Social Science audiobooks

America's Women - Abridged

By: Gail Collins

Narrated by: Jane Alexander

Length: TBA

Abridged: Yes

Rich in detail, filled with fascinating characters, and panoramic in its sweep, this magnificent, comprehensive work tells for the first time the complete story of the American woman from the Pilgrims to the 21st-centuryIn this sweeping cultural history, Gail Collins explores the transformations, victories, and tragedies of women in America over... Read more

Of Whales and Belly Flowers, Rebirth and Hope

By: Robin Kobaly & Doug Thompson

Narrated by: Justine Willis Toms

Length: 58 minutes

Abridged: No

Masculine and feminine, earth and sea, forest and desert, nature and nurture…the balance of life shows up beautifully and metaphorically in the relationship and the work of Robin Kobaly and Doug Thompson. She is one of the nation's foremost experts on native desert plants; he is a leader in experiential research with marine mammals. Read more

Why Men Don't Have a Clue and Women Always Need More Shoes - Abridged

By: Barbara Pease & Allan Pease

Narrated by: Barbara Pease & Allan Pease

Length: 2 hours 54 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Do you know the top seven things men do that drive women nuts? Or the real reason women cry more than men do? What are men really looking for in a woman—both at first sight and for the long-term? These are only the starting points for Barbara and Allan Pease as they discuss the very real—and often very funny—differences between the sexes.
Why... Read more

Loud and Clear

By: Anna Quindlen

Narrated by: Kathe Mazur

Length: 8 hours 7 minutes

Abridged: No

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • Pulitzer Prize–winner Anna Quindlen offers wisdom, opinions, insights, and reflections about current events and modern life in this provocative and inspiring book.

“A tour de force for our time, [Loud and Clear] is equally as compelling as a look at public events as it is a reflection on being a woman and on... Read more

Idyll Banter - Abridged

By: Chris Bohjalian

Narrated by: Chris Bohjalian

Length: 4 hours 32 minutes

Abridged: Yes

In March 1986, while living in Brooklyn, Chris Bohjalian and his wife were cab-napped on a Saturday night and taken on a forty-five-minute joy ride in which the driver ignored all traffic lights and stop signs. Around midnight he deposited the young couple on a near-deserted street, where police officers were about to storm a crack house.... Read more

The Progress Paradox - Abridged

By: Gregg Easterbrook

Narrated by: Rick Adamson

Length: 5 hours 46 minutes

Abridged: Yes

In The Progress Paradox, Gregg Easterbrook draws upon three decades of wide-ranging research and thinking to make the persuasive assertion that almost all aspects of Western life have vastly improved in the past century--and yet today, most men and women feel less happy than in previous generations. Why this is so and what we should do about it... Read more

Maiden, Mother, Matriarch and Crone: Birthing the Circlesof Our Lives

By: Elizabeth Davis

Narrated by: Justine Willis Toms

Length: 57 minutes

Abridged: No

Midwife, mother, teacher and visionary, Elizabeth Davis brings new insights to the experience of everywoman as she describes the phases and cycles through which all women pass. At the same time she recognizes the challenges and ambivalence often encountered in moving through each passage. Read more

An Imperfect God - Abridged

By: Henry Wiencek

Narrated by: Rick Adamson

Length: 7 hours 30 minutes

Abridged: Yes

A major new biography of Washington, and the first to explore his engagement with American slavery

When George Washington wrote his will, he made the startling decision to set his slaves free; earlier he had said that holding slaves was his "only unavoidable subject of regret." In this groundbreaking work, Henry Wiencek explores the founding... Read more

The Roots of Violence

By: Susan Griffin

Narrated by: Michael Toms

Length: 58 minutes

Abridged: No

In this dialogue, Susan Griffin explores the relationship between what happens in our intimate lives and the violence we express individually and as a nation. She explains, "The idea that we have to get somebody with a lot of muscles to take care of us happens when our core relationship to our own feelings has been erased." Read more

Preachers of Hate - Abridged

By: Kenneth R. Timmerman

Narrated by: Kenneth R. Timmerman

Length: 5 hours 56 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Like no book before it, Preachers of Hate uncovers an ancient hatred that threatens the life and livelihood of every American. The “new” anti-Semitism targets not only Jews, but Americans specifically and the West in general. It targets our values, our lifestyle, and our freedoms. It is the single most important issue we face when trying to make... Read more

Cultural Nonviolence

By: Satish Kumar

Narrated by: Michael Toms

Length: 57 minutes

Abridged: No

In the spirit of Gandhi, Martin Luther King, and Jesus, Satish Kumar brings a gentle wisdom to the difficult questions that must be answered if we are to end the pattern of destruction that threatens our world today. His simple, yet comprehensive perspective addresses the violence that is pervasive in human society and, amazingly, offers... Read more

Why Men Don't Have a Clue and Women Always Need More Shoes

By: Barbara Pease & Allan Pease

Narrated by: Lee Adams & Stephen Hoye

Length: 8 hours 45 minutes

Abridged: No

Do you know the top seven things men do that drive women nuts? Or the real reason women cry more than men do? What are men really looking for in a woman—both at first sight and for the long-term? These are only the starting points for Barbara and Allan Pease as they discuss the very real—and often very funny—differences between the sexes.

