Full Trial Audiobooks in Biography & Memoir, Memoirs

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/601070 to listen full audiobooks. Title: You Could Make This Place Beautiful: A Memoir Author: Maggie Smith Narrator: Maggie Smith Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 7 hours 48 minutes Release date: April 11, 2023 Ratings: Ratings of Book: 4.24 of Total 37 Ratings of Narrator: 4.43 of Total 7 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: INSTANT NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • NPR Best Book of the Year • Time Best Book of the Year • Oprah Daily Best Memoir of the Year “A bittersweet study in both grief and joy.” ­—Time “A sparklingly beautiful memoir-in-vignettes” (Isaac Fitzgerald, New York Times bestselling author) that explores coming of age in your middle age—from the bestselling poet and author of Keep Moving. “Life, like a poem, is a series of choices.” In her memoir You Could Make This Place Beautiful, poet Maggie Smith explores the disintegration of her marriage and her renewed commitment to herself. The book begins with one woman’s personal heartbreak, but its circles widen into a reckoning with contemporary womanhood, traditional gender roles, and the power dynamics that persist even in many progressive homes. With the spirit of self-inquiry and empathy she’s known for, Smith interweaves snapshots of a life with meditations on secrets, anger, forgiveness, and narrative itself. The power of these pieces is cumulative: page after page, they build into a larger interrogation of family, work, and patriarchy. You Could Make This Place Beautiful, like the work of Deborah Levy, Rachel Cusk, and Gina Frangello, is an unflinching look at what it means to live and write our own lives. It is a story about a mother’s fierce and constant love for her children, and a woman’s love and regard for herself. Above all, this memoir is “extraordinary” (Ann Patchett) in the way that it reveals how, in the aftermath of loss, we can discover our power and make something new and beautiful.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/603128 to listen full audiobooks. Title: This Isn't Going to End Well: The True Story of a Man I Thought I Knew Author: Daniel Wallace Narrator: Michael Crouch Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 6 hours 16 minutes Release date: April 11, 2023 Ratings: Ratings of Book: 3.75 of Total 4 Ratings of Narrator: 4 of Total 2 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: In this powerful memoir, the bestselling author of Big Fish tries to come to terms with the life and death of his multi-talented longtime friend and brother-in-law, who had been his biggest hero and inspiration, in a poignant, lyrical, and moving memoir. If we’re lucky, we all encounter at least one person whose life elevates and inspires our own. For acclaimed novelist Daniel Wallace, he had one hero and inspiration for so much of what followed: his longtime friend and brother-in-law William Nealy. Seemingly perfect, impossibly cool, William was James Dean, Clint Eastwood, and MacGyver all rolled into one, an acclaimed outdoorsman, a famous cartoonist, an accomplished author, a master of all he undertook, William was the ideal that Daniel sought to emulate.    But when William took his own life at age 48, Daniel was left first grieving, and then furious with the man who broke his and his sister’s hearts. That anger led him to commit a grievous act of his own, a betrayal that took him down a dark path into the tortured recesses of William’s past. Eventually, a new picture of William emerged, of a man with too many secrets and too much shame to bear.    This Isn’t Going to End Well is Daniel Wallace’s first foray into nonfiction. Part love story, part true crime, part a desperate search for the self and how little we really can know another, This Isn’t Going to End Well tells an intimate and moving story of what happens when we realize our heroes are human.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/612323 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Irma: The Education of a Mother's Son Author: Terry Mcdonell Narrator: Joe Knezevich Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 5 hours 31 minutes Release date: April 11, 2023 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: A son’s lessons from his single mother—a twenty five year old widow who took control of her life, defied expectations and raised him into a manhood of his own—from the author of the acclaimed The Accidental Life. As a child, Terry McDonell imagined epic stories about his father, a fighter pilot who died in World War II. But, as he discovers in this dazzling memoir, the real hero in his life was his mother, Irma, who moved with him to California hoping for a new life and raised him through difficult