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Hero of the Empire
- The Boer War, a Daring Escape, and the Making of Winston Churchill
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 10 hrs and 14 mins
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Publisher's summary
From New York Times best-selling author of Destiny of the Republic and The River of Doubt, a thrilling narrative of Winston Churchill's extraordinary and little-known exploits during the Boer War.
At age 24 Winston Churchill was utterly convinced it was his destiny to become prime minister of England one day, despite the fact he had just lost his first election campaign for Parliament. He believed that to achieve his goal, he had to do something spectacular on the battlefield. Despite deliberately putting himself in extreme danger as a British army officer in colonial wars in India and Sudan and as a journalist covering a Cuban uprising against the Spanish, glory and fame had eluded him.
Churchill arrived in South Africa in 1899, valet and crates of vintage wine in tow, there to cover the brutal colonial war the British were fighting with Boer rebels. But just two weeks after his arrival, the soldiers he was accompanying on an armored train were ambushed, and Churchill was taken prisoner. Remarkably, he pulled off a daring escape - but then had to traverse hundreds of miles of enemy territory alone, with nothing but a crumpled wad of cash, four slabs of chocolate, and his wits to guide him.
The story of his escape is incredible enough, but then Churchill enlisted, returned to South Africa, fought in several battles, and ultimately liberated the men with whom he had been imprisoned. Churchill would later remark that this period, "could I have seen my future, was to lay the foundations of my later life".
Millard spins an epic story of bravery, savagery, and chance encounters with a cast of historical characters - including Rudyard Kipling, Lord Kitchener, and Mohandas Gandhi - with whom he would later share the world stage. But Hero of the Empire is more than an adventure story, for the lessons Churchill took from the Boer War would profoundly affect 20th-century history.
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Grand.
- By Clean Drain Dry on 12-02-19
By: Brian Hogan
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The Boer War
- By: Martin Bossenbroek
- Narrated by: James Langton
- Length: 19 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
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In The Boer War, winner of the Netherland's 2013 Libris History Prize and shortlisted for the 2013 AKO Literature Prize, the author brings a completely new perspective to this chapter of South African history, critically examining the involvement of the Netherlands in the war. Furthermore, unlike other accounts, Martin Bossenbroek explores the war primarily through the experiences of three men uniquely active during the bloody conflict.
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Interesting and engaging view of the War
- By Douglas on 04-17-18
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The Johnstown Flood
- By: David McCullough
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann
- Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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At the end of the last century, Johnstown, Pennsylvania, was a booming coal-and-steel town filled with hardworking families striving for a piece of the nation's burgeoning industrial prosperity. In the mountains above Johnstown, an old earth dam had been hastily rebuilt to create a lake for an exclusive summer resort patronized by the tycoons of that same industrial prosperity, among them Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, and Andrew Mellon.
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A page-turner! HIstory that reads like a novel
- By Susan K Donley on 06-17-05
By: David McCullough
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China's Long March
- 6,000 Miles of Danger
- By: Jean Fritz
- Narrated by: Bernadette Dunne
- Length: 3 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1986, Jean Fritz went to China and talked to survivors of the Long March. It is from their recollections and her own broad, personal knowledge of Chinese history that Fritz has written one of the most compelling accounts of the incredible 6,000-mile journey across China made by the Communist Army in 1934 and 1935. Fritz takes us on the route of the 60-mile-long First Front Army, the unit of Mao Zedong that wound its way through a terrain so perilous it was often more threatening than their battles with the enemy.
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Loose with the facts
- By Amazon Customer on 08-31-20
By: Jean Fritz
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The Green Glass Sea
- By: Ellen Klages
- Narrated by: Julie Dretzin
- Length: 7 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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This first novel from Nebula Award-winning short story writer Ellen Klages was picked as a Junior Library Guild selection and named a Book Sense Number-One Children's Pick. It follows a young girl named Dewey, whose father is part of a super-secret project in 1943 Los Alamos. Dewey, a gifted scientist herself, slowly realizes the implications of "the gadget" her father is working on. She and Suze, another Los Alamos child, find comfort in each other's friendship.