Why... Read more

There Must Be a Pony In Here Somewhere - Abridged

By: Kara Swisher & Lisa Dickey

Narrated by: Kara Swisher

Length: 5 hours 49 minutes

Abridged: Yes

In her acclaimed AOL.COM, Kara Swisher chronicled the unlikely ascent of a group of underdog entrepreneurs and their influence on American net culture. This book picks up where the previous one left off, investigating AOL's merger with Time Warner and its aftermath. Journalists Swisher and Dickey have an ear for the comic and an appreciation... Read more

The Partly Cloudy Patriot

By: Sarah Vowell

Narrated by: Conan O'Brien, Seth Green, Stephen Colbert, Pau...

Length: 5 hours 15 minutes

Abridged: No

From This American Life contributor and self-described “history nerd” Sarah Vowell comes a collection of humorous and personal essays investigating American history, pop culture, and Buffy the Vampire Slayer.

In this insightful and funny collection of personal stories Vowell travels through the American past and in doing so ponders a number of... Read more

True Notebooks - Abridged

By: Mark Salzman

Narrated by: Mark Salzman

Length: 5 hours 25 minutes

Abridged: Yes

When Mark Salzman is invited to visit a writing class at Central Juvenile Hall, a lockup for Los Angeles’s most violent teenage offenders, he scrambles for a polite reason to decline. He goes—expecting the worst—and is so astonished by what he finds that he becomes a teacher there himself. True Notebooks is an account of Salzman’s first years... Read more

Mountains Beyond Mountains - Abridged

By: Tracy Kidder

Narrated by: Tracy Kidder

Length: 4 hours 39 minutes

Abridged: Yes

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER •“[A] masterpiece . . . an astonishing book that will leave you questioning your own life and political views.”—USA Today
 
“If any one person can be given credit for transforming the medical establishment’s thinking about health care for the destitute, it is Paul Farmer. . . . [Mountains Beyond Mountains]... Read more

The Progress Paradox

By: Gregg Easterbrook

Narrated by: Jonathan Marosz

Length: 11 hours 15 minutes

Abridged: No

In The Progress Paradox, Gregg Easterbrook draws upon three decades of wide-ranging research and thinking to make the persuasive assertion that almost all aspects of Western life have vastly improved in the past century--and yet today, most men and women feel less happy than in previous generations. Why this is so and what we should do about it... Read more

Confessions of a Reformed Dieter

By: A.J. Rochester

Narrated by: A.J. Rochester

Length: 9 hours 43 minutes

Abridged: No

When A.J. Rochester is singled out as the ideal candidate for a television show on obesity, she is at first appalled and then resolved. Enough is enough. She vows to lose forty kilos - not because she yearns to become a pretzel, but so she can keep up with her little boy and turn her life around at last. A funny, insightful and inspiring... Read more

The Borderlands of Science

By: Michael Shermer

Narrated by: Grover Gardner

Length: 13 hours 21 minutes

Abridged: No

As author of the bestselling Why People Believe Weird Things and How We Believe, and Editor-in-Chief of Skeptic magazine, Michael Shermer has emerged as the nation's number one scourge of superstition and bad science. Now, in The Borderlands of Science, he takes us to the place where real science (such as the big bang theory), borderland science... Read more

Embracing Crone Wisdom

By: Jean Shinoda Bolen, M.D.

Narrated by: Justine Willis Toms

Length: 57 minutes

Abridged: No

What wisdom do you have that you can pass on? Have the difficult times in your life left you bitter, seeking someone to blame? Or have they left you juicy with self-awareness, purpose, and humor? Have you become a crone? Join author and Jungian analyst Jean Shinoda Bolen as she explores the enormous potential for wisdom in the last third of your... Read more

American Patriots

By: Gail Buckley

Narrated by: Robert Stuart

Length: 15 hours 3 minutes

Abridged: No

American Patriots is one of the great untold stories in American history. There have been books on individual black soldiers, but this is the first to tell the full story of the black American military experience, starting with the Revolution and culminating with Desert Storm.

The best histories are about more than facts and events — they... Read more

Global Spiritual Activism

By: Starhawk

Narrated by: Michael Toms

Length: 57 minutes

Abridged: No

In a society that seems unsure of what to do with a "witch," Starhawk has remarkably and quietly attained broad recognition as an authority on Goddess religion. She shares the excitement and hope she derives from the dedication of a new generation of activists who devote their lives to fostering global transformation. Read more

Throw the Rascals Out

By: Jim Hightower

Narrated by: Michael Toms

Length: 57 minutes

Abridged: No

Like a modern day Thomas Paine, America's populist and rabble-rouser speaks out for the rest of us, as contrasted to the ruling elite.  Hightower rises up against assorted robber barons, profiteers, empire builders, supremacists, militants and the neo-cons in our midst, that have amassed domineering power and run roughshod over common folks and... Read more

Preachers of Hate

By: Kenneth R. Timmerman

Narrated by: Robertson Dean

Length: 13 hours 28 minutes

Abridged: No

Like no book before it, Preachers of Hate uncovers an ancient hatred that threatens the life and livelihood of every American. The “new” anti-Semitism targets not only Jews, but Americans specifically and the West in general. It targets our values, our lifestyle, and our freedoms. It is the single most important issue we face when trying to make... Read more