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Fire in the Straw
- Notes on Inventing a Life
- Narrated by: Larry Belling
- Length: 6 hrs and 54 mins
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Fire in the Straw
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Publisher's summary
Named One of the New York Post's Best New Books to Read
Fire in the Straw is the witty and deeply felt memoir of Nick Lyons, a man with an intrepid desire to reinvent himself - which he does, over and over.
Nick Lyons shape shifts from reluctant student and graduate of the Wharton School, to English professor, to husband of a fiercely committed painter, to ghost writer, to famous fly fisherman and award-winning author, to father and then grandfather, to executive editor at a large book publishing company, and finally to founder and publisher of his own successful independent press.
Written with the same warm and earthy voice that has enthralled tens of thousands of fly-fishing fanatics, Nick weaves the disparate chapters of his life: from the moment his widowed mother drops him off at a grim boarding school at the age of five, where he spends three lonely and confusing years; to his love of basketball and pride playing for Penn; to the tumultuous period, in the army and after, when he found and was transformed by literature; to his marriage to Mari, his great love and anchor of his life.
Suddenly, with a PhD in hand and four children, Nick embarks on a complex and thrilling ride, juggling family, fishing, teaching, writing, and publishing, the wolf always at his door. Against all odds, The Lyons Press survives, his children prosper, his wife’s art flourishes, and his books and articles make him a household name. Fire in the Straw is a love story, a confessional, and a beautiful big-hearted memoir.
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Overall5 out of 5 stars
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Performance5 out of 5 stars
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- Big Daddy K
- 04-05-22
An accumulation of memories
I very much enjoyed this book. At first it seemed somewhat dour and a bit depressing, but then one realizes that life is, at times, just that. Soon the good stuff shows up for the author. Very well written and left me with a good sense of what The authors life was and is. Well done and well lived.
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A fine, entertaining book, very well read.
- By Richard Delman on 09-28-19
By: Brian Doyle
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The First Man
- By: Albert Camus
- Narrated by: Jefferson Mays
- Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 40
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 36
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Story5 out of 5 stars 36
In The First Man, Albert Camus tells the story of Jacques Cormery, a boy who lived a life much like his own. Camus summons up the sights, sounds, and textures of a childhood circumscribed by poverty and a father's death yet redeemed by the austere beauty of Algeria and the boy's attachment to his nearly deaf-mute mother. The result is a moving journey through the lost landscape of youth that also discloses the wellsprings of Camus's aesthetic powers and moral vision.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Great Narration by Jefferson Mays
- By Sean Patrick Stevens on 07-31-21
By: Albert Camus
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Youngblood Hawke
- By: Herman Wouk
- Narrated by: Nick Sullivan
- Length: 41 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 262
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 228
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 223
Arthur Youngblood Hawke, an ex-Navy man moves from rural Kentucky to New York to assault the citadel of New York publishing with his first novel, an oversized manuscript that becomes an instant success. Toasted by critics and swept along on a tide of popularity, he gives himself over to the lush life that gilds artistic success. Love comes with an affair with an older married woman and an unfulfilled flame with his editor, while wealth pours in with the publication of his second novel, and participation in real-estate developments.
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5 out of 5 stars
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More than a good yarn
- By Arken on 10-24-18
By: Herman Wouk
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Pnin
- By: Vladimir Nabokov
- Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki
- Length: 5 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 163
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 130
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 130
One of the best-loved of Nabokov's novels, Pnin features his funniest and most heart-rending character. Professor Timofey Pnin is a haplessly disoriented Russian emigre precariously employed on an American college campus in the 1950s. Pnin struggles to maintain his dignity through a series of comic and sad misunderstandings, all the while falling victim both to subtle academic conspiracies and to the manipulations of a deliberately unreliable narrator.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Why not leave their private sorrows to people?
