John Rothermel
- 19
- reviews
- 8
- helpful votes
- 32
- ratings
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Bird by Bird
- Some Instructions on Writing and Life
- By: Anne Lamott
- Narrated by: Anne Lamott
- Length: 6 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 315
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 271
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 271
For a quarter century, more than a million readers and listeners—scribes and scribblers of all ages and abilities—have been inspired by Anne Lamott’s hilarious, big-hearted, homespun advice. Advice that begins with the simple words of wisdom passed down from Anne’s father—also a writer—in the iconic passage that gives the book its title.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Why oh why did she narrate this?!
- By Amor Fati on 01-02-23
- Bird by Bird
- Some Instructions on Writing and Life
- By: Anne Lamott
- Narrated by: Anne Lamott
Lessons of a master
Reviewed: 08-04-24
Bird by Bird outlines how to write literary fiction from the perspective of a mature and successful author of fiction and nonfiction who is also a writing instructor.
The gist is to write every day, and by piling up pages, skill, character, plot et. al. will also develop. The key is patience and persistence, and not worrying if first drafts are "s*****". Just keep observing, writing, and developing.
Lamont is an excellent and witty reader of her own audiobook.
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Rogue Justice
- By: Geoffrey Household
- Narrated by: Robin Browne
- Length: 7 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 11
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 9
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 10
After a failed attempt to assassinate Hitler in peacetime, the mysterious hero of Geoffrey Household's classic 1939 thriller Rogue Male goes undercover in the heart of Nazi Germany, scheming and planning for a second opportunity. With nothing to lose, the rogue male declares his own reckless private war, with no intention of taking prisoners.
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3 out of 5 stars
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A lesser Rogue Male
- By Zeno on 02-22-21
- Rogue Justice
- By: Geoffrey Household
- Narrated by: Robin Browne
First-rate performances all-round
Reviewed: 06-27-24
A sequel to his 1939 novel Rogue Male, Rogue Justice (1982) was also written by Geoffrey Household. It is a brief, "relaxed" first-person thriller. Narrator Richard Ingleram, having failed a second time to get close enough to Hitler to murder him, flees east, then south. Poland, Romania, Greece, Turkey, British Palestine, and Egypt each offer him precarious cover to evade Nazi pursuers. Once he reaches Haifa, the UK mandate authorities assume he's an Oswald Mosley type British fascist.
The justice Ingleram comes to seek is physical oblivion. His personal vendetta has failed, but has blown-back to dirty his own values. His only priority is not to shame his family name.
Rogue Justice is a fine novel, first-rate as a thriller and a story of ethical awakening. Reversals of fortune abound. In the end, death drive becomes death wish.
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Life of the Party
- Stories of a Perpetual Man-Child
- By: Bert Kreischer
- Narrated by: Bert Kreischer
- Length: 5 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall5 out of 5 stars 4,188
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 3,763
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 3,745
Bert Kreischer doesn't know how to say "no." If he did, he wouldn't have gotten himself mixed up with a group of Russian mobsters on a class trip to Moscow, earning him his nickname: "The Machine." He wouldn't have wrestled with a bear or swum with sharks on national television. He wouldn't have (possibly) smoked PCP with a star of Saturday Night Live. And he wouldn't have been named the Number One Partier in the Nation by Rolling Stone, inspired the movie National Lampoon's Van Wilder, or performed standup to sellout crowds across the country.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Fart Chrysler
- By Ryan Bonifay on 05-23-17
- Life of the Party
- Stories of a Perpetual Man-Child
- By: Bert Kreischer
- Narrated by: Bert Kreischer
Dismal
Reviewed: 03-01-23
He just laughs along with himself so obnoxiously... Not every comedian warrants a book deal.
