Showing results by narrator "Jim Meskimen" in All Categories

Twelve miles long and a mile wide, Elysiana is an island off the coast of New Jersey sitting astride the convergence of powerful fault lines, social, political, and existential. It’s a place of beauty and insanity, shared by the angelic and profane, This is a story that could have only happened on the Jersey Shore during the summer of ’69, a time when the social fabric was tearing apart, in a place where that fabric had never been very well knit together.

When his friend Peralta, newly sworn in as sheriff, is shot by a sniper, David Mapstone, former historian and new deputy sheriff, can’t keep a cool, academic distance - and he’d better not. While Peralta lies comatose in the hospital, the powers that be install Mapstone as acting sheriff in his friend’s place. Mapstone feels unqualified, but he’s the only person whose temporary appointment won’t infuriate all the other candidates, who want the sheriff’s position permanently. Meanwhile, a cryptic note scrawled by Peralta before the shooting forces Mapstone to confront his own personal history, inadvertently drawing him into danger.

A memoir of a composer’s life in the Alaskan wilderness and a meditation on making art in a landscape acutely threatened by climate change. In the summer of 1975, the composer John Luther Adams, then a 22-year-old graduate of CalArts, boarded a flight to Alaska. So began a journey into the mountains and forests of the Far North - and across distinctive mental and aural terrain - that would last for the next 40 years.

California, 1957. Lee Mellon believes he is the descendant of the only Confederate general to have come from Big Sur and is himself a seeker of truth in his own modern-day war against the status quo. For the first time in audio, A Confederate General from Big Sur was the late Richard Brautigan's first published novel, written when he was 28.

Luke Kingsley’s glory days are behind him. A star on the rise, his life and career imploded after his soul singer wife, Lisa Hayes, disappeared without a trace, silencing a very public and tumultuous marriage. Most people, especially an avenging PI, think Luke got away with murder. The last thing he expects is to be pulled back from the brink by a starstruck stranger.

It has been said that somewhere in the world you have an exact double. This rocket-ride of a novel ignites with the sudden cry of "Ai! Pedrito!", as Naval Lieutenant Tom Smith discovers that his exact look-alike is the notorious South American revolutionary and spy, Pedrito Miraflores. Inspired by a real incident in the life of L. Ron Hubbard, Ai! Pedrito! is a fun-to-listen-to, compelling novel of what can sometimes happen when intelligence goes wrong.

Cardboard Gods is the memoir of Josh Wilker, a brilliant writer who has marked the stages of his life through the baseball cards he collected as a child. It also captures the experience of growing up obsessed with baseball cards and explores what it means to be a fan of the game. Along the way, as we get to know Josh, his family, and his friends, we also get Josh’s classic observations about the central artifacts from his life - the baseball cards themselves.

Simon Inescort is no longer bodily present in his marriage. It's been several months since he keeled over the rail of a Nova Scotia-bound ferry, a massive heart attack to blame. Simon's widow, Lorca Pell, has sold their farmhouse to newlyweds Zachary and Muriel. He spends time replaying his marriage in his own mind, while also engaging in occasionally intimate observation of the new homeowners. But soon the crisis of a missing child, a local 11-year-old, threatens the tenuous domestic equilibrium, as the weight of the case falls to Zachary, a rookie private detective.

When American fighter jets were being downed at an unprecedented rate during the Vietnam War, the US Navy turned to a young lieutenant commander, Dan Pedersen, to figure out a way to reverse their dark fortune. On a shoestring budget and with little support, Pedersen picked eight of the finest pilots to help train a new generation to bend jets like the F-4 Phantom to their will and learn how to dogfight all over again.

Being a hefty, deaf newcomer almost makes Will Halpin the least popular guy at Coaler High. But when he befriends the only guy less popular than him, the dork-namic duo has the smarts and guts to figure out who knocked off the star quarterback. Will can’t hear what’s going on, but he’s a great observer. So, who did it? And why does that guy talk to his fingers? And will the beautiful girl ever notice him? (Okay, so Will’s interested in more than just murder...).

