Get New Free Audiobooks in Biography & Memoir, History & Culture

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/612605 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Washington: A Legacy of Leadership Series: Part of The Generals Author: Paul Vickery Narrator: Chad Escue Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 6 hours 22 minutes Release date: May 9, 2023 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: His name is carved in granite, his likeness cast in bronze, his legend as large as the role he played as America's first president. But before he was a commander-in-chief, George Washington was a general in a revolution that would decide the future of the people and land he called his own. If victorious, he would gain immortality. If defeated, he would find his neck in a hangman's noose. Washington knew the sting of defeat—at Brandywine, at Germantown—yet this unwavering leadership and his vision for a new and independent nation emboldened an army prepared to fight barefoot if necessary to win that independence. Wrote an officer after the Battle of Princeton:  'I saw him brave all the dangers of the field and his important life hanging as it were by a single hair with a thousand deaths flying around him.' Among America's pantheon of Founding Fathers, one man to this day stands out.  Author Paul Vickery tracks the unlikely rise of Washington, a man whose stature in command of a young army became prelude to a presidency. As Vickery writes, 'He learned to become the father of our country by first being the father of our military.' Accompanying images are included in the audiobook companion PDF download.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/616789 to listen full audiobooks. Title: American Breakdown: Our Ailing Nation, My Body’s Revolt, and the Nineteenth-Century Woman Who Brought Me Back to Life Author: Jennifer Lunden Narrator: Anna Caputo Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 12 hours 46 minutes Release date: May 9, 2023 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: A Silent Spring for the human body, this wide-ranging, genre-crossing literary mystery interweaves the author’s quest to understand the source of her own condition with her telling of the story of the chronically ill 19th-century diarist Alice James—ultimately uncovering the many hidden health hazards of life in America. When Jennifer Lunden became chronically ill after moving from Canada to Maine, her case was a medical mystery. Just 21, unable to hold a book or stand for a shower, she lost her job and consigned herself to her bed. The doctor she went to for help told her she was “just depressed.” After suffering from this enigmatic illness for five years, she discovered an unlikely source of hope and healing: a biography of Alice James, the bright, witty, and often bedridden sibling of brothers Henry James, the novelist, and William James, the father of psychology. Alice suffered from a life-shattering illness known as neurasthenia, now often dismissed as a “fashionable illness.” In this meticulously researched and illuminating debut, Lunden interweaves her own experience with Alice’s, exploring the history of medicine and the effects of the industrial revolution and late-stage capitalism to tell a riveting story of how we are a nation struggling—and failing—to be healthy. Although science—and the politics behind its funding—has in many ways let Lunden and millions like her down, in the end science offers a revelation that will change how readers think about the ecosystems of their bodies, their communities, the country, and the planet.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/612598 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Bryson City Tales: Stories of a Doctor's First Year of Practice in the Smoky Mountains Author: Walt Larimore, M.D. Narrator: Tom Parks Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 10 hours 25 minutes Release date: May 2, 2023 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: Captivating stories of how a young doctor's first year of medical practice in the Smoky Mountains shaped his practice of life and faith. The little mountain hamlet of Bryson City, North Carolina, offers more than dazzling vistas. For Walt Larimore, a young 'flatlander' physician setting up his first practice, the town presents its peculiar challenges as well. With the winsomeness of a James Herriott book, Bryson City Tales sweeps you into a world of colorful characters, the texture of Smoky Mountain life, and the warmth, humor, quirks, and struggles of a small country town. It's a world where the family doctor is also the emergency physician, the coroner, and the obstetrician, and where wilderness medicine is part of the job, search-and-rescue calls in the national forest are a way of life, and the next patient just may be somebody's livestock or pet. Bryson City Tales is the tender and insightful chronicle of a young man's rite of passage from medical student to family physician. Laughter and adventure await you in these pages, and lessons learned from Bryson City's unforgettable residents. A map is included in the audiobook companion PDF download.