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Better Never to Have Been
- The Harm of Coming into Existence
- By: David Benatar
- Narrated by: Dennis Kleinman
- Length: 7 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 18
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 16
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Story4 out of 5 stars 16
Most people believe that they were either benefited or at least not harmed by being brought into existence. Thus, if they ever do reflect on whether they should bring others into existence—rather than having children without even thinking about whether they should—they presume that they do them no harm. Better Never to Have Been challenges these assumptions. David Benatar argues that coming into existence is always a serious harm.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Thorough
- By udoka addy on 04-01-23
- Better Never to Have Been
- The Harm of Coming into Existence
- By: David Benatar
- Narrated by: Dennis Kleinman
Intellectually underwhelming
Reviewed: 01-31-23
An underwhelming exercise in rhetorical legalese: ahistorical and complacent. The viewpoint on human misery is not differentiated by class or region of the world.Meh.
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Rodney Stone
- By: Arthur Conan Doyle
- Narrated by: Peter Joyce
- Length: 10 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 6
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Performance3.5 out of 5 stars 4
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Story4 out of 5 stars 3
As well as penning some of the most popular detective fiction, Conan Doyle also wrote thrilling adventure stories. ‘Rodney Stone’ is a combination of both. Nelson, Beau Brummell, Fox and King George III himself appear in a tale at the heart of which is, as one character says, “a pretty conspiracy - a criminal, an actress and a prize-fighter, all playing their parts”.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Not as good as Sherlock!
- By She on 12-17-11
- Rodney Stone
- By: Arthur Conan Doyle
- Narrated by: Peter Joyce
Simply superb adventure!
Reviewed: 12-05-22
Conan Doyle's 1896 novel is a coming-of-age, hidden heir, bare knuckle boxing, Regency society, pre-Trafalgar Royal Navy epic. The narration/performance by Peter Joyce is simply superb. I wish it had been twice as long.
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A Master of Mysteries
- By: L. T. Meade
- Narrated by: Victoria Bradley
- Length: 4 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall1 out of 5 stars 1
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Performance1 out of 5 stars 1
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Story5 out of 5 stars 1
"A Master of Mysteries" (1898) is a collection of connected short stories by L. T. Meade and Robert Eustace. Excerpt: "From my earliest youth the weird, the mysterious had an irresistible fascination for me. Having private means, I resolved to follow my unique inclinations, and I am now well known to all my friends as a professional exposer of ghosts, and one who can clear away the mysteries of most haunted houses.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Disgracefully amateurish production
- By John Rothermel on 11-10-22
- A Master of Mysteries
- By: L. T. Meade
- Narrated by: Victoria Bradley
Disgracefully amateurish production
Reviewed: 11-10-22
This sounds exactly like the audiobook available on YouTube for free. The story's great, of course.
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Against Nature (Against the Grain)
- By: Joris-Karl Huysmans
- Narrated by: Nicholas Boulton
- Length: 7 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 95
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Performance5 out of 5 stars 85
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 85
Against Nature was one of the most shocking French novels of the 19th century. When it was published in 1884, it thrilled the aesthetes, the poets, and the intellectuals of Europe on both sides of the Channel (notably Oscar Wilde) because for all its lofty tone, it had, as its core, an unbridled decadence, and it was this same character that challenged, even horrified, established bourgeois society.
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5 out of 5 stars
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An excellent reading of the Decadent classic
- By Mark Hedden on 06-13-17
- Against Nature (Against the Grain)
- By: Joris-Karl Huysmans
- Narrated by: Nicholas Boulton
Great novel
Reviewed: 09-13-22
Very funny black comedy. Really enjoyed it. Excellent reader.
Hard to imagine a novel with one above-the-title character being ambitious, but A Rebours (1884) by Joris-Karl Huysmans is ferociously ambitious.
It is also ferociously funny. Jean Des Esseintes, the last excretion of an exhausted noble family, decides to turn his back on society and spend the rest of his life in refined aesthetic self-distraction, isolated far from his old haunts of Parisian debauchery.
Each chapter is an acidic thumbnail of his ambitions and what comes of them: interior decoration, a homemade liquor organ, the pet tortoise, his book collecting habits. He recalls fondly some old escapades with a woman trappeze artist and a female ventriloquist, neither of whom could fulfill desires, no matter how carefully he spelled them out.
