Radical Centrist
- 9
- reviews
- 20
- helpful votes
- 159
- ratings
-
The Eagle of the Ninth
- By: Rosemary Sutcliff
- Narrated by: Charlie Simpson
- Length: 4 hrs and 32 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 461
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 347
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 348
Marcus Flavius Aquila, a young centurion in Roman Britain, is forced into retirement after receiving a wound in his first major engagement against a rebel British tribe. It allows him the freedom to embark upon a dangerous mission to find out what happened to the Ninth Legion, which, years before, disappeared in the savage lands of the Picts. Will he find out what happened to the men, led by his father, who never returned? And will he recover the Eagle, the symbol of Roman dominance and power?
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
Give it to us unabridged!
- By C. Liddiard on 01-12-11
- The Eagle of the Ninth
- By: Rosemary Sutcliff
- Narrated by: Charlie Simpson
good story, annoying music
Reviewed: 08-09-24
I'm a sucker for Roman historical fiction and thenstory didn't disappoint, though the music between chapters was ridiculous and unnecessary.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
America's Founding Fathers
- By: Allen C. Guelzo, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Allen C. Guelzo
- Length: 17 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 906
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 805
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 801
Today, the US Constitution is the oldest, continually-operating instrument of government in the world. But to think of the Constitution as a fully-formed, canonical document is to miss out on an honest, well-rounded grasp of American history. Now, more than ever, any well-informed citizen should understand how the Constitution lives, breathes, and endures.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Great lecture series
- By D. Littman on 04-21-17
- America's Founding Fathers
- By: Allen C. Guelzo, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Allen C. Guelzo
good info, melodramatic delivery
Reviewed: 08-07-24
a series of interesting sketches of the men and events surrounding the framing of the Constitution. I like Guelzo's writing, but his delivery here was off-puttingly melodramatic.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
War on the Border
- Villa, Pershing, the Texas Rangers, and an American Invasion
- By: Jeff Guinn
- Narrated by: Timothy Andrés Pabon
- Length: 10 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 100
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 83
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 83
Jeff Guinn, chronicler of the Southwestern US and of American undesirables (Bonnie and Clyde, Charles Manson, and Jim Jones) tells the “riveting and supremely entertaining narrative” (S.C. Gwynne, New York Times best-selling author of Empire of the Summer Moon) of Pancho Villa’s bloody raid on a small US border town that sparked a violent conflict with the US.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
Interesting research, but a biased narrative.
- By Jorge Molina on 07-18-21
- War on the Border
- Villa, Pershing, the Texas Rangers, and an American Invasion
- By: Jeff Guinn
- Narrated by: Timothy Andrés Pabon
Great story, good performance, except...
Reviewed: 10-25-21
The narrator kept mispronouncing adjutant as ad-JOO-tant, which drove me nuts. Other than that, fascinating look at how close we came to war with Mexico.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Through the Eye of a Needle: Wealth, the Fall of Rome, and the Making of Christianity in the West, 350-550 AD
- By: Peter Brown
- Narrated by: Fleet Cooper
- Length: 31 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 263
-
Performance4 out of 5 stars 226
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 221
Jesus taught his followers that it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter heaven. Yet by the fall of Rome, the church was becoming rich beyond measure. Through the Eye of a Needle is a sweeping intellectual and social history of the vexing problem of wealth in Christianity in the waning days of the Roman Empire, written by the world's foremost scholar of late antiquity.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
A learned, well-balanced postmodern history
- By Jacobus on 11-21-12
Fascinating book, laughable narration
Reviewed: 08-08-20
A great history of the late Empire and the development of the Church, using the lens of charitable donation. It helps if you know some basics about the history of the period, though -- this isn't a survey book for beginners. But the narrator was hilariously bad -- he fluctuated between classical and medieval pronunciation of Latin, his French sounded like Peter Sellers doing Inspector Clouseau, and even a lot of the English words were mispronounced.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
2 people found this helpful
-
Gulag
- A History
- By: Anne Applebaum
- Narrated by: Laural Merlington
- Length: 27 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 988
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 868
-
Story4.5 out of 5 stars 864
The Gulag - a vast array of Soviet concentration camps that held millions of political and criminal prisoners - was a system of repression and punishment that terrorized the entire society, embodying the worst tendencies of Soviet communism. In this magisterial and acclaimed history, Anne Applebaum offers the first fully documented portrait of the Gulag, from its origins in the Russian Revolution, through its expansion under Stalin, to its collapse in the era of glasnost.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Nice compliment to Solzhenitsyn
- By Thucydides on 08-03-17
- Gulag
- A History
- By: Anne Applebaum
- Narrated by: Laural Merlington
Great book, annoying narrator
Reviewed: 05-07-19
This is an impressive, deeply researched book and anyone interested in history should get it. Five stars.
