The Waterworks
A Novel
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Narrated by:
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Mark Bramhall
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By:
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E. L. Doctorow
About this listen
One rainy morning in 1871 in lower Manhattan, Martin Pemberton, a freelance writer sees in a passing stagecoach several elderly men, one of whom he recognizes as his supposedly dead and buried father. While trying to unravel the mystery, Pemberton disappears, sending McIlvaine, his employer, the editor of an evening paper, in pursuit of the truth behind his freelancer’s fate. Layer by layer, McIlvaine reveals a modern metropolis surging with primordial urges and sins, where the Tweed Ring operates the city for its own profit and a conspicuously self-satisfied nouveau-riche ignores the poverty and squalor that surrounds them.
In E. L. Doctorow’s skilled hands, The Waterworks becomes, in the words of The New York Times, “a dark moral tale . . . an eloquently troubling evocation of our past.”
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The Gift is the last of the novels Nabokov wrote in his native language and the crowning achievement of that period in his literary career. It is also his ode to Russian literature, evoking the works of Pushkin, Gogol, and others in the course of its narrative: the story of Fyodor Godunov-Cherdyntsev, an impoverished émigré poet living in Berlin, who dreams of the book he will someday write - a book very much like The Gift itself.
One of the twentieth century’s master prose stylists, Vladimir Nabokov was born in St. Petersburg in 1899.
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A complex and rich Künstlerroman
- By Darwin8u on 11-30-13
By: Vladimir Nabokov
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Buddenbrooks
- The Decline of a Family
- By: Thomas Mann
- Narrated by: David Rintoul
- Length: 26 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
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First published in 1900, when Thomas Mann was 25, Buddenbrooks is a minutely imagined chronicle of four generations of a North German mercantile family - a work so true to life that it scandalized the author’s former neighbours in his native Lübeck.
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Where Have You Been All My Life, Thomas Mann?
- By Virginia Waldron on 03-30-17
By: Thomas Mann
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The Patriots
- A Novel
- By: Sana Krasikov
- Narrated by: Suzanne Toren, George Guidall
- Length: 22 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Florence Fein grows up in Brooklyn in the 1930s, in a family that is gaining a foothold in the middle class. At City College she becomes engaged politically with the left-leaning student groups, and eventually, in the midst of the Depression, she takes a job with a trade organization that has a position for her in Moscow. There, she falls in love with another expatriate American and has a son. Soon after, Florence is sent to a work camp and her son to an orphanage.
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Point of View of characters, past and present collide
- By Angela Adams on 01-29-19
By: Sana Krasikov
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A Test of Wills
- By: Charles Todd
- Narrated by: Samuel Giles
- Length: 10 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Ian Rutledge returns to his career at Scotland Yard after years fighting in the First World War. Unknown to his colleagues he is still suffering from shell shock, and is burdened with the guilt of having had executed a young soldier on the battlefield for refusing to fight. A jealous colleague has learned of his secret and has managed to have Rutledge assigned to a difficult case which could spell disaster for Rutledge whatever the outcome. A retired officer has been murdered, and Rutledge goes to investigate.
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Difficult to follow the narrator
- By Carol on 01-02-13
By: Charles Todd
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Night Soldiers
- By: Alan Furst
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 18 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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New York Times bestselling author Alan Furst is widely recognized as master of the historical spy novel. Furst’s works are vivid evocations of long-forgotten heroes and feature plots that unfold to the inexorable cadence of history. Night Soldiers is a simultaneously thrilling and illuminating tale of espionage set in 1934.
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Best Alan Furst novel!
- By Placeholder on 04-27-11
By: Alan Furst
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Galilee
- By: Clive Barker
- Narrated by: Paul Hecht
- Length: 23 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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The Barbarossa family’s roots are far more ancient and ethereal, but they are bound to the Gearys by a shared history of murder, insanity, and adultery. When Rachel Geary and Galilee, the seductive prince of the Barbarossa clan, fall in love, they unleash powerful enmities that could destroy both dynasties. Shorter and more conventional than some of Barker’s other work, this novel is especially rich with complex, passionate, three-dimensional characters, lush settings, and elegant language.
