, The Buddha in the Attic traces the extraordinary lives of young Japanese brides, from their arduous journey by boat, where they exchange photographs of their husbands, imagining uncertain futures in an unknown land; to their arrival in San Francisco and their tremulous first nights as new wives; to their backbreaking work picking fruit in the fields and scrubbing the floors of white women; to their struggles to master a new language and a new culture; to their experiences in childbirth, and then as mothers....
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Fascinating topic, irritating writing style
- By Lydia on 08-26-11
By: Julie Otsuka
-
White Dog Fell from the Sky
- By: Eleanor Morse
- Narrated by: Carla Mercer-Meyer
- Length: 14 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 139
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 119
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 118
Botswana, 1976: Isaac Muthethe thinks he is dead. Smuggled across the border from South Africa in a hearse, he awakens covered in dust, staring at blue sky and the face of White Dog. Far from dead, he is, for the first time, in a country without apartheid. A medical student in South Africa, he was forced to flee after witnessing a friend murdered by white members of the South African Defense Force.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Unexpectedly Stunning Work!
- By Kathi on 03-15-13
By: Eleanor Morse
-
Girl
- A Novel
- By: Edna O'Brien
- Narrated by: Sheila Atim
- Length: 5 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 55
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 53
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 53
"I was a girl once, but not anymore." So begins Girl, Edna O’Brien’s harrowing portrayal of the young women abducted by Boko Haram. Set in the deep countryside of northeast Nigeria, this is a brutal story of incarceration, horror, and hunger; a hair-raising escape into the manifold terrors of the forest; and a descent into the labyrinthine bureaucracy and hostility awaiting a victim who returns home with a child blighted by enemy blood.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Low quality. Hard to understand.
- By RS on 04-21-20
By: Edna O'Brien
-
The Little Red Chairs
- By: Edna O'Brien
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 9 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 502
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 445
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 446
Vlad, a stranger from Eastern Europe masquerading as a healer, settles in a small Irish village where the locals fall under his spell. One woman, Fidelma McBride, becomes so enamored that she begs him for a child. All that world is shattered when Vlad is arrested, and his identity as a war criminal is revealed.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Red, as Scarlet, as Enraging, as Bloody
- By W Perry Hall on 04-17-16
By: Edna O'Brien
-
No Heaven for Good Boys
- A Novel
- By: Keisha Bush
- Narrated by: Samba Schutte
- Length: 10 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 32
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 30
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 30
Six-year-old Ibrahimah loves snatching pastries from his mother’s kitchen, harvesting string beans with his father, and searching for sea glass with his sisters. But when he is approached in his rural village one day by Marabout Ahmed, a seemingly kind stranger and highly regarded teacher, the tides of his life turn forever.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Captivating
- By Amazon Customer on 02-05-21
By: Keisha Bush
-
Claire of the Sea Light
- By: Edwidge Danticat
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 7 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 170
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 151
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 152
Claire Limyè Lanmè - Claire of the Sea Light - is an enchanting child born into love and tragedy in Ville Rose, Haiti. Claire’s mother died in childbirth, and on each of her birthdays Claire is taken by her father, Nozias, to visit her mother’s grave. Nozias wonders if he should give away his young daughter to a local shopkeeper, who lost a child of her own, so that Claire can have a better life. But on the night of Claire’s seventh birthday, when at last he makes the wrenching decision to do so, she disappears.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Claire Shines, Other Characters Not So Much
- By FanB14 on 09-15-13
By: Edwidge Danticat
Critic reviews
Related to this topic
-
Pearl in a Cage
- By: Joy Dettman
- Narrated by: Deidre Rubenstein
- Length: 20 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 38
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 30
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 30
On a balmy midsummer's evening in 1923, a young woman - foreign, dishevelled and heavily pregnant - is found unconscious just off the railway tracks in the tiny logging community of Woody Creek. The town midwife, Gertrude Foote, is roused from her bed when the woman is brought to her door. Try as she might, Gertrude is unable to save her, but the baby lives.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Pearl in a Cage
- By Verita on 06-16-17
By: Joy Dettman
-
White Dog Fell from the Sky
- By: Eleanor Morse
- Narrated by: Carla Mercer-Meyer
- Length: 14 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 139
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 119
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 118
Botswana, 1976: Isaac Muthethe thinks he is dead. Smuggled across the border from South Africa in a hearse, he awakens covered in dust, staring at blue sky and the face of White Dog. Far from dead, he is, for the first time, in a country without apartheid. A medical student in South Africa, he was forced to flee after witnessing a friend murdered by white members of the South African Defense Force.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Unexpectedly Stunning Work!