times. Like most headstrong boys growing up in mid-century America, McDonell took his mother for granted, never giving her life much thought. He was bright, cocky, and determined to make his own way, separate from her and from his complicated roots. But as he matured, built a career, married, divorced, remarried, and raised his own sons, McDonell came to see that Irma had lived her life in a way that allowed him to discover what he wanted his own life to be. The person he was would be forever tied to Irma’s courage and wisdom and love. From his recollections—a series of colorful, deeply personal, sometimes funny, stunningly composed vignettes—an intriguing and poignant portrait emerges. Irma is the story of a formidable woman who built the life she wanted as she raised her son to be the kind of man and father he had longed for but never knew.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/613629 to listen full audiobooks. Title: The Escape to Cabo Author: S. A. Lapoint Narrator: S. A. Lapoint Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 5 hours 45 minutes Release date: April 11, 2023 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: Featuring multiple voices, sound effects, and music, The Escape to Cabo is a based-on-a-true-story emotion sparker. Scott Frieze has a comfortable life, no real complaints … a great job, home in the Tucson foothills, a Lincoln and a Road King in the garage. Deciding that it is now or never to fulfill a childhood fantasy that has haunted him for over forty years, his life does a complete one-eighty. Tag along with Scotty as he finds himself on the Legal System’s doorstep. Experience the courtroom drama, join him behind the walls of a Maximum-Security Prison … the young thugs jungle. Upon release and believing that the tab has been paid in full, he soon discovers that his sentence has only just begun; someone has slated vengeance and he must continue to pay. His only chance to taste freedom again… Flight. Superbly concealed innuendos, double entendre, and dry-ass humor. Don’t be surprised should you have a strong desire to go back to Chapter 1 …

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/610793 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Chicken Boy: My Life With Hens Author: Arthur Parkinson Narrator: Arthur Parkinson Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 7 hours 49 minutes Release date: April 6, 2023 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: Brought to you by Penguin. A charming portrait of life in the company of hens, by the Sunday Times bestselling author of The Flower Yard Growing up in an ex-mining town in Nottinghamshire, Arthur Parkinson never wanted a dog, or a cat, or a pony - just hens. As a kid, he was known as 'chicken boy', a taunt Arthur now proudly reclaims with his crested coterie that includes countless hens, from Sheila the white Silkie to Clarissa the champagne-coloured Buff Cochin. A personal and humorous memoir of Arthur's life amongst his hens, Chicken Boy is illustrated throughout with his own characterful watercolours and candid photography of his 'ladies'. This is an invitation to discover the joy that is only possible in the company of these intriguing creatures: Pekins are friendly, Lavender Leghorns aloof, while Burford Browns have a bad habit of feather-pecking... Having already earned renown as 'king of the small-space garden', Arthur's appreciation for the natural world is inspiring and relatable. The quiet fulfilment of hen-keeping rituals has rescued his mental health from pervasive depression. His sanctuary is the backyard: nurturing chicks who grow into happy hens and planting hardy, chicken scratch-resistant foliage. Chicken Boy is a joyful ramble through the hen house - sleeves rolled-up - and a testament to the mutual rewards and delights of keeping hens. ©2023 Arthur Parkinson (P)2023 Penguin Audio

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/601136 to listen full audiobooks. Title: American Ramble: A Walk of Memory and Renewal Author: Neil King Narrator: Will Tulin Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 10 hours 57 minutes Release date: April 4, 2023 Ratings: Ratings of Book: 5 of Total 2 Ratings of Narrator: 5 of Total 1 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: A stunning, revelatory memoir about a 330-mile walk from Washington, D.C., to New York City—an unforgettable pilgrimage to the heart of America across some of our oldest common ground.  