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Desperate Passage audiobook cover art

  • Desperate Passage

  • The Donner Party's Perilous Journey West
  • By: Ethan Rarick
  • Narrated by: Christopher Prince
  • Length: 9 hrs and 23 mins
  • Unabridged
  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars 587
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In late October 1846, the last wagon train of that year's westward migration stopped overnight before resuming its arduous climb over the Sierra Nevada Mountains, unaware that a fearsome storm was gathering force. After months of grueling travel, the 81 men, women and children would be trapped for a brutal winter with little food and only primitive shelter. The conclusion is known: by spring of the next year, the Donner Party was synonymous with the most harrowing extremes of human survival.

  • 4 out of 5 stars

  • Very well researched story of the Donner Party

  • By JOSEPH on 06-11-12
History of the Donner Party audiobook cover art

  • History of the Donner Party

  • A Tragedy of the Sierra
  • By: C. F. McGlashan
  • Narrated by: Bobbie Frohman
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  • Unabridged
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C.F. McGlashan was the newspaper publisher of the local paper in Truckee, California, the closest town to the Donner Pass. McGlashan interviewed the survivors of the Donner Party, gathered artifacts and amassed an enormous amount of secondary information. Over an 18 month period, McGlashan published serialized articles in his paper and turned his articles into a book. History of the Donner Party is considered the definitive account of one of the most notorious treks in American history.

  • 3 out of 5 stars

  • Good story, bad reading.

  • By S. Smail on 12-25-13
The Men Who United the States audiobook cover art

  • The Men Who United the States

  • America's Explorers, Inventors, Eccentrics, and Mavericks, and the Creation of One Nation, Indivisible
  • By: Simon Winchester
  • Narrated by: Simon Winchester
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  • Overall
    4.5 out of 5 stars 559
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How did America become “one nation, indivisible”? What unified a growing number of disparate states into the modern country we recognize today? To answer these questions, Winchester follows in the footsteps of America’s most essential explorers, thinkers, and innovators. Introducing the fascinating people who played a pivotal role in creating today’s United States, he ponders whether the historic work of uniting the States has succeeded, and to what degree.

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  • Simon Winchester tells us the history of America

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The Hunger audiobook cover art

  • The Hunger

  • By: Alma Katsu
  • Narrated by: Kirsten Potter
  • Length: 10 hrs and 34 mins
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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars 255
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Tamsen Donner must be a witch. That is the only way to explain the series of misfortunes that have plagued the wagon train known as the Donner Party. Depleted rations, bitter quarrels, and the mysterious death of a little boy have driven the pioneers to the brink of madness. They cannot escape the feeling that someone - or something - is stalking them. Whether it was a curse from the beautiful Tamsen, the choice to follow an experimental route West, or just bad luck - the 90 men, women, and children of the Donner Party are at the brink of one of the deadliest adventures in history.

  • 5 out of 5 stars

  • Intense, visceral, excellent read

  • By j on 03-09-18
Across the Plains in the Donner Party audiobook cover art

  • Across the Plains in the Donner Party

  • By: Virginia Reed Murphy
  • Narrated by: Colleen Delany
  • Length: 1 hr and 2 mins
  • Unabridged
  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars 28
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The story of the Donner Party is very much the story of James F. Reed's family, not simply because the Reeds were prominent members, but because they left much documentary evidence: diaries, memoirs, correspondence, and letters written en route and interviews shortly after the disaster. The adopted daughter of Reed, Virginia Reed Murphy's memoir is a noteworthy recounting of the Donner party disaster and its gruesome end. Her writing is sprightly, informal, and full of human interest.

  • 5 out of 5 stars

  • Unembelished Excellence

  • By LL on 10-13-10
The Best Land Under Heaven audiobook cover art

  • The Best Land Under Heaven

  • The Donner Party in the Age of Manifest Destiny
  • By: Michael Wallis
  • Narrated by: Michael Wallis
  • Length: 16 hrs and 17 mins
  • Unabridged
  • Overall
    4.5 out of 5 stars 216
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars 202
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    4.5 out of 5 stars 199

Cutting through 160 years of mythmaking, best-selling historian Michael Wallis presents the ultimate cautionary tale of America's westward expansion.

  • 5 out of 5 stars

  • Well researched but performance is just mediocre

  • By T. Redwood on 07-14-17

Publisher's Summary

The westward movement of Americans in the 19th century was one of the largest and most consequential migrations in history, and for countless people back east, the West represented opportunities for adventure, independence, and fortune. Even in the 21st century, Americans look back on the era fondly, even romantically, and millions are familiar with the popular game that reignited interest in the Oregon Trail.

Of course, it's easy for people with modern transportation to comfortably reminisce about the West, because many pioneers discovered that the traveling was fraught with various kinds of obstacles and danger, including bitter weather, potentially deadly illnesses, and hostile Native Americans, not to mention an unforgiving landscape that famous American explorer Stephen Long deemed "unfit for human habitation." 19th century Americans were all too happy and eager for the transcontinental railroad to help speed their passage west and render overland paths obsolete.

One of the main reasons people yearned for new forms of transportation is because of the most notorious and tragic disasters in the history of westward travel. While people still romanticize the Wild West, many Americans are still all too familiar with the fate of the Donner Party, a group of 87-90 people that met with disaster in the Sierra Nevada mountain range during the winter of 1846-1847. The party knew the journey would take months, but early snowfalls in the mountains left dozens of people trapped in snow drifts that measured several feet, stranding them in a manner that made it virtually impossible for them to go any further for several weeks.

©2012 Charles River Editors (P)2015 Charles River Editors

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