- By Darwin8u on 01-13-20
By: Vladimir Nabokov
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Reading My Father
- A Memoir
- By: Alexandra Styron
- Narrated by: Alexandra Styron
- Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 61
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 39
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Story4 out of 5 stars 37
Alexandra Styron's parents—the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Sophie’s Choice and his political activist wife, Rose—were, for half a century, leading players on the world’s cultural stage. Alexandra was raised under both the halo of her father’s brilliance and the long shadow of his troubled mind. Reading My Father portrays the epic sweep of an American artist’s life. It is also a tale of filial love, beautifully written with humor, compassion, and grace.
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5 out of 5 stars
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William Styron Ranks...
- By Douglas on 12-22-13
By: Alexandra Styron
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Hemingway's Boat
- Everything He Loved in Life, and Lost, 1934 - 1961
- By: Paul Hendrickson
- Narrated by: Jonathan Davis
- Length: 22 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 132
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 114
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Story4 out of 5 stars 118
An award-winning historian and author, Paul Hendrickson here turns his attention to one of America’s most cherished literary icons, Ernest Hemingway. Drawing on previously unpublished material, Hendrickson focuses on Hemingway’s life in its twilight, just prior to his suicide, and the seemingly singular constant in the man’s life: his boat, Pilar. On this vessel, Hemingway would entertain and travel, but it would also be the scene of some of his greatest tragedies.
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4 out of 5 stars
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A Hemingway biography for the 21st Century
- By George on 09-16-14
By: Paul Hendrickson
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Trying to Save Piggy Sneed
- By: John Irving
- Narrated by: Joe Barrett
- Length: 7 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 283
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 236
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Story3.5 out of 5 stars 235
Trying to Save Piggy Sneed contains a dozen short works by John Irving, beginning with three memoirs, including an account of Mr. Irving’s dinner with President Ronald Reagan at the White House. The longest of the memoirs, The Imaginary Girlfriend,” is the core of this collection.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Missing memoir: The Imaginary Girlfriend
- By K. Rothschild on 03-13-21
By: John Irving
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As I Knew Him
- My Dad, Rod Serling
- By: Anne Serling
- Narrated by: Anne Serling
- Length: 8 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 116
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 103
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 103
To Anne Serling, the imposing figure the public saw hosting The Twilight Zone each week, intoning cautionary observations about fate, chance, and humanity, was not the father she knew. Her fun-loving dad would play on the floor with the dogs, had nicknames for everyone in the family, and was apt to put a lampshade on his head and break out in song. He was her best friend, her playmate, and her confidant. After his unexpected death at 50, Anne, just 20, was left stunned.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A Beautiful Tribute to a Wonderful Man
- By Becky on 04-12-20
By: Anne Serling
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The Lions of Fifth Avenue
- A Novel
- By: Fiona Davis
- Narrated by: Erin Bennett, Lisa Flanagan
- Length: 10 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 3,132
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 2,703
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 2,696
It's 1913, and on the surface, Laura Lyons couldn't ask for more out of life - her husband is the superintendent of the New York Public Library, allowing their family to live in an apartment within the grand building, and they are blessed with two children. But headstrong, passionate Laura wants more, and when she takes a leap of faith and applies to the Columbia Journalism School, her world is cracked wide open.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Exhilarating
- By Joanna Butler on 08-20-20
By: Fiona Davis
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This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage
- By: Ann Patchett
- Narrated by: Ann Patchett
- Length: 11 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 1,655
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,476
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 1,458
Blending literature and memoir, Ann Patchett, author of State of Wonder and Bel Canto examines her deepest commitments: to writing, family, friends, dogs, books, and her husband in This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage. Together, these essays, previously published in The Atlantic, Harper, Vogue, and The Washington Post, form a resonant portrait of a life lived with loyalty and with love.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Entertaining, engrossing, and elucidative essays
- By Bonny on 01-07-14
By: Ann Patchett
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Slouching Towards Bethlehem
- By: Joan Didion
- Narrated by: Diane Keaton
- Length: 6 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 1,766
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,563
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 1,547
Universally acclaimed from the time it was first published in 1968, Slouching Towards Bethlehem has been admired for decades as a stylistic masterpiece. Academy Award-winning actress Diane Keaton (Annie Hall, The Family Stone) performs these classic essays, including the title piece, which will transport the listener back to a unique time and place: the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco during the neighborhood’s heyday as a countercultural center.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Didion deserves better.