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/616326 to listen full audiobooks. Title: In Search of Perfumes: A Lifetime Journey to the Source of Nature’s Scents Author: Dominique Roques Narrator: Jean Brassard Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 9 hours 5 minutes Release date: May 2, 2023 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: In this intoxicating concoction of history, travelogue, and memoir, one of the perfume industry’s leading scouts of natural ingredients tells the story of the precious ingredients needed to make our favorite fragrances. Do you know how many flowers it takes to produce a kilo of rose oil? One million roses, each handpicked. When it comes to nature, Dominique Roques is a unique authority. He has spent the last thirty years working closely with local communities across the globe to establish a sustainable supply of natural ingredients crucial to perfume making. From resin cultivated by traditional methods in El Salvador to rose oil distilleries in India as old as the Taj Mahal, his network reveals an elusive trade built on the fault lines of tradition and modernity. With In Search of Perfumes, Roques tells the story of seventeen of the industry’s most precious ingredients–where they come from, their cultural and historic significance, and why we love them—from Indonesian patchouli to the ''Damask rose,” interweaving his own recollections and reflections on his life and work. From Andalusia to Somaliland, Roques takes us on an exclusive tour of a vast but delicate ecosystem wholly sustained by the artisans who are its caretakers. Isolated and rural, the tropical jungles of northern Laos remain to this day the only source of benzoin that centuries earlier wafted through the air of Louis XIV’s court. In Madagascar, where every transaction is made in cash, a caravan of porters carry pallets bearing $500,000 dollars to exchange for vanilla beans. The Venezuelan tonka bean, as fickle as the weather, may refuse to flower for years but is so esteemed by perfumers that patience becomes its truest virtue. Everywhere Roques takes us, his infectious curiosity and amiability illuminate an immersive world of the uncharted. Entertaining and eye-opening, decorated with beautiful black-and-white illustrations , In Search of Perfumes is an irresistible exploration of the smells that fuel our nostalgia and suffuse our fantasies. Translated from the French by Stephanie Smee Supplemental enhancement PDF accompanies the audiobook.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/614968 to listen full audiobooks. Title: The Exceptions: Nancy Hopkins and the fight for women in science Author: Kate Zernike Narrator: Kathe Mazur Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 14 hours 30 minutes Release date: April 27, 2023 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: ‘Outstanding’ Bonnie Garmus, bestselling author of Lessons in Chemistry The remarkable untold story of how a group of sixteen determined women used the power of the collective and the tools of science to inspire ongoing radical change. This is a triumphant account of progress, whilst reminding us that further action is needed. These women scientists entered the work force in the 1960s during a push for affirmative action. Embarking on their careers they thought that discrimination against women was a thing of the past and that science was a pure meritocracy. Women were marginalized and minimized, especially as they grew older, their contributions stolen and erased. Written by the Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who broke the story in 1999 for The Boston Globe, when the Massachusetts Institute of Technology made the astonishing admission that it discriminated against women on its faculty, The Exceptions is an intimate narrative which centres on Nancy Hopkins – a surprisingly reluctant feminist who became a hero to two generations of women in science. In uncovering an erased history, we are finally introduced to the hidden scientists who paved the way for collective change.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/603432 to listen full audiobooks. Title: The Queen and the Arts Series: Part of Royal House of Windsor Author: Helen Cathcart Narrator: Lorna Bennett Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 6 hours 50 minutes Release date: April 25, 2023 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II acquired a cultivated appreciation of the arts from an early age, with the study of a picture a week in her schooldays, and in maturity has consistently proven herself a dutiful, conscientious, and enthusiastic patron of the arts. In this impressive volume, Helen Cathcart guides the listener through the public galleries, state apartments, and private rooms of royal abodes, pointing out the historic furniture and bespoke ceramics, the royal portraits, and of course the Old Masters that adorn the tapestried walls. Here is the pencil sketch by Michelangelo, the watercolor by Queen Victoria's daughter Princess Louise, the first edition Lewis Carroll in the Royal Library, and the Faberge easter eggs, among many other treasures. The Queen and the Arts not only highlights Her Majesty's abiding interest in the arts in all its forms but also her expert knowledge and care of the royal collection and her wish for it to be seen and enjoyed by as many as possible.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/614340 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Little Earthquakes: A Memoir Author: Sarah Mandel Narrator: Jean Ann Douglass Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 7 hours 42 minutes Release date: April 25, 2023 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: “Sarah Mandel has done something remarkable here. I found myself weeping, laughing with delight and moved with love—all in the span of the day it took me to devour this book. Filled with deliciously specific images and metaphors, clear dialogue, and rich explorations of self and others, Mandel has written—among other things—a tender witness statement of and for her body.”