Politics & Economy bestsellers

The Message

By: Ta-Nehisi Coates
Narrated by: Ta-Nehisi Coates
Length: 5 hours 20 minutes

“This should be required reading. Either apartheid is wrong or it’s not. Read more

Mutual Aid

Building Solidarity During This Crisis (and the Next)

By: Dean Spade
Narrated by: Stephen R. Thorne
Length: 4 hours 41 minutes

Around the globe, people are faced with a spiraling succession of crises, from the Covid-19 pandemic and climate change-induced fires, floods, and storms to the ongoing horrors of mass incarceration, racist policing, brutal immigration enforcement, endemic gender violence, and severe wealth inequality. As governments fail to respond to—or... Read more

On Tyranny: Expanded Audio Edition

Updated with Twenty New Lessons from Russia's War on Ukraine

By: Timothy Snyder
Narrated by: Timothy Snyder
Length: 9 hours 45 minutes

The #1 New York Times bestseller, now in an expanded audiobook edition that includes detailed historical context for the democracy-threatening Ukrainian conflict and a call to action for modern times.

This edition includes the bestselling original essay collection On Tyranny, read by the author.

In this exclusive audiobook edition, which... Read more

The Small and the Mighty

Twelve Unsung Americans Who Changed the Course of History, from the Founding to the Civil Rights Movement

By: Sharon McMahon
Narrated by: Sharon McMahon
Length: 10 hours 13 minutes

“A thoroughly informative and enjoyable look at 12 Americans who made a difference. Sharon McMahon narrates the book herself, and it’s all the better for her own inflections and emotions. Cannot recommend enough! Read more

A People's History of the United States

By: Howard Zinn
Narrated by: Jeff Zinn
Length: 34 hours 9 minutes

“What this classic, alternative, and, yes, overtly leftist history of the United States most impressed upon me is that the history of American protest is just as vital and as old a tradition as the stars and stripes. The American people have always protested, gone on strike, marched - for suffrage, abolition, labor rights, civil rights,... Read more

The Demon of Unrest

A Saga of Hubris, Heartbreak, and Heroism at the Dawn of the Civil War

By: Erik Larson
Narrated by: Will Patton & Erik Larson
Length: 17 hours 17 minutes

“So many history books focus on what happened, but Erik Larson always asks: Why? In this gripping narrative of the months leading to the first shots fired in what is still the bloodiest conflict in U.S. history, Larson brings us as near as it is possible to be inside the minds of key players in the decisions leading to the Civil War. This tale of... Read more

How to Be an Antiracist

By: Ibram X. Kendi
Narrated by: Ibram X. Kendi
Length: 10 hours 29 minutes

“Among the multi-faceted array of antiracist literature newly published in the last two years, Ibram X. Kendi’s How To Be an Antiracist stands alone as a definitive source of history and socio-political critique, while offering a new paradigm of thought aimed at paving the way for correcting centuries of social injustice. Hearing this visionary... Read more

A Promised Land

By: Barack Obama
Narrated by: Barack Obama
Length: 29 hours 9 minutes

“No one really needs my blurb to help sell this book, but I wanted to give it anyway, especially for the audiobook, narrated by Barack Obama himself. If you want to know his incredible knowledge and wisdom that guided him through major decisions, and also hear him drop a few F-bombs, you need to listen to this fantastically written book. Read more

Wild Faith

How the Christian Right Is Taking Over America

By: Talia Lavin
Narrated by: Talia Lavin
Length: 9 hours 45 minutes

The acclaimed author of Culture Warlords investigates the rise of the Christian Right over the last half-century that lays out the grim vision evangelicals are enforcing on our democracy.

All across America, a storm is gathering: from book bans in school libraries to anti-trans laws in state legislatures; firebombings of abortion clinics and... Read more

On Tyranny

Twenty Lessons from the Twentieth Century

By: Timothy Snyder
Narrated by: Timothy Snyder
Length: 1 hour 47 minutes

“This pocket guide to preserving our freedoms and resisting authoritarianism, penned by Yale historian of fascism Timothy Snyder, takes lessons from the fall of democracies across Europe in the 20th Century, each posing a warning to us now in the 21st Century. A brief but mind blowing, eye-opening read that left me feeling sobered and empowered... Read more

