Discover the Best Audio Stories in Biography & Memoir

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/738548 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Who Is a Worthy Mother?: An Intimate History of Adoption Author: Rebecca Wellington Narrator: April Doty Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 7 hours 31 minutes Release date: April 9, 2024 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: Nearly every person in the United States is affected by adoption. In the wake of the U.S. Supreme Court's overturning of Roe v. Wade, the renewed debate over women's reproductive rights places an even greater emphasis on adoption. Wellington's timely—and deeply researched—account amplifies previously marginalized voices and exposes the social and racial biases embedded in the United States' adoption industry. The history of adoption is rarely told from an adoptee's perspective. Wellington remedies this gap by framing the chronicle of adoption in America using her own life story. As she reckons with the pain and unanswered questions of her own experience, she explores broader issues surrounding adoption in the United States, including changing legal policies, sterilization and compulsory relinquishment programs, forced assimilation of babies of color and Indigenous babies adopted into white families, and other liabilities. According to Wellington, US adoption practices in America are shrouded in secrecy, for they frequently cast shame on unmarried women, women struggling with fertility, and 'illegitimate' babies and children. As the United States once again finds itself embroiled in heated disputes over women's bodily autonomy Wellington's book offers a unique and much-needed frame of reference.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/737703 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Balcony Over Jerusalem: A Middle East Memoir - Israel, Palestine and Beyond Author: John Lyons Narrator: Peter Houghton Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 12 hours 36 minutes Release date: April 3, 2024 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: An intimate account of the Israel-Palestine conflict and beyond, from one of Australia's most experienced foreign correspondents. Now updated with a foreword by Stan Grant and a new author's note. 'Lyons knows if you stand with the suffering, you're closer to the truth' Stan Grant, award-winning journalist and bestselling author 'A penetrating analysis of power with empathy for the human story' Sarah Ferguson, presenter of 7.30 Leading Australian journalist John Lyons takes readers on a fascinating personal journey through the wonders and dangers of the Middle East. In this updated edition, Lyons draws from his years living in Jerusalem to give context to the devastating war between Israel and Palestinians in Gaza and gives readers a behind-the-scenes look at the Israeli occupation of the West Bank. Having reported on the Middle East for three decades, Lyons has interviewed everyone from senior Israeli military and intelligence figures to key leaders from Hezbollah and Hamas. He's witnessed the brutal Iranian Revolutionary Guard up close, was kidnapped by Egyptian soldiers, and was one of the last foreign journalists in Iran during the violent crackdown on the 'Green Revolution'. He's confronted Hamas officials about why they fire rockets into Israel and Israeli soldiers about why they fire tear gas at Palestinian schoolchildren. Beyond the politics and headlines, Lyons explains the Middle East through everyday life and experiences: his son's school, the markets, and the conversations with friends on their balcony overlooking it all. Through Lyons' incisive reporting, you will develop an empathetic understanding of what brought us to this tragic impasse - and where it's headed next.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/721797 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Run For Your Life: The remarkable true story of a family forced into hiding after leaking Russian secrets Author: Sue Williams Narrator: Sue Williams Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 7 hours 0 minutes Release date: April 2, 2024 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: The remarkable true story of a family forced into hiding after leaking Russian secrets What started out as a great adventure turned into a terrifying nightmare when Nick Stride and his family were forced to flee for their lives from one of the richest, most powerful men in the world.   Nick moved to Russia in 1998 to help build the British Embassy in Moscow, but ended up on the run with his wife and two children after leaking secrets from Vladimir Putin’s one-time deputy. Hiding off grid on Australia’s final frontier – remote beaches on the Dampier Peninsula on the far north Kimberley coast – the family faced crocodiles, sharks, snakes, raging bushfires and the devastating Cyclone Yvette, and survived only by catching fish and crabs and learning how to kill wild animals. It was a life-or-death move, but Nick felt he had no choice. Now, emerging from isolation, the family are finally ready to share their incredible story.