Essays audiobooks

Dune and Philosophy

By: Kevin S. Decker

Narrated by: Ariana Delawari & Nas Mehdi

Length: 10 hours 43 minutes

Abridged: No

"He who controls the spice controls the universe." Frank Herbert's Dune saga is the epic story of Paul, son of Duke Leto Atreides, and heir to the massive fortune promised by the desert planet Arrakis and its vast reservoirs of a drug called "spice." To control the spice, Paul and his mother Jessica, a devotee of the pseudo-religious Bene... Read more

The Ugly History of Beautiful Things

By: Katy Kelleher

Narrated by: Cindy Kay

Length: 8 hours 52 minutes

Abridged: No

Paris Review contributor Katy Kelleher explores our obsession with gorgeous things, unveiling the fraught histories of makeup, flowers, perfume, silk, and other beautiful objects.

April recommended reading by the New York Times Book Review, Vanity Fair, Goodreads, Jezebel, Christian Science Monitor, All Arts, and the Next Big Idea Club
One of... Read more

Under the Henfluence

By: Tove Danovich

Narrated by: Tove Danovich

Length: 7 hours

Abridged: No

Since first domesticating the chicken thousands of years ago, humans have become exceptionally adept at raising them for food. Yet most people rarely interact with chickens or know much about them. In Under the Henfluence, culture reporter Tove Danovich explores the lives of these quirky, mysterious birds who stole her heart the moment her first... Read more

Strong Female Character

By: Hanna Flint

Narrated by: Hanna Flint

Length: 8 hours 39 minutes

Abridged: No

Hanna Flint speaks from the heart in this personal and incisive reflection on how cinema has been the key to understanding herself and the world we live in. A staunch feminist of mixed-race heritage, Hanna has succeeded in an industry not designed for people like her. Interweaving anecdotes from familial and personal experiences—episodes of... Read more

Half Wild

By: Dave Dempsey

Narrated by: Melissa Ingells

Length: 3 hours 22 minutes

Abridged: No

Humans and canines have been cohabitating for centuries, straddling a boundary that allows us to live together within and across our species. In this empathetic volume, author Dave Dempsey explores this life on the border, the overlapping planes between humans and the nonhuman world that lead to both magnificent creation and appalling... Read more

Ethics in the Real World, Revised Edition

By: Peter Singer

Narrated by: Julian Elfer

Length: 9 hours 18 minutes

Abridged: No

Peter Singer is often described as the world's most influential philosopher. He is also one of its most controversial. He helped launch the animal rights and effective altruism movements and contributed to the development of bioethics. Now, in Ethics in the Real World, Singer shows that he is also a master at dissecting important current events... Read more

The Possibility of Life

By: Jaime Green

Narrated by: Jaime Green

Length: 8 hours 24 minutes

Abridged: No

“Every page of this book makes our shared universe feel larger and more interesting than ever before, a true gift of fascinating science and engrossing storytelling.” —Matt Bell, author of Appleseed

A spellbinding exploration of alien life and the cosmos, examining how the possibility of life on other planets shapes our understanding of... Read more

Not Funny

By: Jena Friedman

Narrated by: Jena Friedman

Length: 7 hours

Abridged: No

For fans of the perceptive comedy of Hannah Gadsby, Lindy West, and Sarah Silverman, Academy Award–nominated and acclaimed stand-up comedian Jena Friedman presents a “smart and thoughtful and even a little offensive” (Sacha Baron Cohen) collection of essays on the cultural flashpoints of today.

Growing up, Jena Friedman didn’t care about being... Read more

The God Desire

By: David Baddiel

Narrated by: David Baddiel

Length: 2 hours

Abridged: No

From the bestselling author of Jews Don’t Count ‘ A hugely heartfelt, funny, kind, fascinating, human and clever book ’ ALAIN DE BOTTON‘ Magnificent. Breathtaking. And shockingly rare … another one-sitting wonder’ STEPHEN FRY David Baddiel would love there to be a God. He has spent a lot of... Read more

The Full English

By: Stuart Maconie

Narrated by: Stuart Maconie

Length: 12 hours 26 minutes

Abridged: No

A Sunday Times Book of the Week and Top 10 Bestseller A Times bestseller A Waterstones Paperback of the Year 2024 A Spectator Book of the Year What kind of country is England today? What does it mean to be English? ... Read more

English Journey

By: J. B. Priestley

Narrated by: Sean Baker

Length: 17 hours 36 minutes

Abridged: No

‘The finest book ever written about England and the English’ Stuart Maconie ‘J. B. Priestley is one of our literary icons of the 20th Century and it is time that we all became re-acquainted with his genius.’ Dame Judi Dench Three years before George Orwell made his... Read more

Delight

By: J. B. Priestley

Narrated by: Sean Baker

Length: 4 hours 50 minutes

Abridged: No

‘An exquisitely-written, generous, funny, thoughtful book about the everyday joys of being alive. I love it.’ Dolly Alderton ‘J. B. Priestley is one of our literary icons of the 20th Century and it is time that we all became re-acquainted with his genius.’ Dame Judi Dench ... Read more

Also sprach Zarathustra 1

By: Friedrich Nietzsche

Narrated by: Volker Braumann

Length: 5 hours 35 minutes

Abridged: No

In "Also sprach Zarathustra" bringt Friedrich Nietzsche die Kerngedanken seiner Philosophie in großer Dichtung zum Ausdruck. Die ewige Wiederkunft des Gleichen, der Übermensch, der Wille zur Macht: All dies findet sich in diesem monolithisch dastehenden Werk und bündelt sich in der feurigen Figur des Zarathustra. Der Sprecher Volker Braumann... Read more

In Our Shoes

By: Brianna Holt

Narrated by: Brianna Holt

Length: 6 hours 18 minutes

Abridged: No

Part memoir, part cultural critique, In Our Shoes uses pop culture and author Brianna Holt’s own lived experience to dissect the stereotypes and preconceived notions that young Black women must overcome in America today.