Professor Vlad Smith is on a terrifying quest, one that will take him from the halls of our most hallowed institutions to the most run-down of old houses in blighted neighborhoods. A mysterious committee, shredded yellowed newspapers, a daguerreotype of a Confederate soldier, a headless corpse, and a corpseless head.... These are the clues that Smith must piece together to save his sanity and his daughter and uncover the terrible secret of the Boss in the Wall.

Here is a stunning and provocative guide to the future of international relations—a system for managing global problems beyond the stalemates of business versus government, East versus West, rich versus poor, democracy versus authoritarianism, free markets versus state capitalism.

As the early years of detective fiction gave way to two separate golden ages - of hard-boiled tales in America and intricately-plotted, so-called “cozy” murders in Britain - the legacy of Sherlock Holmes, with his fierce devotion to science and logic, gave way to street smarts on the one hand and social insight on the other, but even though these new sub-genres went their own ways, their detectives still required intelligence and clear-sightedness as characterized the earliest works of detective fiction: the trademarks of Sherlock Holmes, and of all the detectives featured here.

What defines Boston? Its history? Its landmarks? Its sports teams and shrines? Perhaps the question should be, who defines Boston? From Henry David Thoreau to Dennis Lehane, Boston has been beloved by many of America's greatest writers, and there is no better group of men and women to capture the heart and soul of the Hub. In Our Boston, editor Andrew Blauner has collected both original and reprinted essays from Boston-area writers past and present, all celebrating the city they love.

An obscure original manuscript of Marco Polo’s travels ... A tantalizing clue to the site of Kublai Khan’s fabled burial site ... A chance to unearth the truth behind a long-lost treasure. It’s an opportunity that would make Indiana Jones drop everything but his whip and race off to China. But he’d be too late. Lieutenant Jonathan Daly is way ahead of him. Two bullet holes and a bad case of malaria may not be enough to stop Daly, but a crew of criminals, a brood of British agents, and the entire Chinese army are all in the game ... and determined to keep him out of it.

Emma is house-sitting on the rainy Washington coast with only her golden retriever for company. She likes the isolation, the peace and quiet, and the opportunity to read. But her latest pick, a poorly written and gruesome horror novel, is disappointing and Emma leaves a one-star review. A message dings back - the author, H.G. Kane, has replied and he's furious. Emma brushes it off, until disturbing incidents start to occur. Scratches in the night. A figure crawling around in the shadows.

The Triumph of the Egg is a fictional panorama of a great region of our country, unfolded by a writer who - to quote the New York Times - "depicts life in the Midwest as Dostoevsky pictured the many colored life of Russia, with almost as wonderful a touch of genius, with a more concentrated and daring skill." This coveted 1921 collection is an example of what a book of stories can be when a writer of vision deals with the materials of American life.

Wrongfully accused, Spar has been condemned to suffer the brutality of the guards and the conditions on Devil’s Island. But they haven’t broken his will, and now, escaping, he has one mission in life: revenge. Spar’s out to kill the man who put him into the devil’s hands. But he’ll have to take on a gallery of rogues who are as treacherous as the waters of the Caribbean.

Eighteen-year-old Lee Thompson has a chip on his shoulder and a mission in his heart to save his dad, an aging sheriff who’s lost control of his town. Old Diehard’s lost control of his town, and it seems every outcast and outlaw west of the Mississippi is on the prowl in Wolf River, Montana. Now Lee’s come all the way from Texas to stand up for his father, a man who hasn’t seen him since he was a boy and who doesn’t know him from Adam.

Detective Terry Lane is a standout homicide cop who thought he’d seen it all ... until now. Lane has seen the darkest side of human behavior but he’s never seen a murder spree like this, targeting the wealthy, the powerful and the privileged. For the evidence is clear: the killers have not emerged from the seamy underside of the city ... but from six feet under it. They are the walking dead, spreading terror and showing no mercy.