Since the dawn of civilization, human beings have sought not just the necessities—food, water, shelter, companionship—but the joys of entertainment, of exhilaration and pure delight, an escape from the day-to-day tedium. It should come as no great surprise, then, that amusement parks have a documented history dating back to the 18th century with the advent of pleasure gardens featuring zoos, rides, live music, and the like. Stephen Silverman’s thorough exploration of the history of amusement parks is at once a vivid portrait of the curious characters who brought these parks to life, a glimpse into the surprising (and sometimes unsavory) backgrounds of popular attractions, a testament to the creatives, engineers, and artisans central to such ventures, and a celebration of landmarks from the 1893 Chicago World’s Fair to Steeplechase, Cedar Point, and Six Flags.

Disneyland is perhaps the quintessential theme park, a land of imagination where childlike wonder reigns and worries are checked at the gate. And while it’s a locale whose now-expansive magic (spanning 12 parks across the globe) we often take for granted, the early days of Disneyland were beset with doubt. Walt Disney, riding off the golden age of animation and the creation of a cultural icon in one Mickey Mouse, wanted to craft a place where that very magic came to life. His family and financial backers did not share his vision, but Disney forged ahead, wagering his success against his own life insurance policy. Needless to say, Walt’s dream was realized in a “The Happiest Place on Earth,” an amusement park unlike any other that would come to draw in massive crowds of first-timer families and die-hard devotees alike. Richard Snow’s history of Disneyland is a must for anyone who’s ever experienced the awe of strolling down Main Street, laying eyes on Cinderella’s castle, balancing a teetering, swirly cup of Dole Whip in hand.

Not all theme parks are built on faith, trust, and pixie dust. Up until its closure in 1996, Action Park in Vernon Township, New Jersey, was notorious for its design flaws and undertrained teenage staff, toeing the line between thrill and danger. Let’s just say the nickname “Class Action Park” was far from unwarranted. A lawless land dedicated to good times, the park’s reputation for inebriation, indifference, and questionable engineering was well-earned by numerous accidents, injuries, and tragically, six on-site fatalities. Despite its complicated history, the park is often recalled with a hazy nostalgia, a rite of passage that spoke to the wild-and-free temperament of young, East Coast Gen-Xers. In this listen, Andy Mulvihill, the son of Action Park’s founder, Gene, tackles the story of the park’s inception, shortcomings, and legacy.

As a millennial who grew up obsessed with both theme parks and all things spooky, I was pretty much the prime target demographic for R.L. Stine’s One Day at HorrorLand. (As a matter of fact, I still vividly remember picking this quintessential Goosebumps story up from a plastic bin in my elementary school library and tearing through it in one weekend.) If you’re feeling nostalgic, take a trip down memory lane with this hair-raising listen that follows the Morris family as their journey to the Zoo Gardens Theme Park goes awry and they instead wind up at the suspiciously empty HorrorLand. Lizzy, Luke, and their parents encounter scare after scare—from the monstrous costumes worn by the staff to ominous rides on the Doom Slide and Coffin Cruise. But the longer they spend taking in the amusements at HorrorLand, the more it seems they might never return home. The perfect blend of humor, quirk, and creep factor, this listen is classic Goosebumps at its finest.

A bestselling book is adapted into a blockbuster movie and, in turn, into a booming amusement attraction—what could go wrong? As it turns out, quite a lot. The much-adored Jaws ride at Universal Studios Florida—a park whose initial concept was inviting guests to “Ride the Movies”—was among Universal’s opening-day attractions, setting sail on June 7, 1990. The attraction was a technical feat, featuring pontoon boats, hundreds of feet of track, extensive electrical wiring, and, lest we forget to mention, subaquatic technical sharks. But while it triumphed in vision, it lacked in reliability: The ride closed shortly after it debuted, and wouldn’t open to guests again until late 1993, when an improved version launched to acclaim. Devoted fanbase and thrilling new ride system aside, the pain points amassed, from hydraulic fluid leaks that resulted in EPA intervention to the rising cost of petroleum and diesel. As the vision of Universal began to shift, the effort of upkeep outweighed the desire to innovate, and Jaws was ultimately beached. In this deep dive on the ride and its legacy, culture writer Dustin McNeill recounts interviews with the ride’s opening and closing teams, park execs, and the charismatic skippers who operated the ride, ultimately painting a loving portrait of a treasured attraction.

Sorry, I couldn’t resist. Not only is Jurassic Park the inspiration for one of my all-time favorite attractions (shout-out to my beloved elderly Ultrasaurus animatronic at Universal Orlando's River Adventure) and one of the greatest audiobooks I’ve ever heard, it’s also the perfectly crafted cautionary tale of how not to run a theme park. The story unfolds as showboating entrepreneur John Hammond prepares to open the titular attraction, bringing in field specialists to preview his assortment of living, breathing dinosaurs genetically re-created through DNA preserved in fossilized amber. But when the park's security systems go down, the resurrected beasts run wild, and the group must fight to survive if they want to make it off the island alive. Unlike Steven Spielberg’s 1993 master-class adaptation, Michael Crichton’s spec fic triumph is less an action-adventure romp and more an incisive takedown of unbridled capitalism, unchecked ambition, and the commodification of natural life. Needless to say, the stakes of this unnerving, violent modern classic make the everyday perils of lengthy wait times and broken-down coasters a bit easier to swallow.