Neil King Jr.’s desire to walk from Washington, D.C., to New York City began as a whim and soon became an obsession. By the spring of 2021, events had intervened that gave his desire greater urgency. His neighborhood still reeled from the January 6th insurrection. Covid lockdowns and a rancorous election had deepened America’s divides. Neil himself bore the imprints of a long battle with cancer. Determined to rediscover what matters in life and to see our national story with new eyes, Neil turned north with a small satchel on his back and one mission in mind: To pay close attention to the land he crossed and the people he met. What followed is an extraordinary 26-day journey through historic battlefields and cemeteries, over the Mason-Dixon line, past Quaker and Amish farms, along Valley Forge stream beds, atop a New Jersey trash mound, across New York Harbor, and finally, to his ultimate destination: the Ramble, where a tangle of pathways converges in Central Park. The journey travels deep into America’s past and present, uncovering forgotten pockets and overlooked people. At a time of mounting disunity, the trip reveals the profound power of our shared ground. By turns amusing, inspiring, and sublime, American Ramble offers an exquisite account of personal and national renewal—an indelible study of our country as we’ve never seen it before.  Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/601098 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Brown Boy: A Memoir Author: Omer Aziz Narrator: Omer Aziz Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 8 hours 18 minutes Release date: April 4, 2023 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: An uncompromising portrait of identity, family, religion, race, and class that “cuts to the bone” (Publishers Weekly, starred review) told through Omer Aziz’s incisive and luminous prose. In a tough neighborhood on the outskirts of Toronto, miles away from wealthy white downtown, Omer Aziz struggles to find his place as a first-generation Pakistani Muslim boy. He fears the violence and despair of the world around him, and sees a dangerous path ahead, succumbing to aimlessness, apathy, and rage. In his senior year of high school, Omer quickly begins to realize that education can open up the wider world. But as he falls in love with books, and makes his way to Queen’s University in Ontario, Sciences Po in Paris, Cambridge University in England, and finally Yale Law School, he continually confronts his own feelings of doubt and insecurity at being an outsider, a brown-skinned boy in an elite white world. He is searching for community and identity, asking questions of himself and those he encounters, and soon finds himself in difficult situations—whether in the suburbs of Paris or at the Temple Mount in Jerusalem. Yet the more books Omer reads and the more he moves through elite worlds, his feelings of shame and powerlessness only grow stronger, and clear answers recede further away. Weaving together his powerful personal narrative with the books and friendships that move him, Aziz wrestles with the contradiction of feeling like an Other and his desire to belong to a Western world that never quite accepts him. He poses the questions he couldn’t have asked in his youth: Was assimilation ever really an option? Could one transcend the perils of race and class? And could we—the collective West—ever honestly confront the darker secrets that, as Aziz discovers, still linger from the past? In Brown Boy, Omer Aziz has written an eye-opening book that eloquently describes the complex process of creating an identity that fuses where he’s from, what people see in him, and who he knows himself to be.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/603527 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Share My Life: A Journey of Love, Faith and Redemption Author: Kem Narrator: Kem, Keith David Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 6 hours 30 minutes Release date: April 4, 2023 Ratings: Ratings of Book: 5 of Total 2 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: Grammy Award–nominated artist Kem shares his life in this “breathtaking” (Michael Eric Dyson, New York Times bestselling author) and revealing memoir tracing his transformative journey from homelessness to gold-selling artist. Known for his smooth, affecting crooning and dapper style, Kem’s journey to the stage is nothing short of inspiring. In Share My Life, Kem goes back to the very beginning before his time to introduce his grandmother, who worked as a sharecropper in the South and had thirteen children. As Kem’s family rises from the sharecropping and ultimately lands in Detroit, there is an unspoken mantra of “hard things are better left unsaid,” which has devastating consequences down the line. And so, Kem grows up in the midst of an impenetrable silence. His mother is never without a beer in her hand, and his relationship with his father is oddly tense. Emotionally starved, Kem internalizes harmful feelings, eventually spiraling to drug use in his search for relief. At nineteen, Kem is homeless, roaming the cold Detroit streets. In the overly bright AA halls, Kem comes across men like himself verbalizing their feelings. The meetings helped him discover his own voice, using music as an outlet that has since touched millions. In Share My Life, Kem chronicles his “revelatory, moving, and inspirational” (Lisa Cortés, Academy Award–nominated and Emmy Award–winning producer and director) journey of self-discovery. The young boy who struggled with feelings of worthlessness becomes a man willing to put everything on the line for his dream.