Patriot

A Memoir

By: Alexei Navalny
Narrated by: Matthew Goode
Length: 16 hours 46 minutes

“A powerhouse of a memoir. Learn about Navalny's metamorphosis from ordinary Soviet citizen to activist who took on the corruption and treachery of Putin's regime, and as a result, was almost fatally poisoned. Navalny's is a tale of caution of what happens to a country when we allow autocrats and oligarchs to have complete rule which ultimately... Read more

An Unfinished Love Story

A Personal History of the 1960s

By: Doris Kearns Goodwin
Narrated by: Doris Kearns Goodwin
Length: 17 hours 37 minutes

“Great history/biography. The actual speeches are a great addition to a thoroughly enjoyable revisit to the 60’s political scene from insiders. Read more

Hood Feminism

Notes from the Women that a Movement Forgot

By: Mikki Kendall
Narrated by: Mikki Kendall
Length: 6 hours 57 minutes

“Hood Feminism touches on many subjects that mainstream feminists may not think of as feminist issues. Issues like food and housing insecurity, parenting, and disability rights, among others. Mikki Kendall calls out mainstream feminism as existing only for the advancement of white women, to the detriment of women of color. Some of my biggest... Read more

Poverty, by America

By: Matthew Desmond
Narrated by: Dion Graham
Length: 5 hours 40 minutes

“Yeah, yeah we all know how income inequality has skyrocketed in recent decades, but do you want to get fired up about it? Matthew Desmond targets the usual suspects in this damning manifesto, but he also asks complicated, nuanced questions about how all of us are complicit in the status quo. An important read for everyone interested in creating... Read more

The Hundred Years' War on Palestine

A History of Settler Colonialism and Resistance, 1917–2017

By: Rashid Khalidi
Narrated by: Fajer Al-Kaisi & Rashid Khalidi
Length: 10 hours 30 minutes

This program includes an introduction read by the author.

A landmark history of one hundred years of war waged against the Palestinians from the foremost US historian of the Middle East, told through pivotal events and family history.

In 1899, Yusuf Diya al-Khalidi, mayor of Jerusalem, alarmed by the Zionist call to create a Jewish national home... Read more

Jesus and John Wayne

How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation

By: Kristin Kobes du Mez
Narrated by: Suzie Althens
Length: 12 hours 3 minutes

“This 75-year-spanning study by a Christian historian traces American evangelicals’ takeover of the Republican Party and shows how their highest values - militarism and masculinity, patriarchy and patriotism - turned a modest Jesus Christ into a macho John Wayne, and made voting for Donald Trump not a necessary evil, but a natural conclusion. As... Read more

Defectors

The Rise of the Latino Far Right and What It Means for America

By: Paola Ramos
Narrated by: Victoria Villarreal
Length: 9 hours 12 minutes

An award-winning journalist's exploration of how race, identity and political trauma have influenced the rise in far-right sentiment among Latinos, and how this group can shape American politics

“A deeply reported, surprisingly personal exploration of a phenomenon that is little understood in our politics: the affiliation of Latino voters with... Read more

Surviving Autocracy

By: Masha Gessen
Narrated by: Masha Gessen
Length: 5 hours 45 minutes

“When Gessen speaks about autocracy, you listen.” —The New York Times

“A reckoning with what has been lost in the past few years and a map forward with our beliefs intact.” —Interview

As seen on MSNBC’s Morning Joe and heard on NPR’s All Things Considered: the bestselling, National Book Award–winning journalist offers an essential guide to... Read more

Nuclear War

A Scenario

By: Annie Jacobsen
Narrated by: Annie Jacobsen
Length: 11 hours 18 minutes

“A staff FAVORITE. Seriously, Ryann and Mickie can't stop recommending this one. Holy s***! This book was excellent, and this book was terrifying. And I could not recommend it enough. It's a question on all of our minds; what would happen if the US was hit by a nuclear weapon? Well, this book answers that question - in horrifying detail. Annie... Read more

Freedom is a Constant Struggle

Ferguson, Palestine, and the Foundations of a Movement

By: Angela Y. Davis
Narrated by: Angela Y. Davis & Coleen Marlo
Length: 5 hours 47 minutes

“A must read on the interconnection of all liberation struggles that has only become more relevant since its publication in 2016. Angela Davis is one of the most steadfast voices of our time, and her background as a public speaker makes for excellent narration. Read more

Democracy Awakening

Notes on the State of America

By: Heather Cox Richardson
Narrated by: Heather Cox Richardson
Length: 8 hours 51 minutes

A New York Times Bestseller

A vital and urgent call to action about the precarious state of American democracy, charting its historical challenges and current threats, from one of our era’s most important and insightful historians, with a new afterword by the author.