But how could the producers of an audiobook about the Soviet concentration-camp system not get a narrator who has at least a passing familiarity with the pronunciation of Russian words and names? Her voice is not unpleasant and she otherwise does a creditable job of reading, but I don't think she pronounces a single Russian name properly -- sometimes her pronunciation was so bad that it wasn't clear what she was saying at all. Seems like before undertaking a project like this, you might want to look up the pronunciation of Felix Dzerzhinsky, Lavrentiy Beria, the city of Lvov, etc. -- the narrator must have worked overtime to get the pronunciations so wrong.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
17 people found this helpful
-
Rocket Boys
- The Coalwood Series, Book 1
- By: Homer Hickam
- Narrated by: Tom Stechschulte
- Length: 13 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall5 out of 5 stars 1,136
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 1,027
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 1,031
The New York Times best-selling memoir that inspired the film October Sky, Rocket Boys is a uniquely American memoir - a powerful, luminous story of coming of age at the dawn of the 1960s, of a mother's love and a father's fears, of a group of young men who dreamed of launching rockets into outer space... and who made those dreams come true. Nominated for the National Book Critics Circle Award, Homer Hickam's lush, lyrical memoir is a marvelously entertaining chronicle of triumph.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
Endearing Memoir of the Early Space Race
- By Paula on 10-03-16
- Rocket Boys
- The Coalwood Series, Book 1
- By: Homer Hickam
- Narrated by: Tom Stechschulte
An amazing book
Reviewed: 11-26-18
You don't need to know anything about rockets or coal mining or West Virginia to appreciate this book. Even with a mostly happy ending I got choked up at the end. The narration is also very well done. I haven't seen the movie version (October Sky), but I will now, knowing that the book is likely to be better (as it always is, except for The Godfather).
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Artemis
- By: Andy Weir
- Narrated by: Rosario Dawson
- Length: 8 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 95,317
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 87,217
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 87,015
Jazz Bashara is a criminal. Well, sort of. Life on Artemis, the first and only city on the moon, is tough if you're not a rich tourist or an eccentric billionaire. So smuggling in the occasional harmless bit of contraband barely counts, right? Not when you've got debts to pay and your job as a porter barely covers the rent. Everything changes when Jazz sees the chance to commit the perfect crime, with a reward too lucrative to turn down.
-
3 out of 5 stars
-
A ferrari with no motor
- By will on 11-18-17
- Artemis
- By: Andy Weir
- Narrated by: Rosario Dawson
Good, but not quite up to The Martian.
Reviewed: 03-07-18
Dawson was a pretty good reader -- accents were okay (if not as good as the best, like the guy who read the Aubrey/Maturin books). The science seemed plausible, the story less so -- the protagonist is one of those hot female superhero types that comic book lovers who can't get dates seem to like. Though it could make a decent action movie. I'd give it a B -- it's not as good as The Martian, but if you loved The Martian, you'll like this.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Venice
- Pure City
- By: Peter Ackroyd
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 14 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall4 out of 5 stars 100
-
Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 80
-
Story4 out of 5 stars 77
The Venetians' language and way of thinking set them aside from the rest of Italy. They are an island people, linked to the sea and to the tides rather than the land. This latest work from the incomparable Peter Ackroyd, like a magic gondola, transports its listeners to that sensual and surprising city. His account embraces facts and romance, conjuring up the atmosphere of the canals, bridges, and sunlit squares, the churches and the markets, the festivals and the flowers.
-
2 out of 5 stars
-
An endless droning list.....
- By jack on 03-15-11
- Venice
- Pure City
- By: Peter Ackroyd
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
Too flowery; not enough hard history
Reviewed: 03-29-14
Would you say that listening to this book was time well-spent? Why or why not?
I definitely learned something about Venice, so it wasn't a waste of time, but it was way too literary and impressionistic for me.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Washington
- A Life
- By: Ron Chernow
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 41 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall5 out of 5 stars 13,490
-
Performance5 out of 5 stars 11,703
-
Story5 out of 5 stars 11,645
In Washington: A Life celebrated biographer Ron Chernow provides a richly nuanced portrait of the father of our nation. This crisply paced narrative carries the reader through his troubled boyhood, his precocious feats in the French and Indian War, his creation of Mount Vernon, his heroic exploits with the Continental Army, his presiding over the Constitutional Convention, and his magnificent performance as America's first president.
-
5 out of 5 stars
-
A sad day when my book was done!
- By ButterLegume on 12-13-10
- Washington
- A Life
- By: Ron Chernow
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
Forget the wooden teeth
Reviewed: 10-31-12
If you could sum up Washington: A Life in three words, what would they be?
Informative, thorough, compelling
Who was your favorite character and why?
Washington, obviously
Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?
No -- it's too long for that. But I never got tired of it, even listening for hours at a time while driving between DC and NY.
Any additional comments?
Washington comes to life in this book -- you see him as a real person in a way that we don't usually experience him. Any American interested in learning more about the origins of our country should get this book.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!