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Wonderful!
- By Rita on 12-08-08
By: Ellen Klages
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The Moves Make the Man
- By: Bruce Brooks
- Narrated by: Peter Francis James
- Length: 8 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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First time I saw Bix was at a baseball game. He was a shortstop, supreme. I didn't want to start liking this flashy cracker with a momma in a high-style black dress. But Bix got me, baby. Next thing I knew, there I was, Jerome Foxworthy, doing hoops privately in the woods and getting my moves down, when Bix showed up. I taught him all I knew-- even though he wanted to play everything straight, not fake it. Because he had one game coming up where he'd need all the moves to put his life together again.
By: Bruce Brooks
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The River of Doubt
- Theodore Roosevelt's Darkest Journey
- By: Candice Millard
- Narrated by: Richard Ferrone
- Length: 6 hrs and 14 mins
- Abridged
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At once an incredible adventure narrative and a penetrating biographical portrait, The River of Doubt is the true story of Theodore Roosevelt's harrowing exploration of one of the most dangerous rivers on earth.
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Great portions if this wonderful book were skipped.
- By Bonnie E. Wullenwaber on 02-12-18
By: Candice Millard
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The Great Gilly Hopkins
- By: Katherine Paterson
- Narrated by: Alyssa Bresnahan
- Length: 4 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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At age 11, Gilly is nobody's real kid. If only she could find her beautiful mother, Courtney, and live with her instead of in the ugly foster home where she has just been placed! How could she, the great Gilly Hopkins, known throughout the county for her brilliance and unmanageability, be expected to tolerate Maime Trotter, the fat, nearly illiterate widow who is now her guardian?
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Heartbreakingly Wonderful
- By CM on 04-18-17
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Child of the River
- By: Irma Joubert
- Narrated by: Sarah Zimmerman
- Length: 10 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
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Persomi is young, white, and poor, born the middle child of illiterate sharecroppers on the prosperous Fourie farm in the South African Bushveld. Persomi’s world is extraordinarily small. She has never been to the local village and spends her days absorbed in the rhythms of the natural world around her, escaping the brutality and squalor of her family home through the newspapers and books passed down to her from the main house and through her walks in the nearby mountains.
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Mostly Just Tedious and Ploding
- By Regina on 12-15-20
By: Irma Joubert
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Jungle of Stone
- The True Story of Two Men, Their Extraordinary Journey, and the Discovery of the Lost Civilization of the Maya
- By: William Carlsen
- Narrated by: Paul Michael Garcia
- Length: 16 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1839 rumors of extraordinary yet baffling stone ruins buried within the unmapped jungles of Central America reached two of the world's most intrepid travelers. Seized by the reports, American diplomat John Lloyd Stephens and British artist Frederick Catherwood sailed together out of New York Harbor on an expedition into the forbidding rainforests of present-day Honduras, Guatemala, and Mexico. What they found would rewrite the West's understanding of human history.
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Unsung Explorers at the Heart of History
- By thomas on 01-10-17
By: William Carlsen
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The Snow Goose
- By: Paul Gallico
- Narrated by: Steve Mackintosh, Georgia Groome, Deborah Findlay, and others
- Length: 57 mins
- Original Recording
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A BBC Radio 4 full-cast dramatisation of Paul Gallico’s The Snow Goose by Nick Warburton, starring Steven Mackintosh.
When Open Book asked various authors to champion a favourite neglected classic on the programme, Michael Morpurgo chose The Snow Goose - perhaps no surprise, with his own story 'War Horse' depicting a friendship between a boy and his horse which takes them both into the horror of World War I.
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The Snow Goose
- By Sarah FitzGerald on 08-29-11
By: Paul Gallico
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The Blackbird Girls
- By: Anne Blankman
- Narrated by: Kathleen Gati, Natasha Soudek
- Length: 10 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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On a spring morning, neighbors Valentina Kaplan and Oksana Savchenko wake up to an angry red sky. A reactor at the nuclear power plant where their fathers work—Chernobyl—has exploded. Before they know it, the two girls, who've always been enemies, find themselves on a train bound for Leningrad to stay with Valentina's estranged grandmother, Rita Grigorievna. In their new lives in Leningrad, they begin to learn what it means to trust another person.