- By Kathi on 03-15-13
By: Eleanor Morse
-
All the Lives We Never Lived
- By: Anuradha Roy
- Narrated by: Vikas Adam
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 48
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 43
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 41
From the Man Booker Prize-nominated author of Sleeping on Jupiter, The Folded Earth, and An Atlas of Impossible Longing, a poignant and sweeping novel set in India during World War II and the present day about a son’s quest to uncover the truth about his mother....
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Beautiful book
- By Sonia S. on 12-13-19
By: Anuradha Roy
-
Street Without a Name
- Childhood and Other Misadventures in Bulgaria
- By: Kapka Kassabova
- Narrated by: Emily Gray
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 60
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 53
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 53
Kassabova was born in Sofia, Bulgaria, and grew up under the drab, muddy, gray mantle of one of communism’s most mindlessly authoritarian regimes. Escaping with her family as soon as possible after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, she lived in Britain, New Zealand, and Argentina, and several other places. But when Bulgaria was formally inducted to the European Union she decided it was time to return to the home she had spent most of her life trying to escape. What she found was a country languishing under the strain of transition. This two-part memoir of Kapka’s childhood and return explains life on the other side of the Iron Curtain.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Good start, but ended up not liking the author
- By Giselle on 11-02-21
By: Kapka Kassabova
-
The Past Is Never
- A Novel
- By: Tiffany Quay Tyson
- Narrated by: Devon Sorvari
- Length: 9 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 64
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 60
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 59
Siblings Bert, Willet, and Pansy know better than to go swimming at the old rock quarry. According to their father, it's the Devil's place, a place that's been cursed and forgotten. But Mississippi Delta summer days are scorching hot, and they can't resist cooling off in the dark, bottomless water - until the day six-year-old Pansy vanishes...not drowned, not lost, simply gone. When their father disappears as well, Bert and Willet leave their childhoods behind to try and hold their broken family together.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Intriguing Southern gothic tale
- By Robert Jason on 03-11-20
-
A House for Mr. Biswas
- By: V. S. Naipaul
- Narrated by: Sam Dastor
- Length: 21 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 335
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 284
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 284
A House for Mr. Biswas, by Nobel and Booker Prize-winning author V. S. Naipaul, is a powerful novel about one man's struggle for identity and belonging. Born into poverty, then trapped in the shackles of charity and gratitude, Mr. Biswas longs for a house he can call his own. He loathes his wife and her wealthy family, upon whom he is dependent. Finding himself a mere accessory on their estate, his constant rebellion is motivated by the one thing that can symbolize his independence.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Performance makes a fatal mistake. No Trini accent
- By Christopher on 01-04-19
By: V. S. Naipaul
-
Pearl in a Cage
- By: Joy Dettman
- Narrated by: Deidre Rubenstein
- Length: 20 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 38
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 30
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 30
On a balmy midsummer's evening in 1923, a young woman - foreign, dishevelled and heavily pregnant - is found unconscious just off the railway tracks in the tiny logging community of Woody Creek. The town midwife, Gertrude Foote, is roused from her bed when the woman is brought to her door. Try as she might, Gertrude is unable to save her, but the baby lives.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Pearl in a Cage
- By Verita on 06-16-17
By: Joy Dettman
-
White Dog Fell from the Sky
- By: Eleanor Morse
- Narrated by: Carla Mercer-Meyer
- Length: 14 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 139
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 119
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 118
Botswana, 1976: Isaac Muthethe thinks he is dead. Smuggled across the border from South Africa in a hearse, he awakens covered in dust, staring at blue sky and the face of White Dog. Far from dead, he is, for the first time, in a country without apartheid. A medical student in South Africa, he was forced to flee after witnessing a friend murdered by white members of the South African Defense Force.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Unexpectedly Stunning Work!
- By Kathi on 03-15-13
By: Eleanor Morse
-
All the Lives We Never Lived
- By: Anuradha Roy
- Narrated by: Vikas Adam
- Length: 11 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 48
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 43
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 41
From the Man Booker Prize-nominated author of Sleeping on Jupiter, The Folded Earth, and An Atlas of Impossible Longing, a poignant and sweeping novel set in India during World War II and the present day about a son’s quest to uncover the truth about his mother....