In this fresh exploration of cultural appropriation, wokeness, tone policing, and more, Holt carefully dismantles myths about... Read more

Where the Waves Turn Back

By: Tyson Motsenbocker

Narrated by: Tyson Motsenbocker

Length: 6 hours 39 minutes

Abridged: No

In this powerful memoir, following the death of his mother, Tyson Motsenbocker retraces the journey an 18th century priest took in this harrowing story of one man’s pilgrimage of healing and finding beauty and hope in tragedy.  After years on the road performing at sold-out venues, Tyson Motsenbocker returned home to the impending death of his... Read more

The Point of No Return

By: Thomas Byrne Edsall

Narrated by: Mike Chamberlain

Length: 13 hours 38 minutes

Abridged: No

After Donald Trump's rise to power, after the 2020 presidential election, after January 6, is American politics past the point of no return? New York Times columnist Thomas Byrne Edsall fears that the country may be headed over a cliff. In this compelling and illuminating book, Edsall documents how the Trump years ravaged the nation's politics,... Read more

Secret Letters

By: John Willis

Narrated by: Natalie Pela & Orlando Wells

Length: TBA

Abridged: No

While Pilot Officer Geoffrey Myers was caught up in the Battle of Britain, his French wife and two half-Jewish children were trapped in increasingly dangerous circumstances in Nazi-occupied France. In intimate, frank, and powerful letters, Myers kept a record of his war, his deep love for his wife Margot and their children, and his... Read more

Writing Landscape

By: Linda Cracknell

Narrated by: Linda Cracknell

Length: 3 hours 34 minutes

Abridged: No

Inhabiting a landscape, walking a landscape, writing a place and time.Linda Cracknell is a writer of place and nature who believes in being alert, observing, and writing from the particulars of each experience. Engaging bodily with her writing, she is someone for whom getting mud on her boots, sleeping high up in the hills, or being slapped by... Read more

Welcome to the Circus of Baseball

By: Ryan McGee

Narrated by: Ryan McGee

Length: 8 hours 47 minutes

Abridged: No

A gloriously funny, nostalgic memoir of a popular ESPN reporter who, in the summer of 1994, was a fresh-out-of-college intern for a minor league baseball team. Madness and charm ensue as Ryan McGee spends the season steeped in sweat, fertilizer, nacho cheese sauce, and pure, unadulterated joy in North Carolina with the Asheville Tourists.

"A... Read more

Grounded

By: James Canton

Narrated by: Peter Noble

Length: 8 hours 12 minutes

Abridged: No

From the author of The Oak Papers comes a beautiful meditation on how to foster a profound and healing spiritual communion with the natural world, exploring how the sacred can be accessed by looking to the past, to our ancestors and how they tread through their worlds.“Canton's writing has an exquisite, somewhat dreamlike quality.”—Peter... Read more

American Ramble

By: Neil King

Narrated by: Will Tulin

Length: 10 hours 57 minutes

Abridged: No

A stunning, revelatory memoir about a 330-mile walk from Washington, D.C., to New York City—an unforgettable pilgrimage to the heart of America across some of our oldest common ground. Neil King Jr.’s desire to walk from Washington, D.C., to New York City began as a whim and soon became an obsession. By the spring of 2021, events had intervened... Read more

The Kevin Powell Reader

By: Kevin Powell

Narrated by: Kevin Powell

Length: 12 hours 1 minute

Abridged: No

Kevin Powell is one of the most prolific and acclaimed American writers, thinkers, activists, and public speakers of the past three decades. His writings are important contributions to our national conversations on race, gender, class, politics, pop culture, celebrity, hip-hop, and the past, present, and future of the United States. The Kevin... Read more

Near Death By A Thousand Cuts

By: Andrew Butters

Narrated by: Andrew Butters

Length: 3 hours 50 minutes

Abridged: No

Pregnant and dealing with a bout of morning sickness, Andrew Butters' soon-to-be mom handed the keys to her car to her husband and asked him to start it up. He cranked the engine and released the clutch, not realizing it was still in gear. The car lurched forward, striking her in the caboose and launching her into the ditch. Thus began her... Read more

Psicoanálisis y ciencias humanas

By: Louis Althusser

Narrated by: Gustavo Dardes

Length: 2 hours 52 minutes

Abridged: No

Las dos conferencias publicadas en el presente volumen fueron pronunciadas por Louis Althusser durante el seminario sobre Lacan y el psicoanálisis que se llevó a cabo en la Escuela Normal Superior de París durante el año universitario 1963-1964. Read more