His dining room is remodeled into a ship's galley, with authentic fixtures and window art. Tired of the materiality of the country, he orders imitation flowers, gets rid of them and imports exotic species that look like raw meat from an anatomy class. (Perhaps this suggested the carnivorous garden plants on TV's "The Addams Family"?)
When Des Esseintes decides to make his own scent, he nearly ashyxiates himself.
Then it's off to London to savor the Dickensian atmosphere he has been reading about when not studying lithographs of flayed Christian martyrs. Except he only makes it to an English bodega in Paris, then decides physical journeys aren't worth it. So he goes home.
Goes home and quickly binds up his digestive system with quack snake-oil remedies. A local doctor prescribes three enemas a day, which turns out for Des Esseintes to be a sublime aesthetic experience. He decides to create an enema menu from which to order his meals.
Sadly for him and the reader, his local doctor makes him go back to Paris. Prescription: rejoin the human race before you outsmart yourself to death!
A Rebours is a very funny novel. Anyone who ever daydreamed about being able to afford to just stay home will appreciate its macabre and lugubrious drollery.
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2 people found this helpful
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A Dark Matter
- By: Peter Straub
- Narrated by: Robertson Dean
- Length: 14 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall3.5 out of 5 stars 198
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 125
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Story3.5 out of 5 stars 123
The incomparable master of horror and suspense returns with a powerful, brilliantly terrifying novel that redefines the genre in original and unexpected ways. The charismatic and cunning Spenser Mallon is a campus guru in the 1960s, attracting the devotion and demanding sexual favors of his young acolytes. After he invites his most fervent followers to attend a secret ritual in a local meadow, the only thing that remains is a gruesomely dismembered body - and the shattered souls of all who were present.
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1 out of 5 stars
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A New Vision of Hell
- By Nor Cal Reader on 02-28-10
- A Dark Matter
- By: Peter Straub
- Narrated by: Robertson Dean
Adults relive traumas from their youth
Reviewed: 07-27-22
Like many popular horror novels in the last four decades, A Dark Matter's plot is the reunion of childhood friends who together must face the ramifications of a horrific supernatural event that occurred when they were in high school in the late 1960s. Straub uses this plot device to explore trauma, recovery, and competing and conflicting memories. It is an ambitious and well-written novel.
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Revival
- A Novel
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: David Morse
- Length: 13 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 11,896
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 10,763
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Story4 out of 5 stars 10,752
In a small New England town, over half a century ago, a shadow falls over a small boy playing with his toy soldiers. Jamie Morton looks up to see a striking man, the new minister. Charles Jacobs, along with his beautiful wife, will transform the local church. The men and boys are all a bit in love with Mrs. Jacobs; the women and girls feel the same about Reverend Jacobs - including Jamie’s mother and beloved sister, Claire. With Jamie, the Reverend shares a deeper bond based on a secret obsession.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Sinister and Classic King
- By David Shear on 11-12-14
- Revival
- A Novel
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: David Morse
Great cosmic horror novel
Reviewed: 07-17-22
REVIVAL is for King very economical. Gone is the old good versus evil of THE STAND. we are well into the cosmic indifferentist aesthetic here.
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The Country of the Pointed Firs
- By: Sarah Orne Jewett
- Narrated by: Cindy Hardin Killavey
- Length: 3 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 73
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 59
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Story4 out of 5 stars 61
This superlative work by Sarah Orne Jewett, a late 19th century writer, shows great literary skill, artistry and charm. The Country of the Pointed Firs depicts the close personal and family relationships in a small New England village. In its appreciation of the natural beauty and restorative powers of a small community, it is similar to Thoreau's Walden.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Missing Chapter 21, 22, 23
- By Vu on 04-13-11
- The Country of the Pointed Firs
- By: Sarah Orne Jewett
- Narrated by: Cindy Hardin Killavey
Outstanding performance
Reviewed: 06-10-22
A lovely book performed with an ear for Maine dialects. Comforting and beautiful. 👍
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