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Beautiful book
- By Sonia S. on 12-13-19
By: Anuradha Roy
-
Street Without a Name
- Childhood and Other Misadventures in Bulgaria
- By: Kapka Kassabova
- Narrated by: Emily Gray
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 60
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 53
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 53
Kassabova was born in Sofia, Bulgaria, and grew up under the drab, muddy, gray mantle of one of communism’s most mindlessly authoritarian regimes. Escaping with her family as soon as possible after the collapse of the Berlin Wall, she lived in Britain, New Zealand, and Argentina, and several other places. But when Bulgaria was formally inducted to the European Union she decided it was time to return to the home she had spent most of her life trying to escape. What she found was a country languishing under the strain of transition. This two-part memoir of Kapka’s childhood and return explains life on the other side of the Iron Curtain.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Good start, but ended up not liking the author
- By Giselle on 11-02-21
By: Kapka Kassabova
-
The Past Is Never
- A Novel
- By: Tiffany Quay Tyson
- Narrated by: Devon Sorvari
- Length: 9 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 64
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 60
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 59
Siblings Bert, Willet, and Pansy know better than to go swimming at the old rock quarry. According to their father, it's the Devil's place, a place that's been cursed and forgotten. But Mississippi Delta summer days are scorching hot, and they can't resist cooling off in the dark, bottomless water - until the day six-year-old Pansy vanishes...not drowned, not lost, simply gone. When their father disappears as well, Bert and Willet leave their childhoods behind to try and hold their broken family together.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
Intriguing Southern gothic tale
- By Robert Jason on 03-11-20
-
A House for Mr. Biswas
- By: V. S. Naipaul
- Narrated by: Sam Dastor
- Length: 21 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 335
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 284
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 284
A House for Mr. Biswas, by Nobel and Booker Prize-winning author V. S. Naipaul, is a powerful novel about one man's struggle for identity and belonging. Born into poverty, then trapped in the shackles of charity and gratitude, Mr. Biswas longs for a house he can call his own. He loathes his wife and her wealthy family, upon whom he is dependent. Finding himself a mere accessory on their estate, his constant rebellion is motivated by the one thing that can symbolize his independence.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Performance makes a fatal mistake. No Trini accent
- By Christopher on 01-04-19
By: V. S. Naipaul
-
Stars Between the Sun and Moon
- One Woman's Life in North Korea and Escape to Freedom
- By: Lucia Jang, Susan McClelland
- Narrated by: Janet Song
- Length: 7 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 211
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 196
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 196
Born in 1970s North Korea, Lucia Jang grew up in a typical household - her parents worked in the factories, and the family scraped by on rations. Nightly she bowed to her photo of Kim Il-Sung. It was the beginning of a chaotic period with a decade-long famine. Jang married an abusive man who sold their baby. She left him and went home to help her family by illegally crossing the river to China to trade goods. She was caught and imprisoned twice.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Fantastic story. Well read.
- By Jfm on 02-20-16
By: Lucia Jang, and others
-
Nine Continents
- A Memoir In and Out of China
- By: Xiaolu Guo
- Narrated by: Emily Woo Zeller
- Length: 11 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 39
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 32
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 33
Xiaolu Guo has traveled further than most to become who she needed to be. Now, as she experiences the birth of her daughter in a London maternity ward surrounded by women from all over the world, she looks back on that journey. It begins in the fishing village shack on the East China Sea where her illiterate grandparents raised her, and brings her to a rapidly changing Beijing, full of contradictions: a thriving underground art scene amid mass censorship, curious Westerners who held out affection only to disappear back home.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
must read
- By Jeff Darlington on 10-22-17
By: Xiaolu Guo
-
Prayers for the Stolen
- A Novel
- By: Jennifer Clement
- Narrated by: Justine Eyre
- Length: 5 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 60
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 50
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 47
Ladydi Garcia Martinez was born into a world where being a girl is a dangerous thing. In the mountains of Guerrero, Mexico, women must fend for themselves, as their men have left to seek opportunities elsewhere. While her mother waits in vain for her husband's return, Ladydi and her friends dream of a future that holds more promise than mere survival, finding humor, solidarity, and fun in the face of so much tragedy. When Ladydi is offered work as a nanny for a wealthy family in Acapulco, she seizes the chance and finds her first taste of love with a young caretaker there.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
I don’t know how to feel about this...