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/737566 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Gold from Iron: A Humble Beginning, Olympic Dreams, and the Power in Getting Back Up Author: Nick Baumgartner Narrator: Dan Bittner Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 9 hours 0 minutes Release date: April 2, 2024 Ratings: Ratings of Book: 4.5 of Total 2 Ratings of Narrator: 4 of Total 1 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: A daring and improbable story of Olympic gold from blue-collar origins Every summer in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, Nick Baumgartner went to work pouring concrete, taking on the harsh physical conditions of the construction trade to support his professional snowboarding dreams come winter. To limit travel time while he trained for the Olympics an hour and a half away from home, he lived out of a crusty, old construction van, parked anywhere he could find a spot. And in 2022, after seventeen years of failure—all the crashes, injuries, and personal setbacks—he won Olympic gold at forty years old, becoming the oldest Olympic snowboard medalist in history. In this candid and affable memoir, Baumgartner details his journey from a one-stoplight town to the podium in Beijing. Tales of crisscrossing the globe on the racing circuit and competing in four Olympic Games sit comfortably alongside Baumgartner’s reflections as a single parent and his affectionate portrayal of Iron River, Michigan, the community that raised him. More than just a sports story, Gold from Iron is a tale of massive dreams, constant sacrifice, and the lessons that can be learned racing down an ice-covered course on a carbon fiber board.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/726820 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Growing with Grace: A journey into self-discovery, wellbeing and the art of living consciously Author: Simone Callahan Narrator: Simone Callahan Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 2 hours 47 minutes Release date: April 2, 2024 Ratings: Ratings of Book: 1 of Total 1 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: Simone Callahan’s wellness journey was instrumental to her healing process when her marriage ended. Now, she’s determined to guide and support others in their search for inner peace during difficult times. In Growing with Grace, Simone explores the power of self-care, resilience, bravery and positivity. She also shares the skills she has learned as a qualified yoga instructor – skills that have transformed her physically and emotionally. Growing with Grace uncovers the holistic relationship between yogic wisdom, inner peace, nature, and spiritual wellbeing. This book offers meditation and breathing techniques, hour-long yoga sequences and tips for healthy, conscious living. The audio edition includes an exclusive guided yoga nidra meditation practice to help you relax.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/731894 to listen full audiobooks. Title: We Loved It All: A Memory of Life Author: Lydia Millet Narrator: Xe Sands Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 7 hours 30 minutes Release date: April 2, 2024 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: Acclaimed novelist Lydia Millet’s first work of nonfiction is a genre-defying tour de force that makes an impassioned argument for people to see their emotional and spiritual lives as infinitely dependent on the lives of nonhuman beings. Drawing on a quarter-century of experience as an advocate for endangered species at the Center for Biological Diversity, Millet offers intimate portraits of what she calls “the others”—the extraordinary animals with whom we still share the world, along with those already lost. Humans, too, fill this book, as Millet touches on the lives of her world-traveling parents, fascinating partners and friends, and colorful relatives, from diplomats to nut farmers—all figures in the complex tapestry each of us weaves with the surrounding world. Written in the tradition of Annie Dillard or Robert Macfarlane, We Loved It All is an incantatory work that will appeal to anyone concerned about the future of life on earth—including our own.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/719247 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Now is Not the Time for Flowers: What No One Tells You About Life, Love and Loss Author: Stacey Heale Narrator: Stacey Heale Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 9 hours 51 minutes Release date: March 28, 2024 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: AS SEEN ON LORRAINE AND FEATURED IN THE TIMES 'Stacey Heale ... has such a muscular take on grief, and her ideas around how we live with profound loss are truly original.' Clover Stroud When Stacey Heale's husband, Greg, was diagnosed with incurable cancer on their daughter's first birthday, everything changed. She quickly realised how little is spoken about what the harder times in our lives really look like, leaving us lost to navigate the unknown alone. Confronted with a new life she was not prepared for, Stacey began to untangle the brutal realities of life and death - and the fundamental differences between our expectations and reality. Now is Not the Time for Flowers is Stacey's unflinchingly beautiful and raw memoir that addresses the big conversations that imminent death dictates, boldly taking the reader on a journey through the full spectrum of our lives and their complexities. Told through vignettes of her own life and the death of her husband, Stacey offers a movingly honest, insightful and humorous account of modern womanhood through the lenses of love, desire, motherhood, death, grief, identity, personal growth and the challenges and questions that our lives force upon us. Now is Not the Time for Flowers is a powerful call to arms for us to discuss the messy and unexpected truths of our nuanced lives. 'To tell the explicit truths of lives is critical; to refrain from doing so keeps us lonely and isolated. Women are shamed for their emotional natures and their desire to talk so much, so we've shut down these avenues between us. ... To be honest is to show care, for ourselves and others. There is integrity in truth; it is freeing even when it's painful and hard. Sometimes it can land like a blow to the head, but its ripples are in no way as far-reaching as secrets.'

