History audiobooks

Benjamin Franklin

By: Carl Van Doren

Narrated by: Patrick Cullen

Length: 32 hours 46 minutes

Abridged: No

From his beginnings as a journalist at age sixteen to his retirement from public affairs at eighty-two, there was no break in Benjamin Franklin’s activity and accomplishments. A writer, inventor, and statesman, he remains unsurpassed in the range of his natural gifts and the important uses to which he put them.In this Pulitzer Prize–winning... Read more

The First Tycoon

By: T.J. Stiles

Narrated by: Mark Deakins

Length: 28 hours 42 minutes

Abridged: No

A gripping, groundbreaking biography of the combative man whose genius and force of will created modern capitalism.

Founder of a dynasty, builder of the original Grand Central, creator of an impossibly vast fortune, Cornelius “Commodore” Vanderbilt is an American icon. Humbly born on Staten Island during George Washington’s presidency, he rose... Read more

The Day We Found the Universe

By: Marcia Bartusiak

Narrated by: Erik Synnestvedt

Length: 10 hours 32 minutes

Abridged: No

From one of our most acclaimed science writers: a dramatic narrative of the discovery of the true nature and startling size of the universe, delving back past the moment of revelation to trace the decades of work--by a select group of scientists--that made it possible.

On January 1, 1925, thity-five-year-old Edwin Hubble announced findings that... Read more

Ghosts of War

By: Ryan Smithson

Narrated by: Ryan Smithson

Length: 5 hours 54 minutes

Abridged: No

In this extraordinary and harrowing memoir, follow one GI’s tour of duty as Ryan Smithson brings readers inside a world that few understand. This is no ordinary teenager’s story. Instead of opting for college life, Ryan Smithson joined the Army Reserve when he was seventeen. Two years later, he was deployed to Iraq as an Army engineer.His... Read more

Red Orchestra

By: Anne Nelson

Narrated by: Anne Nelson

Length: 13 hours 37 minutes

Abridged: No

This riveting account of German resistance is based on years of research by the distinguished journalist Anne Nelson. This is a beautiful and moving portrait of ordinary but heroic figures—an untold story of a circle of Germans and German-Americans in Berlin who took a principled stand against Hitler and the Holocaust. They expressed their... Read more

Uranium

By: Tom Zoellner

Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor

Length: 12 hours 58 minutes

Abridged: No

Uranium is a common element in the earth's crust and the only naturally occurring mineral with the power to end all life on the planet. After World War II, it reshaped the global order—whoever could master uranium could master the world.



Marie Curie gave us hope that uranium would be a miracle panacea, but the Manhattan Project gave us reason to... Read more

American History to 1877

By: Robert D. Geise

Narrated by: Jeff Riggenbach

Length: 5 hours 41 minutes

Abridged: No

Designed to be compatible with virtually every standard textbook in their subject field, Barron’s EZ-101 Study Keys give you a valuable overview of your college-level course. Classroom-style notes emphasize important facts, remind you what you need to remember for term papers and exams, and help guide you through the complexities of lectures and... Read more

Classical Mythology

By: Peter Meineck

Narrated by: Peter Meineck

Length: 8 hours 10 minutes

Abridged: No

In Classical Mythology: The Greeks, widely published Professor Peter Meineck examines in thrilling detail the far-reaching influence of Greek myths on Western thought and literature. The nature of myth and its importance to ancient Greece in terms of storytelling, music, poetry, religion, cults, rituals, theatre, and literature are viewed... Read more

You’re Only as Good as Your Next One

By: Mike Medavoy

Narrated by: Robertson Dean

Length: 13 hours 18 minutes

Abridged: No

Mike Medavoy is a Hollywood rarity: a studio executive who, though never far from controversy, remained loved and respected through four decades of moviemaking. He helped bring to the screen some of the most acclaimed Oscar-winning films of our time, including Apocalypse Now, One Flew over the Cuckoo’s Nest, Amadeus, The Silence of the Lambs,... Read more

Intellectuals

By: Paul Johnson

Narrated by: Frederick Davidson

Length: 18 hours 17 minutes

Abridged: No

Since the time of Voltaire and Rousseau, the secular intellectual has increasingly filled the vacuum left by the decline of the cleric and assumed the functions of moral mentor and critic of mankind. This fascinating portrait of the minds that have shaped the modern world examines the moral credentials of those whose thoughts have influenced... Read more

Eyes on the Horizon

By: Malcolm McConnell & Richard B. Myers

Narrated by: Arthur Morey

Length: 13 hours 41 minutes

Abridged: No

General Richard B. Myers has unique insight into how the American national security system works. In Eyes on the Horizon, he recounts his military career and outlines a bold blueprint for a strategic overhaul of our security system, including the military, so that the nation is adequately protected and prepared to fight in this era of what he... Read more

The Big Rich

By: Bryan Burrough

Narrated by: James Jenner

Length: 22 hours 11 minutes

Abridged: No

Phenomenal reviews and sales greeted the hardcover publication of The Big Rich, New York Times bestselling author Bryan Burrough's spellbinding chronicle of Texas oil. Weaving together the multigenerational sagas of the industry's four wealthiest families, Burrough brings to life the men known in their day as the Big Four: Roy Cullen, H. L.... Read more

Commodore

By: Edward J. Renehan, Jr.