- By Victoria Wright on 01-21-13
By: Joan Didion
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Sanshiro
- Penguin Classics
- By: Natsume Soseki, Haruki Murakami, Jay Rubin
- Narrated by: Andrew Koji
- Length: 7 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 31
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 29
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 29
One of Soseki's most beloved works of fiction, the novel depicts the 23-year-old Sanshiro leaving the sleepy countryside for the first time in his life to experience the constantly moving 'real world' of Tokyo, its women and university. In the subtle tension between our appreciation of Soseki's lively humour and our awareness of Sanshiro's doomed innocence, the novel comes to life. Sanshiro is also penetrating social and cultural commentary.
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3 out of 5 stars
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This story had no point.
- By icelandicponies on 12-30-21
By: Natsume Soseki, and others
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The Secret Life of Sunflowers
- By: Marta Molnar, Dana Marton
- Narrated by: Kendra Murray
- Length: 9 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 267
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 247
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 247
When Hollywood auctioneer Emsley Wilson finds her famous grandmother's diary while cleaning out her New York brownstone, the pages are full of surprises. The first surprise is, the diary isn't her grandmother's. It belongs to Johanna Bonger, Vincent van Gogh's sister-in-law.
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2 out of 5 stars
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Nothing like a expected…
- By LOVETOQUILT on 05-06-23
By: Marta Molnar, and others
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The Sum of Our Days
- By: Isabel Allende
- Narrated by: Blair Brown, Isabel Allende
- Length: 11 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 42
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 38
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 38
Isabel Allende reconstructs the painful reality of her own life in the wake of the tragic death of her daughter, Paula. Narrated with warmth, humor, exceptional candor, and wisdom, this remarkable memoir is as exuberant and as full of life as its creator. Allende bares her soul while sharing her thoughts on love, marriage, motherhood, spirituality and religion, infidelity, addiction, and memory - and recounts stories of the wildly eccentric, strong-minded, and eclectic tribe she gathers around her and lovingly embraces as a new kind of family.
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5 out of 5 stars
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She does not disappoint
- By ChiChi's Rule on 06-01-22
By: Isabel Allende
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Alburquerque
- By: Rudolfo Anaya
- Narrated by: Timothy Andrés Pabon
- Length: 10 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 37
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 30
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 29
Abrán González always knew he was different. Called a coyote because of his fair skin, the kid from Barelas found escape through boxing and became one of the youngest Golden Gloves champs. But the arrival of a letter from a dying woman turns his entire life into a lie. The revelation that he was adopted makes him feel like an orphan and sends him on a quest to find his birth father.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Alburquerque
- By Paul Hernandez on 04-29-20
By: Rudolfo Anaya
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Mercy Among the Children
- A Novel
- By: David Adams Richards
- Narrated by: Bernard Clark
- Length: 13 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 47
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 45
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Story4 out of 5 stars 45
Sydney Henderson is a truly great man. As a young man, Sydney, believing he has accidentally killed a friend, makes a pact with God, promising never to harm another if the boy's life is spared. In the years that follow, the almost pathologically gentle Sydney holds true to his promise - at terrible cost to himself and his family. Stunningly beautiful and haunting, scenes from this magisterial novel will remain etched in the mind forever.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Epic story
- By jhar14 on 06-04-22
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The Yellow House
- By: Sarah M. Broom
- Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
- Length: 14 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 1,146
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 985
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 977
In 1961, Sarah M. Broom’s mother Ivory Mae bought a shotgun house in the then-promising neighborhood of New Orleans East and built her world inside of it. It was the height of the Space Race and the neighborhood was home to a major NASA plant - the postwar optimism seemed assured. A book of great ambition, Sarah M. Broom’s The Yellow House tells a hundred years of her family and their relationship to home in a neglected area of one of America’s most mythologized cities.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great book. I wish the pictures had been included.
- By Lindsay on 02-28-20
By: Sarah M. Broom