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/738994 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Outside Voices: A Memoir of the Berkeley Revolution Author: Joan Gelfand Narrator: Sandy Rustin Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 7 hours 48 minutes Release date: March 26, 2024 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: Berkeley, 1972: a hotbed of creativity where painters, filmmakers, musicians, and writers inspire a young poet.Second-wave feminism, inspired by Gloria Steinem, Bella Abzug, and Betty Friedan is swelling into a tsunami. Women are joining together to change power dynamics in politics, the home, and the workplace.On election day, Joan Gelfand casts her vote for George McGovern and boards a plane from New York to California. With one introduction to a woman musician, Joan’s journey to become a writer is born. Embraced by a thriving women’s community of artists, filmmakers, musicians, poets, and writers, Joan is encouraged to find her voice.Mentored by paradigm-changing writers, Joan finds the courage to face her darkest fears through poetry and art, mining the trauma she experienced after losing her father and questioning her Jewish identity. Reminiscent of Paris in the twenties, Greenwich Village in the sixties, and Berlin in the eighties, Berkeley in the seventies was the “it” city of America.Outside Voices reports the ups and downs of finding one’s way as an artist, living with a women’s band, forging an independent Jewish identity, founding a women’s restaurant, and becoming a published writer and songwriter while exploring the limits of sexuality and spirituality. The story includes road trips to music festivals in the woods, beaches in Mexico, concerts in Southern California, and a retreat in the Pacific Northwest.A triumphant story of determination and will, Outside Voices is a backstage look at the women’s movement that sets the stage for decades of change. This book is a firsthand look at how the power of community emboldened innovation, social change, and self-discovery.“Joan Gelfand has written a compelling book about coming of age in Berkeley in the second wave of feminism circa 1970s. Her depth of discovering herself and her world is intense and reveals all the passion and confusion of a sensitive soul grasping at life through politics, sex, and the long road to becoming a writer.”—Geri Spieler, author of Housewife Assassin: The Woman Who Tried to Kill Gerald Ford

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/738466 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Why Should Guys Have All the Fun?: An Asian American Story of Love, Marriage, Motherhood, and Running a Billion Dollar Empire Author: Blair S. Walker, Loida Lewis Narrator: Loida Lewis Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 8 hours 53 minutes Release date: March 26, 2024 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: If Crazy Rich Asians and a Greek tragedy had a literary offspring, it would be the spitting image of Why Should Guys Have All the Fun? The true story of resolute immigration lawyer and activist Loida Lewis, Why Should Guys Have All the Fun? begins with Loida's adventure-packed Philippine upbringing. A torrid love affair with brilliant, irascible financier Reginald Lewis follows, as does regal living in Manhattan and Paris, and gut-wrenching loss, all before Loida shockingly commandeers a multibillion-dollar, multinational conglomerate and leads it with aplomb. You'll learn how she dealt with her husband's untimely death at the age of fifty and how she managed to raise two independent daughters even as she shepherded a multinational corporation to record earnings. Listeners will also find: explorations of how the author overcame her severe depression after the loss of her beloved husband; discussions of how faith and perseverance helped Loida overcome the myriad challenges and obstacles in her path; and how the author, a Filipina-American woman, navigated a business world dominated by hard-charging white males. A fascinating and engaging memoir from one of America's leading female executives, Why Should Guys Have All the Fun? is an inspiring and uplifting true story of how an ordinary person can rise to achieve extraordinary things.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/734706 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Plain: A Memoir of Mennonite Girlhood Author: Mary Alice Hostetter Narrator: Mary Helen Gallucci Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 5 hours 45 minutes Release date: March 26, 2024 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: Plain tells the story of Mary Alice Hostetter's journey to define an authentic self amid a rigid religious upbringing in a Mennonite farm family. Although endowed with a personality 'prone toward questioning and challenging,' the young Mary Alice at first wants nothing more than to be a good girl, to do her share, and—alongside her eleven siblings—to work her family's Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, farm. She feels fortunate to have been born into a religion where, as the familiar hymn states, she is 'safe in the arms of Jesus.' As an adolescent, that keen desire for belonging becomes focused on her worldly peers, even though she knows that Mennonites consider themselves a people apart. Eventually she leaves behind the fields and fences of her youth, thinking she will finally be able to grow beyond the prohibitions of her church. Discovering and accepting her sexuality, she once again finds herself apart, on the outside of family, community, and societal norms. This quietly powerful memoir of longing and acceptance casts a humanizing eye on a little-understood American religious tradition and a woman's striving to grow within and beyond it.