“Magisterial.” –The Washington Post

“An excellent primer for anyone who needs the... Read more

Emergent Strategy

Emergent Strategy: Book #0

By: adrienne maree brown
Narrated by: adrienne maree brown
Length: 8 hours 24 minutes

“A new way to move forward in societal and personal transformation, inspired by the science-fiction of Octavia Butler, in Emergent Strategy, adrienne maree brown invites us to shape the future we want to see through accepting and influencing the natural state of flux of the world around us and inside us. This book feels like an ongoing... Read more

The Splendid and the Vile

A Saga of Churchill, Family, and Defiance During the Blitz

By: Erik Larson
Narrated by: John Lee & Erik Larson
Length: 17 hours 48 minutes

“An excellent account of the darkest hour through the intimate details of the Churchill family, and accounts and diaries of staff and English, German and American leaders and soldiers. Larson expertly shows Churchill's highs and lows and how his oration skills, charisma and spirit buoyed society at the exact right time. Excellent for WWII buffs... Read more

Autocracy, Inc.

The Dictators Who Want to Run the World

By: Anne Applebaum
Narrated by: Anne Applebaum
Length: 4 hours 48 minutes

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • From the Pulitzer-prize winning author, an alarming account of how autocracies work together to undermine the democratic world, and how we should organize to defeat them

"A masterful guide to the new age of authoritarianism... clear-sighted and fearless.”—John Simpson, The Guardian • "Especially timely."—The Washington... Read more

Loud

Accept Nothing Less Than the Life You Deserve

By: Drew Afualo
Narrated by: Drew Afualo
Length: 6 hours 33 minutes

This program is read by the author.

The empowering, inspiring, patriarchy-smashing first book by podcast star Drew Afualo.

Drew Afualo is best known as the internet’s “Crusader for Women” and is at the head of a new generation of entertainment’s rising stars. Loud is part manual, part manifesto, and part memoir. It makes it clear that behind her... Read more

Chaos

Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties

By: Tom O'Neill
Narrated by: Kevin Stillwell
Length: 16 hours 15 minutes

A journalist's twenty-year fascination with the Manson murders leads to shocking new revelations about the FBI's involvement in this riveting reassessment of an infamous case in American history.
Over two grim nights in Los Angeles, the young followers of Charles Manson murdered seven people, including the actress Sharon Tate, then eight months... Read more

Strongmen

Mussolini to the Present

By: Ruth Ben-Ghiat
Narrated by: Chloe Cannon
Length: 9 hours 41 minutes

Ruth Ben-Ghiat is the expert on the "strongman" playbook employed by authoritarian demagogues from Mussolini to Putin. In Strongmen, she lays bare the blueprint these leaders have followed over the past 100 years, and empowers us to recognize, resist, and prevent their disastrous rule in the future.



For ours is the age of authoritarian rulers:... Read more

Surrender

40 Songs, One Story

By: Bono
Narrated by: Bono
Length: 20 hours 24 minutes

“Perhaps this was a case of the right book at the right time, but few memoirs have moved me the way Bono's did. Told mostly chronologically, though 40 of U2's songs, Bono reflects on his life, his activism, his music, and his faith in ways that I absolutely connected to. It was a complete listening experience - with music and sound effects! - ... Read more

The Witches Are Coming

By: Lindy West
Narrated by: Lindy West
Length: 6 hours 27 minutes

“Author of Shrill and Shit, Actually, Lindy West, is back with a cultural critique that will have you rolling on the floor laughing and groaning from just how true to life (and frustrating) her observations are. Whip smart as always, West's feminist takes always hit me like a freight train of genius. From #MeToo to the making of her TV show... Read more

Be a Revolution

How Everyday People Are Fighting Oppression and Changing the World—and How You Can, Too

By: Ijeoma Oluo
Narrated by: Ijeoma Oluo
Length: 14 hours 35 minutes

“There's a LOT to love about this book, but what made it such a galvanizing, inspiring joy for me to read — and what will prompt me to return to it again and again — is its emphasis on imagination as a necessary part of movement work. As we dismantle systems of oppression, what systems of care and community and healing might we build to replace... Read more