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Girl's Story
- By kathleen thomas on 08-04-20
By: Anne Blankman
What listeners say about Hero of the Empire
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- G
- 10-04-16
Outstanding work
Beautifully and elligantly written and historically faithful, this is exciting and moving prose. Highly recommended .
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13 people found this helpful
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- Cash
- 05-02-19
historically amazing
I loved this book, it's the second I've listened to from this author. the first being Theodore Roosevelt and the river of doubt. both were incredible. highly recommend.
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1 person found this helpful
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- D PAULSEN
- 06-11-18
the Humbling that shaped a leader
what an intriguing, uncelebrated set of events that inevitably changed and shaped a strong, driven, self-assured aristocrat. Knowing what lies in Churchill's future role in the resilience of his mother country in the wake of the Nazi rampage, the reading audience is subtily lead to recognize the Devine intervention and weaving of tragedy, fear, loss, lonliness, hopelessness, senselessness, tenacity, leadership, patriotism, and experience to prepare the right man for the WWll crisis. Millard has an artful skill of connecting forshadowing, past events, and the present, to tell an edgy story that explains the "how" the quirky, brilliant Churchill became that man. The reader of this audio, Simon Vance, read this story in the dignity of a Brittish accent, and convincing manner of a story teller.
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- Amazon Customer
- 03-29-17
Another great Candice Millard Book
What made the experience of listening to Hero of the Empire the most enjoyable?
Great narrator, great story. How Winston became Winston.
What did you like best about this story?
It was like reading an action novel, but it was real
Which scene was your favorite?
The armored train.
Did you have an extreme reaction to this book? Did it make you laugh or cry?
no
Any additional comments?
All three of Millard's novels are must-read.
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- Neil
- 01-12-20
What an adventure
Fantastic real life story of Churchill. Was he a war correspondent or in the military. I highly recommend this book, if you like adventure and real life facts then this will not disappoint. The courage of the Boers was something also, They won their first engagement, but pushed the empire to take them on again, but the British neglected them in prisoner camps. Most died there.
Gold was the driver of it all for the Europeans with the natives being spectators and victims.
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- Joseph
- 01-10-17
The Drama of History
Almost all of what I knew about Winston Churchill started with the second World War. So it was with real interest that I read Hero of the Empire, to get some sense of the early life of this great man.
Candice Millard tells the story of Churchill in a style that could be fiction. It kept my interest throughout. I was also pleased to learn about the Boers, South Africa and the conflicts and courage of people on all sides.
Simon Vance is wonderful with his command of language(s) and pronunciations as well as his interpretation of the drama in the story itself.
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- Levins-Hevin
- 11-26-17
A great period education of Sir Winston Churchill
A great period education of Sir Winston Churchill time in South Africa during the Boer war. One irritant, was the author went to great lengthens to learn how to pronounce Afrikaans words, and got the most commonly used Afrikaans word in the book INCORRECT. It is kopies NOT kop-jees. A little, sometime more irritating as the book went along, that he could have gotten that word so wrong. Kopies are small hillocks in that area, that give the country a beauty, and he used the word a lot!! Note to a narrator, when doing accents, get a local of that language/dialect to listen to the book.
It also merged Sir Churchill's accounting with another historical book that less expansive bias of his exploits.
I loved the story.
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- Darren Sapp
- 05-12-17
Fascinating!
Any additional comments?
I knew this snippet of Churchill's life, but I had no idea it was worthy of a movie. Millard is an excellent storyteller.
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- Amazon Customer
- 05-12-17
Wonderful!
this is a wonderful introduction to the man who would become a lion. the facial nature is compelling.
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- Bonnie
- 11-07-19
Great book. I highly recommend.
The historical detail is wonderful. The narrator did a fine job of reading the story and even giving a Churchillian flavor to his voice.
Well done, and well enjoyed.
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