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An Audiophile's Dream
- By Joseph on 09-01-11
By: Clive Barker
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The Best Ghost Stories Ever Told
- Best Stories Ever Told
- By: Stephen Brennan - editor
- Narrated by: J. M. Badger, Imelda Pot
- Length: 24 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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A big, brilliant, spooky collection of classic and contemporary ghost stories that will make you hesitate before turning off that light.
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A very mixed review
- By Michael Mayer on 08-05-15
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The Daughters of Mars
- By: Tom Keneally
- Narrated by: Jane Nolan
- Length: 18 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
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Naomi and Sally Durance are daughters of a dairy farmer from the Macleay Valley. Bound together in complicity by what they consider a crime, when the Great War begins in 1914 they hope to submerge their guilt by leaving for Europe to nurse the tides of young wounded. They head for the Dardanelles on the hospital ship Archimedes. Their education in medicine, valour, and human degradation continues on the Greek island of Lemnos, then on the Western Front. Here, new outrages - gas, shell-shock - present themselves.
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Interesting WWI novel with an Australian bent
- By Sarah Gamp on 03-09-13
By: Tom Keneally
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Varina
- A Novel
- By: Charles Frazier
- Narrated by: Molly Parker
- Length: 12 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
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With her marriage prospects limited, teenage Varina Howell agrees to wed the much-older widower Jefferson Davis, with whom she expects a life of security as a landowner. He instead pursues a career in politics and is eventually appointed president of the Confederacy, placing Varina at the white-hot center of one of the darkest moments in American history - culpable regardless of her intentions. The Confederacy falling, her marriage in tatters, and the country divided, Varina and her children escape Richmond and travel south on their own, now fugitives.
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Read it rather than listen
- By Anonymous on 08-31-18
By: Charles Frazier
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What listeners say about The Waterworks
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- NOOPUR PATEL
- 01-19-20
Good book with a potential to be great
Great narrator, Good Story but too many jumps into sub stories that can be hard to follow. But I will definitely recommend it
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- Eric
- 10-06-22
Great Prose
The premise intrigued me enough to listen to the entire book to find out what was going on, but I did get a bit bored in the middle. It moved at a snail's pace and didn't seem to pick up until near the end. Overall an interesting and well written story. I appreciated the thoughtful nature of the prose, and the usage of complex yet digestible vocabulary.
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- Lora S.
- 08-07-18
Bizarre story
Newspaper editor McIlvaine tells the story of his freelance writer, Martin Pemberton who one day sees his supposedly dead father riding around in a stagecoach in the company of several other old men. When McIlvaine notices that the younger Pemberton has himself disappeared, he sets out to find him – a thing not easily done in the New York City of the days of the Tweed Ring. McIlvaine seeks help from one of the few honest policemen in the city at the time, and together they uncover the bizarre story of a few wealthy men who wanted to live forever.
Narrator Mark Bramhall does an excellent job with the narration. Very clear and easy to understand.
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2 people found this helpful
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- D. Witscher
- 12-23-15
History, mystery, and Drama
What did you love best about The Waterworks?
Amazing story with excellent historical underpinnings. Doctorow weaves a tale that combines a mystery with characters who ask the big questions.
Any additional comments?
This book is one of Doctorow's best books and a great joy to listen to . The reader is wonderful and does the story proud. It would be a page turner if we weren't listening to it.
Quite terrific and fun and absolutely engaging.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Anonymous User
- 06-09-24
Literary Mystery/Horror of the Finest Order
A masterfully written, lyrical thriller about the rotting evils of American greed and industry and knowledge-making.
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- adnil
- 11-17-24
Great writer and great narrator
As for favorite part? The end section is very rich with thoughts, feelings and insights. It really came together to give us a picture of ourselves both in the life and thinkings of 1872 NYC post civil war and our lives now. Too much to comment here. So much there. Read it! Narrator is excellent, as always.
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