- By Candice on 01-21-21
By: Jennifer Clement
-
The Third Daughter
- A Novel
- By: Talia Carner
- Narrated by: Saskia Maarleveld
- Length: 10 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 407
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 365
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 362
The turn of the 20th century finds 14-year-old Batya in the Russian countryside, fleeing with her family endless pogroms. Desperate, her father leaps at the opportunity to marry Batya to a worldly, wealthy stranger who can guarantee his daughter an easy life and passage to America. Feeling like a princess in a fairytale, Batya leaves her old life behind as she is whisked away to a new world. But soon, she discovers that she’s entered a waking nightmare. Her new “husband” does indeed bring her to America.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
brilliant novel based on shocking truth
- By Rochelle Jewel Shapiro on 07-05-20
By: Talia Carner
-
Married to a Bedouin
- By: Marguerite van Geldermalsen
- Narrated by: Cat Gould
- Length: 10 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 56
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 50
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 49
"Where you staying?" the Bedouin asked. "Why you not stay with me tonight - in my cave?" Thus begins Marguerite van Geldermalsen's story of how a New Zealand-born nurse came to be married to Mohammad Abdallah Othman, a Bedouin souvenir-seller from the ancient city of Petra in Jordan. It was 1978, and she and a friend were travelling through the Middle East when Marguerite met the charismatic Mohammad who convinced her that he was the man for her.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Disappointing
- By Ellen on 12-03-23
-
Land of Love and Drowning
- By: Tiphanie Yanique
- Narrated by: Cherise Boothe, Korey Jackson, Rachel Leslie, and others
- Length: 14 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 188
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 178
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 173
In the early 1900s an important ship sinks into the Caribbean Sea, just as the Virgin Islands are transferred from Danish to American rule. Orphaned by the sunk vessel are two sisters and their half-brother, now faced with an uncertain identity and future. Each of them is unusually beautiful, and each is in possession of a particular magic that will either sink or save them. Chronicling three generations of an island family from 1916 to the 1970s, Land of Love and Drowning is a novel of love and magic.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
TW: incest
- By Carrissa on 04-12-17
By: Tiphanie Yanique
-
The Road Home
- By: Rose Tremain
- Narrated by: Juliet Stevenson
- Length: 7 hrs and 55 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 90
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 69
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 67
Winner of the Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction 2008, The Road Home is the best-selling story of Lev, a middle-aged migrant from Eastern Europe, who moves to London in search of work after losing his wife and job. Lev's London is awash with money, celebrity and complacency. The world Tremain creates is both convincing and poignant.
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
OK - nice narration - good characters
- By bea on 02-21-11
By: Rose Tremain
-
Continental Drift
- By: Russell Banks
- Narrated by: Zach Villa
- Length: 13 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 55
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 51
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 50
Now available for the first time in audiobook format, a powerful literary classic from one of contemporary fiction's most acclaimed and important writers. Russell Banks' Continental Drift is a masterful novel of hope lost and gained and a gripping, indelible story of fragile lives uprooted and transformed by injustice, disappointment, and the seductions and realities of the American dream.
-
1 out of 5 stars
-
Give up and die
- By AI on 12-09-21
By: Russell Banks
-
The Teller of Secrets
- A Novel
- By: Bisi Adjapon
- Narrated by: Anniwaa Buachie
- Length: 11 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 53
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 51
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 51
Young Esi Agyekum is the unofficial "secret keeper" of her family, as tight-lipped about her father's adultery as she is about her half-sisters' sex lives. But after she is humiliated and punished for her own sexual exploration, Esi begins to question why women's secrets and men's secrets bear different consequences. It is the beginning of a journey of discovery that will lead her to unexpected places. Against a fraught political climate, Esi fights to carve out her own identity, and learns to manifest her power in surprising and inspiring ways.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Hmm took a while to grasp
- By LATOYA LEWIS on 06-25-24
By: Bisi Adjapon
-
What Storm, What Thunder
- By: Myriam J.A. Chancy
- Narrated by: Ella Turenne
- Length: 11 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 60
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 57
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 57
The Earth had buckled, and, in that movement, all that was not in its place fell upon the Earth’s children, upon the blameless as well as the guilty, without discrimination. At the end of a long sweltering day, as markets and businesses begin to close for the evening, an earthquake of 7.0 magnitude shakes the capital of Haiti, Port-au-Prince. Award-winning author Myriam J. A. Chancy masterfully charts the inner lives of the characters affected by the disaster
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake.
- By AuthorAnnaBella on 03-15-22
-
Without a Map
- A Memoir
- By: Meredith Hall
- Narrated by: Kathe Mazur
- Length: 9 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 59
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 55
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 53
Meredith Hall's moving but unsentimental memoir begins in 1965, when she becomes pregnant at sixteen. Shunned by her insular New Hampshire community, she is then kicked out of the house by her mother. Her father and stepmother reluctantly take her in, hiding her before they finally banish her altogether. After giving her baby up for adoption, Hall wanders recklessly through the Middle East, where she survives by selling her possessions and finally her blood.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Not Your Average "16 and Pregnant"
- By Susie on 12-11-12
By: Meredith Hall
-
Owls Do Cry
- By: Janet Frame
- Narrated by: Heather Bolton
- Length: 8 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 34
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 25
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 25
Owls Do Cry is Janet Frame's first novel. She describes her idea behind it in the second volume of her autobiography: 'Pictures of great treasure in the midst of sadness and waste haunted me and I began to think, in fiction, of a childhood, home life, hospital life, using people known to me as a base for main characters, and inventing minor characters.'
-
4 out of 5 stars
-
well told but a wee bit depressing.
- By Muzza on 11-03-19
By: Janet Frame