Hope in the Dark

Untold Histories, Wild Possibilities

By: Rebecca Solnit
Narrated by: Tanya Eby
Length: 5 hours 36 minutes

With Hope in the Dark, Rebecca Solnit makes a radical case for hope as a commitment to act in a world whose future remains uncertain and unknowable. Drawing on her decades of activism and a wide reading of environmental, cultural, and political history, Solnit argued that radicals have a long, neglected history of transformative victories, that... Read more

Erasing History

By: Jason Stanley
Narrated by: Dion Graham
Length: 4 hours 56 minutes

“I’ve never read a book that is as timely, urgent and essential as this one. A battle plan for keeping this nation from falling into fascism.” —Khalil Gibran Muhammad, author of The Condemnation of Blackness

From the bestselling author of How Fascism Works, a searing confrontation with the far right’s efforts to rewrite history and undo a... Read more

On Freedom

By: Timothy Snyder
Narrated by: Timothy Snyder
Length: 10 hours 48 minutes

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A brilliant exploration of freedom—what it is, how it’s been misunderstood, and why it’s our only chance for survival—by the acclaimed Yale historian and author of the #1 New York Times bestseller On Tyranny

“A rigorous and visionary argument . . . Buy or borrow this book, read it, take it to heart.”—The... Read more

Black Pill

How I Witnessed the Darkest Corners of the Internet Come to Life, Poison Society, and Capture American Politics

By: Elle Reeve
Narrated by: Elle Reeve
Length: 8 hours 28 minutes

“Wow. First things first. Elle Reeve is brave. She thinks fast and writes well. Second, man, I learned a lot reading this book. It's about belonging and needing to belong. And the absolute power of the internet and algorithms and how you can become lost in its power. The author narrated the audiobook, very well done. Read more

Citizen

My Life After the White House

By: Bill Clinton
Narrated by: Steven Weber & Bill Clinton
Length: 15 hours 40 minutes

A powerful, candid, and richly detailed memoir from an American icon, revealing what life looks like after the presidency: triumphs, tribulations, and all.

On January 20, 2001, after nearly thirty years in politics—eight of them as president of the United States—Bill Clinton was suddenly a private citizen. Only fifty-four years old, full of... Read more

Prequel

An American Fight Against Fascism

By: Rachel Maddow
Narrated by: Rachel Maddow
Length: 13 hours 9 minutes

#1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Rachel Maddow traces the fight to preserve American democracy back to World War II, when a handful of committed public servants and brave private citizens thwarted far-right plotters trying to steer our nation toward an alliance with the Nazis.
 
“A ripping read—well rendered, fast-paced and delivered with the same... Read more

So You Want to Talk about Race

By: Ijeoma Oluo
Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
Length: 7 hours 41 minutes

In this #1 New York Times bestseller, Ijeoma Oluo offers a revelatory examination of race in AmericaA current, constructive, and actionable exploration of today’s racial landscape, offering straightforward clarity that readers of all races need to contribute to the dismantling of the racial divideIn So You Want to Talk about Race,... Read more

Invisible Rulers

The People Who Turn Lies into Reality

By: Renee DiResta
Narrated by: Anna Caputo
Length: 15 hours

A brilliant, original analysis of the radical shift in the dynamics of power and influence, revealing how the machinery that powered the Big Lie works to create bespoke realities revolutionizing politics, culture, and society.

Renée DiResta’s powerful, original investigation into the way power and influence have been profoundly transformed... Read more

The End of Policing

By: Alex S. Vitale
Narrated by: Michael Butler Murray
Length: 8 hours 17 minutes

Recent years have seen an explosion of protest against police brutality and repression. Among activists, journalists, and politicians, the conversation about how to respond and improve policing has focused on accountability, diversity, training, and community relations. Unfortunately, these reforms will not produce results, either alone or in... Read more

How We Show Up

Reclaiming Family, Friendship, and Community

By: Mia Birdsong
Narrated by: Mia Birdsong
Length: 6 hours 45 minutes

An Invitation to Community and Models for Connection

After almost every presentation activist and writer Mia Birdsong gives to executives, think tanks, and policy makers, one of those leaders quietly confesses how much they long for the profound community she describes. They have family, friends, and colleagues, yet they still feel like they're... Read more

The Power Broker: Volume 3 of 3

Robert Moses and the Fall of New York: Volume 3

By: Robert A. Caro
Narrated by: Robertson Dean
Length: 20 hours 42 minutes

PULITZER PRIZE WINNER • A modern American classic, this huge and galvanizing biography of Robert Moses reveals not only the saga of one man’s incredible accumulation of power but the story of his shaping (and mis-shaping of twentieth-century New York.  One of the Modern Library’s hundred greatest books of the twentieth century.

