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Life Stories
- Profiles from The New Yorker
- Narrated by: Philip Bosco, Amy Irving, Alton Fitzgerald White
- Length: 9 hrs and 50 mins
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Publisher's summary
When they were first published, these biographies brought insight, amusement, understanding, and often, joy or sorrow to those who read them. Gathered here, in Life Stories, they provide an album of our era, a rich and diverse appraisal of some of the most prominent members of an entire century's cast.
A Pryor Love (Richard Pryor), by Hilton Als
A Duke in His Domain (Marlon Brando), by Truman Capote
Isadora (Isadora Duncan), by Janet Flanner
Lady with a Pencil (Katharine White), by Nancy Franklin
Nobody Better, Better Than Nobody (Heloise), by Ian Frazier
The Coolhunt (Baysie Wightman and DeeDee Gordon), by Michael Gladwell
Wunderkind (Floyd Patterson), by A.J. Liebling
Mr. Hunter's Grave (George H. Hunter), by Joseph Mitchell
Show Dog (Biff Truesdale), by Susan Orlean
How Do You Like it Now, Gentlemen? (Ernest Hemingway), by Lillian Ross
The Man Who Walks on Air (Philippe Petit), by Calvin Tomkins
Covering the Cops (Edna Buchanan), by Calvin Trillin
Critic reviews
"Too good to be missed." (AudioFile)
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too short
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too short
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Other Voices, Other Rooms
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offensive narration
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Golden Globe-winning actor Michael C. Hall (Six Feet Under) performs Truman Capote's masterstroke about a young writer's charmed fascination with his unorthodox neighbor, the "American geisha" Holly Golightly. Holly - a World War II-era society girl in her late teens - survives via socialization, attending parties and restaurants with men from the wealthy upper class who also provide her with money and expensive gifts. Over the course of the novella, the seemingly shallow Holly slowly opens up to the curious protagonist.
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On a Thursday morning in May 1961, a well-mannered twenty-one-year-old named Marlene enters the Fifth Avenue apartment of Lee Radziwill to interview for the position of housekeeper and cook. The stylish wife of London-based Prince Stanislaw Radziwill, Princess Lee is intelligent and creative, with ambitions beyond simply jet-setting. But to the public, she is always First Lady Jackie Kennedy's little sister. As Marlene becomes a trusted presence in the Radziwill household, she observes the dazzling array of famous figures who flit in and out of Lee’s intimate circle
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You need to know a bit about the players
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In Cold Blood
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Still the Best
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Reckless Hearts (Short Story)
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Spain, 1959. Slim Hawks Hayward likes to think she doesn’t get jealous. But when her dear friend Lauren “Betty” Bacall learns that Papa Hemingway has come to watch the bullfights and insists that Slim make introductions, she can’t help feeling protective. Slim has known Papa for years. He always makes her feel like the most beautiful woman in the room—even when his wife is standing right beside him. Truth be told, Slim could have learned to love him all those years ago, in the streets of Havana or the mountains of the American West.
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Slim tale
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Capote
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First published in 1988 - just four years after Capote's death - Clarke paints a vivid behind-the-scenes picture of the author's life, based on hundreds of hours of in-depth interviews with the man himself and the people close to him. From the glittering heights of notoriety and parties with the rich and famous to his later struggles with addiction, Capote emerges as a richly multidimensional person - both brilliant and flawed.
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the brightest stars can self destruct
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Answered Prayers
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On the outside, Faith Madison is the very picture of a sophisticated New Yorker. Slim, blond, stylish, Faith has a life many would envy. Overcoming a childhood marked by tragedy, married to a successful investment banker and having raised two grown daughters, Faith has enjoyed her role as mother and wife, and the good life that emanates from their bustling Manhattan town house. But every step of the way, Faith has carried within her a secret she could divulge to no one. And with it, she has kept an even more painful secret from herself.
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Danielle Steele "Answered Prayers"
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Fierce Pajamas
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When Harold Ross founded The New Yorker in 1925, he described it as a “comic weekly.” And although it has become much more than that, it has remained true in its irreverent heart to the founder’s description, publishing the most illustrious literary humorists of the modern era. This anthology gathers together, for the first time, the funniest work of more than seventy New Yorker contributors.
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great, but niche
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New Yorkers
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Over the last 20 years, New York City has been convulsed by enormous challenges: terrorist attack, blackout, hurricane, recession, pandemic. New Yorkers is a grand portrait of the irrepressible city and a hymn to the vitality and resilience of its people. Craig Taylor spent years meeting New Yorkers - rich and poor, old and young, native and immigrant - and getting them to share indelible true tales.
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Craig Taylor’s New yorkers
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Happy-Go-Lucky
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Back when restaurant menus were still printed on paper, and wearing a mask—or not—was a decision made mostly on Halloween, David Sedaris spent his time doing normal things. As Happy-Go-Lucky opens, he is learning to shoot guns with his sister, visiting muddy flea markets in Serbia, buying gummy worms to feed to ants, and telling his nonagenarian father wheelchair jokes. But then the pandemic hits, and like so many others, he’s stuck in lockdown, unable to tour and read for audiences, the part of his work he loves most.
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Great except for an audio glitch
- By Rynnkins on 06-01-22
By: David Sedaris
What listeners say about Life Stories
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Overall
- Donald Frankenfeld
- 05-24-06
Abridged after all
These profiles are so extraordinary that I searched the Internet for others, and discovered the table of contents for this book. Having ordered from Audible an "unabridged" book, I was astonished to find that the Audible version omits about half the content of the print edition. Even at half its advertised length, the Audible version is a gem and well worth it.
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14 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Stella Macy
- 02-16-05
Life Stories
This audiobook is pure gold - a broad myriad of profiles, colorfully written and perfectly read by performers, such as Amy Irving, whose voices enhance rather than invade the writing. I had read some of these excellent profiles in the New Yorker, but this format gave them new life. This is a highly entertaining and intelligent series. I'm only sad that I've not yet found second installment of Life Stories in audiobook, though I'm still searching.
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11 people found this helpful
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Overall
- Jody R. Nathan
- 08-25-04
Exceptional writing makes this a fascinating read
I have to admit that the Truman Capote story on Marlon Brando was a bit disappointing. But the rest, oh my! What a wonderful book of stories; it starts with Lillian Ross on Earnest Hemingway; then goes to Katherine White, one of the founding editors of the New Yorker; then goes on to profile boxers, "cool finders", a tightrope walker; Heloise (from Hints from Heloise); Edna Buchanan (Miami crime beat reporter); Isadora Duncan, and even a champion show dog. My two favorites were Mr. Hunter's Grave by Joseph Mitchell and A Pryor Love (about Richard Pryor) by Hilton Als. Mr. Hunter's Grave was not really about a person so much as about a small town on Staten Island; I know, I don't make it sound like much, but really, I hated to have it end. The story on Richard Pryor was insightful -- it showed the flaws in the man with such compassion and with enough understanding of Mr. Pryor's past to show how it all worked together first to make him into a celebrity, and then brought him down again.
The narration on all the stories is good, but it is the writing that really makes this book stand out. It is the sort of writing that transports you from where ever you are into the world being profiled. You come away wanting to know more about the people discussed, and feeling like you may have met some new friends. 10 hours is not enough for this book; I hope they will put out the unabridged edition. I will go back and listen to these stories again.
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28 people found this helpful