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/604514 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Grounded: A Journey into the Landscapes of Our Ancestors Author: James Canton Narrator: Peter Noble Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 8 hours 12 minutes Release date: April 4, 2023 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: From the author of The Oak Papers comes a beautiful meditation on how to foster a profound and healing spiritual communion with the natural world, exploring how the sacred can be accessed by looking to the past, to our ancestors and how they tread through their worlds. “Canton's writing has an exquisite, somewhat dreamlike quality.”—Peter Wohlleben, author of The Hidden Life of Trees When James Canton walked into Suffolk’s Lindsey Chapel, it was the beginning of what would become a new journey in his life—hours away from the bustling city of London and distant from the years in his early twenties when he traveled from Egypt to Argentina. Standing inside the quaint chapel, Canton realized that his past cosmopolitan desires had been replaced by an intense yearning to understand the history of the place he called home, a burning curiosity about the past and the spiritual ways and beliefs of the people who came before us. In Grounded, Canton retraces his steps into the places where our ancestors have experienced profound emotion, otherwise known as numinous experiences, to help us better understand who we are. Through lyrical meditation, reflection, and a thoughtful consideration of the ways and beliefs of the people who came before us, Canton seeks to know what our ancestors considered to be human, and what lessons we can learn from them to find security in our contemporary selves. Steeped in literary and folklore references, Grounded is a powerful exploration of the power of nature to soothe, nourish, and inspire the human soul.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/604344 to listen full audiobooks. Title: How Not to Kill Yourself: A Portrait of the Suicidal Mind Author: Clancy Martin Narrator: Clancy Martin Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 14 hours 33 minutes Release date: March 28, 2023 Genres: Memoirs Publisher's Summary: An intimate, insightful, at times even humorous exploration of why the thought of death is so compulsive for some while demonstrating that there’s always another solution—from the acclaimed writer and professor of philosophy, based on his viral essay, “I’m Still Here.” “If you’re going to write a book about suicide, you have to be willing to say the true things, the scary things, the humiliating things. Because everybody who is being honest with themselves knows at least a little bit about the subject. If you lie or if you fudge, the reader will know.” The last time Clancy Martin tried to kill himself was in his basement with a dog leash. It was one of over ten attempts throughout the course of his life. But he didn’t die, and like many who consider taking their own lives, he hid the attempt from his wife, family, coworkers, and students, slipping back into his daily life with a hoarse voice, a raw neck, and series of vague explanations. In How Not to Kill Yourself, Martin chronicles his multiple suicide attempts in an intimate depiction of the mindset of someone obsessed with self-destruction. He argues that, for the vast majority of suicides, an attempt does not just come out of the blue, nor is it merely a violent reaction to a particular crisis or failure, but is the culmination of a host of long-standing issues. He also looks at the thinking of a number of great writers who have attempted suicide and detailed their experiences (such as David Foster Wallace, Yiyun Li, Akutagawa, Nelly Arcan, and others), at what the history of philosophy has to say both for and against suicide, and at the experiences of those who have reached out to him across the years to share their own struggles. The result combines memoir with critical inquiry to powerfully give voice to what for many has long been incomprehensible, while showing those presently grappling with suicidal thoughts that they are not alone, and that the desire to kill oneself—like other self-destructive desires—is almost always temporary and avoidable. *Includes a downloadable PDF of resources and tools for crisis from the book