Robert Caro's... Read more

Abortion

Our Bodies, Their Lies, and the Truths We Use to Win

By: Jessica Valenti
Narrated by: Jessica Valenti
Length: 5 hours 12 minutes

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • In a stirring and succinct examination of post-Roe America, “one of the most successful and visible feminists of her generation” (Washington Post) takes on what’s become the country’s most resonant political issue.
 
In her most urgent book yet, New York Times bestselling author Jessica Valenti shines a light on the... Read more

Who's Afraid of Gender?

By: Judith Butler
Narrated by: Judith Butler
Length: 11 hours 47 minutes

This program is read by the author.

Named a Most Anticipated Book of 2024 by Time, Elle, Kirkus, Literary Hub, The Millions, Electric Literature, and them.

"A profoundly urgent intervention.” —Naomi Klein

"A timely must-read for anyone actively invested in re-imagining collective futurity.” —Claudia Rankine

From a global icon, a bold, essential... Read more

War

By: Bob Woodward
Narrated by: Robert Petkoff
Length: 11 hours 53 minutes

Two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Bob Woodward tells the revelatory, behind-the-scenes story of three wars—Ukraine, the Middle East and the struggle for the American Presidency.

War is an intimate and sweeping account of one of the most tumultuous periods in presidential politics and American history.

We see President Joe Biden and his top advisers... Read more

Care Work

Dreaming Disability Justice

By: Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha
Narrated by: Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha
Length: 8 hours 7 minutes

“A primer on disability justice, memoir, personal activism history, and love letter to disabled BIPOC femmes all at once. Read more

Washington

A Life (Pulitzer Prize Winner)

By: Ron Chernow
Narrated by: Scott Brick
Length: 41 hours 47 minutes

Winner of the Pulitzer Prize and a New York Times Bestseller, a landmark biography of George Washington.

In Washington: A Life celebrated biographer Ron Chernow provides a richly nuanced portrait of the father of our nation. With a breadth and depth matched by no other one-volume life of Washington, this crisply paced narrative carries the... Read more

Sage Warrior

Wake to Oneness, Practice Pleasure, Choose Courage, Become Victory

The Revolutionary Love Project

By: Valarie Kaur
Narrated by: Valarie Kaur & Harjit "Dolly" Kaur Brar
Length: 14 hours 28 minutes

Profound inner wisdom for courageous action—from the author of See No Stranger and founder of the Revolutionary Love Project, a “prophetic voice of our generation” (America Ferrera)

How do we find the wisdom to envision a new world and the courage to fight for it?

How do we survive seemingly apocalyptic times?

In a world on fire, how do we find... Read more

Why Nations Fail

The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty

By: Daron Acemoglu & James A. Robinson
Narrated by: Dan Woren
Length: 17 hours 53 minutes

NEW YORK TIMES AND WALL STREET JOURNAL BESTSELLER • From two winners of the 2024 Nobel Prize in Economic Sciences, “who have demonstrated the importance of societal institutions for a country’s prosperity”

“A wildly ambitious work that hopscotches through history and around the world to answer the very big question of why some countries get rich... Read more

How Europe Underdeveloped Africa

By: Walter Rodney
Narrated by: Mirron Willis
Length: 13 hours 21 minutes

The classic work of political, economic, and historical analysis, powerfully introduced by Angela Davis.



In his short life, the Guyanese intellectual Walter Rodney emerged as one of the leading thinkers and activists of the anticolonial revolution, leading movements in North America, South America, the African continent, and the Caribbean. In... Read more

Democracy in Retrograde

How to Make Changes Big and Small in Our Country and in Our Lives

By: Sami Sage & Emily Amick
Narrated by: Nikki Massoud
Length: 4 hours 55 minutes

INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER

A whip-smart combo of self-help and political manifesto that is perfect for anyone who wants to save our democracy but doesn’t know where to start.

In today’s political climate, it’s hard not to get discouraged. Isolated, doom scrolling, lacking a sense of purpose or community...it’s easy to become overwhelmed by... Read more