Narrated by: John McDonough

Length: 12 hours 37 minutes

Abridged: No

Acclaimed historian Edward J. Renehan, Jr.-author of Dark Genius of Wall Street -draws upon previously unreleased documents to deliver the definitive biography of Cornelius Vanderbilt, the 19th-century transportation tycoon who accumulated the largest private fortune in U.S. history. "[A] portrait of a brilliantly successful, genuinely... Read more

Aristoteles - Abridged

By: Aristoteles

Narrated by: Andreas Dietrich

Length: 2 hours 15 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Aristoteles, einer der bedeutendsten Philosophen, lebte von 384 - 322 v. Chr. Er war Schüler Platons und Lehrer Alexanders des Großen. Für seinen Sohn Nikomachos schrieb er einen Leitfaden zum rechten Leben, der als "Nikomachische Ethik" eins der Hauptwerke der philosophischen Ethik wurde. Im Abschnitt über die menschlichen Gemeinschaften... Read more

Der 30jährige Krieg - Abridged

By: Ulrich Offenberg

Narrated by: Detlef Kügow & Claus Brockmeyer

Length: 3 hours 37 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Was ursprünglich als Religionskrieg begonnen hatte, entwickelte sich rasch zu einer blutigen, nationalen Auseinandersetzung europäischer Großmächte. Deutschland wurde zum Schlachtfeld der Franzosen, Spanier, Österreicher und Schweden. Als die Waffen nach 30 Jahren endlich schwiegen und in Münster und in Osnabrück 1648 der Westfälische Frieden... Read more

Alexander der Große - Abridged

By: Ralf Behrwald

Narrated by: Ralf Behrwald

Length: 56 minutes

Abridged: Yes

Alexander der Große, der von 336 323 v. Chr. regierte, war nicht nur einer der größten Eroberer der Weltgeschichte. Seine Eroberung des Perserreichs bereitete zugleich den Boden für die Hellenisierung weiter Teile des östlichen Mittelmeerraumes, die bis zum Fall von Byzanz 1453 und darüber hinaus wirken sollte. Zugleich markiert Alexanders... Read more

American History, 1877 to the Present, Second Edition

By: Mary Jane Capozzoli Ingui

Narrated by: Jeff Riggenbach

Length: 9 hours 23 minutes

Abridged: No

Designed to be compatible with virtually every standard textbook in their subject field, Barron’s EZ-101 Study Keys give you a valuable overview of your college-level course. Classroom-style notes emphasize important facts, remind you what you need to remember for term papers and exams, and help guide you through the complexities of lectures and... Read more

A History of Europe

By: J. M. Roberts

Narrated by: Frederick Davidson

Length: 37 hours 34 minutes

Abridged: No

How is it that the small continent of Europe, with its rich multiplicity of cultures and traditions, has managed to exert so profound an influence on the rest of the world? Roberts’ sweeping and entertaining history notes the paradoxical effect, for good and ill, on everything touched by those Western values that originated in Europe.Beginning... Read more

We Are Our Mothers' Daughters

By: Cokie Roberts

Narrated by: Cokie Roberts

Length: 7 hours 43 minutes

Abridged: No

“[A] paean to feminism and the solidarity of womenkind. . . . This book is a celebration of women in their various roles: mother, sister, civil rights advocate, consumer advocate, first-class mechanic, politician—which Roberts’ own mother once was.”
—Washington Post “The perfect combination of powerful feelings and a modulated style.”
— Los... Read more

A History of the Middle East

By: Peter Mansfield

Narrated by: Richard Brown

Length: 17 hours 1 minute

Abridged: No

For more than four thousand years, the Middle East has provided a setting for titanic struggles between great civilizations and religions. In the twentieth century it became the focus of rivalry between the European powers as the last major Islamic empire of the Ottoman Turks crumbled and collapsed. The discovery of the world’s greatest oil... Read more

The Speed of Sound

By: Scott Eyman

Narrated by: Adams Morgan

Length: 13 hours 39 minutes

Abridged: No

It was the end of an era—it was a turbulent, colorful, and altogether remarkable period, four short years in which America’s most popular industry reinvented itself.Here is the epic story of the transition from silent films to talkies, that moment when movies were totally transformed and the American public cemented its love affair with... Read more

Coming Out of the Ice

By: Victor Herman

Narrated by: Christopher Hurt

Length: 13 hours 42 minutes

Abridged: No

In 1931, a young American named Victor Herman accompanied his parents to the Soviet Union, where his father was to set up a Ford Motor Company plant. In 1938, he was inexplicably thrown into a Soviet prison. It was forty-five years before he was able to return to America.His was a common nightmare during the Stalin years. Those who survived... Read more

The Autobiography of John Stuart Mill

By: John Stuart Mill

Narrated by: Noah Waterman

Length: 6 hours 57 minutes

Abridged: No

Mill’s autobiography deals with but one part of a life, the life of the mind-but a mind that ranks as one of the most remarkable and significant of the nineteenth century. The book memorably depicts the emergence of a brilliant child prodigy, the product of an extraordinary education that both hastened his development and brought him to the... Read more

Charles de Gaulle

By: Don Cook

Narrated by: Frederick Davidson

Length: 22 hours 45 minutes

Abridged: No

This magnificent volume by veteran European correspondent Don Cook is the first major biography of de Gaulle written by an American from an American perspective. Rich with new anecdotal material, it offers fresh evaluations and sheds new light on Europe’s most controversial and enigmatic general, politician, and statesman.Arrogant, haughty,... Read more