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China, Inc.

• UNABRIDGED (13 hrs and 38 mins)
• By Ted C. Fishman
• Narrated By Alan Sklar

China today is visible everywhere: In the news, in the economic pressures battering America, in the workplace, and in every trip to the store. Provocative, timely, and essential, this dramatic account of China's growing dominance as an industrial super-power by journalist Ted C. Fishman explains how the profound shift in the global economic order has occurred, and why it already affects us all.

The Modern Scholar: The Russian Revolution: From Tsarism to Bolshevism

• UNABRIDGED (6 hrs and 47 mins)
• By Jonathan D. Smele

The Russian Revolution of 1917 was a key turning point in the history of modern Europe and the world. For much of the 20th century, politics were defined by attitudes to what had taken place in Russia in 1917. To understand the Russian Revolution, then, is to understand a key building block of modern history and the contemporary world.

The Modern Scholar: The Medieval World I: Kingdoms, Empires, and War

• UNABRIDGED (8 hrs and 20 mins)
• By Thomas F. Madden

This all-encompassing investigation of a highly influential time period includes the major events of the era and informative discussion of empire, papacy, the Crusades, and the fall of Constantinople. During the course of these lectures, Professor Madden also addresses the rise of Islam, reform movements, and schisms in the church. In so doing, Professor Madden underscores the significance and grand scale of an age that continues to hold an undeniable fascination for people today.

Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom: China, the West, and the Epic Story of the Taiping Civil War

• UNABRIDGED (17 hrs and 32 mins)
• By Stephen R. Platt
• Narrated By Angela Lin
• Whispersync for Voice-ready

Stephen R. Platt is widely respected for his incisive nonfiction, particularly in regard to his knowledge and understanding of China. With Autumn in the Heavenly Kingdom, Platt details the absorbing narrative of the Taiping Rebellion, which resulted in the loss of 20 million lives. Occurring in the 1850s, this is the story of a cultural movement characterized by intriguing personages such as influential military strategist Zeng Guofan and brilliant Taiping leader Hong Rengan.

Civilization: The West and the Rest

• UNABRIDGED (13 hrs and 5 mins)
• By Niall Ferguson
• Narrated By Niall Ferguson
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The rise to global predominance of Western civilization is the single most important historical phenomenon of the past five hundred years. All over the world, an astonishing proportion of people now work for Western-style companies, study at Western-style universities, vote for Western-style governments, take Western medicines, wear Western clothes, and even work Western hours. Yet six hundred years ago the petty kingdoms of Western Europe seemed unlikely to achieve much more than perpetual internecine warfare. It was Ming China or Ottoman Turkey that had the look of world civilizations.

The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Volume 1

• UNABRIDGED (41 hrs and 6 mins)
• By Edward Gibbon
• Narrated By Bernard Mayes
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Considered one of the finest historical works in the English language, The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire is lauded for its graceful, elegant prose style as much as for its epic scope. Remarkably accurate for its day, Gibbon's treatise holds a high place in the history of literature and remains an enduring subject of study.

Gibbon's monumental work traces the history of more than 13 centuries, covering the great events as well as the general historical progression. This first volume covers A.D. 180 to A.D. 395, which includes the establishment of Christianity and the Crusades.

The Fountainhead

• UNABRIDGED (32 hrs and 1 min)
• By Ayn Rand
• Narrated By Christopher Hurt
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One of the 20th century's most challenging novels of ideas, The Fountainhead champions the cause of individualism through the story of a gifted young architect who defies the tyranny of conventional public opinion. The struggle for personal integrity in a world that values conformity above creativity is powerfully illustrated through three characters: Howard Roarke, a genius; Gail Wynand, a newspaper mogul and self-made millionaire; and Dominique Francon, a devastating beauty.

Sailing from Byzantium: How a Lost Empire Shaped the World

• UNABRIDGED (9 hrs and 10 mins)
• By Colin Wells
• Narrated By Lloyd James

A gripping intellectual adventure story, Sailing from Byzantium sweeps you from the deserts of Arabia to the dark forests of northern Russia, from the colorful towns of Renaissance Italy to the final moments of a millennial city under siege.

A.D. 381: Heretics, Pagans, and the Dawn of the Monotheistic State

• UNABRIDGED (9 hrs and 43 mins)
• By Charles Freeman
• Narrated By Robert Blumenfeld
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In A.D. 381, Theodosius, emperor of the eastern Roman empire, issued a decree in which all his subjects were required to subscribe to a belief in the Trinity of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit. This edict defined Christian orthodoxy and brought to an end a lively and wide-ranging debate about the nature of God; all other interpretations were now declared heretical.

The Structure of Scientific Revolutions

• UNABRIDGED (9 hrs and 11 mins)
• By Thomas S. Kuhn
• Narrated By Dennis Holland

Named one of "The Hundred Most Influential Books Since the Second World War" by the Times Literary Supplement, and one of the "100 Best Nonfiction" books by the Modern Library, Thomas S. Kuhn's The Structure of Scientific Revolutions is a landmark of scientific thought. Written in 1962, Kuhn's book took an entirely different view of how scientists perceived and achieved changes in basic theoretical assumptions - what he termed "paradigm shifts".