—Hala Alyan, author of Salt Houses A psychologist, wife, and mother chronicles her extraordinary journey with cancer while pregnant with her second baby, and the insights into life, death, trauma, and healing that she gleaned—an utterly inspiring debut memoir reminiscent of the intimacy and emotional power of Paul Kalanithi’s When Breath Becomes Air and Kate Bowler’s No Cure for Being Human. When clinical psychologist Sarah Mandel was pregnant with her second child, she began preparing for her maternity leave, juggling the demands of her soon-to-be-new baby with the needs of her patients. Noticing a lump in her breast, she assumed it was most likely a clogged milk duct. But a biopsy revealed it was not. When she went into labor, she learned that she had Stage Four cancer—devastating news that forced her to confront terminal illness as she was bringing new life into the world. But Sarah's illness took a highly improbable turn when, after three months of treatment, her second PET scan showed no evidence of disease. Sarah, however, was unable to celebrate the good news; she was frozen in a dissociated state caused by the emotional whiplash of going from oncology patient to new mother, from a terminal sentence to a shocking reprieve. As a therapist who specialized in trauma work, Sarah had utilized “narrative therapy” to help her patients. Now she wondered: Could the treatment that eased her patients’ pain successfully help her navigate her own trauma? Little Earthquakes is a beautiful and thought-provoking debut from a brave and unwavering new voice that captures the mind, sears the soul, and leaves its indelible mark on the heart.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/617689 to listen full audiobooks. Title: The Secret Gate: A True Story of Courage and Sacrifice During the Collapse of Afghanistan Author: Mitchell Zuckoff Narrator: Sean Pratt Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 9 hours 43 minutes Release date: April 25, 2023 Ratings: Ratings of Book: 4 of Total 1 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: The incredible true story of a breathtaking rescue in the frenzied final hours of the U.S. evacuation of Afghanistan—and how a brave Afghan mother and a compassionate American officer engineered a daring escape—from the #1 New York Times bestselling author of 13 Hours “Reads like a thriller . . . The Secret Gate is a fast-paced escape narrative, but it is also a morally complex interrogation.”—The Washington Post (Best Books of the Year) When the U.S. began its withdrawal from Afghanistan and the Afghan Army instantly collapsed, Homeira Qaderi was marked for death at the hands of the Taliban. A celebrated author, academic, and champion for women's liberation, Homeira had achieved celebrity in her home country by winning custody of her son in a contentious divorce, a rarity in Afghanistan's patriarchal society. As evacuation planes departed above, Homeira was caught in the turmoil at the Kabul Airport, trying and failing to secure escape for her and her eight-year-old son, Siawash, along with her parents and the rest of their family.  Meanwhile, a young American diplomat named Sam Aronson was enjoying a brief vacation between assignments when chaos descended upon Afghanistan. Sam immediately volunteered to join the skeleton team of remaining officials at Kabul Airport, frantically racing to help rescue the more than 100,000 stranded Americans and their Afghan helpers. When Sam learned that the CIA had established a secret entrance into the airport two miles away from the desperate crowds crushing toward the gates, he started bringing families directly through, personally rescuing as many as fifty-two people in a single day.  On the last day of the evacuation, Sam was contacted by Homeira's literary agent, who persuaded him to help her escape. He needed to risk his life to get them through the gate in the final hours before it closed forever. He borrowed night-vision goggles and enlisted a Dari-speaking colleague and two heavily armed security contract “shooters.” He contacted Homeira with a burner phone, and they used a flashlight code signal borrowed from boyhood summer camp. For her part, Homeira broke Sam’s rules and withstood his profanities. Together they braved gunfire by Afghan Army soldiers anxious about the restive crowds outside the airport. Ultimately, to enter the airport, Homeira and Siawash would have to leave behind their family and everything they had ever known.  The Secret Gate tells the thrilling, emotional tale of a young man's courage and a mother and son’s skin-of-the-teeth escape from a homeland that is no longer their own.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/605363 to listen full audiobooks. Title: After the Miracle: The Political Crusades of Helen Keller Author: Max Wallace Narrator: Christine Lakin Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 12 hours 48 minutes Release date: April 11, 2023 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: In this powerful new history, New York Times bestselling author Max Wallace draws on groundbreaking research to reframe Helen Keller’s journey after the miracle at the water pump, vividly bringing to light her rarely discussed, lifelong fight for social justice across gender, class, race, and ability.   Raised in Alabama, she sent shockwaves through the South when she launched a public broadside against Jim Crow and donated to the NAACP. She used her fame to oppose American intervention in WWI. She spoke out against Hitler the month he took power in 1933 and embraced the anti-fascist cause during the Spanish Civil War. She was one of the first public figures to alert the world to the evils of Apartheid, raising money to defend Nelson Mandela when he faced the death penalty for High Treason, and she lambasted Joseph McCarthy at the height of the Cold War, even as her contemporaries shied away from his notorious witch hunt. But who was this revolutionary figure? She was Helen Keller. From books to movies to Barbie dolls, most mainstream portrayals of Keller focus heavily on her struggles as a deafblind child—portraying her Teacher, Annie Sullivan, as a miracle worker. This narrative—which has often made Keller a secondary character in her own story—has resulted in few people knowing that her greatest accomplishment was not learning to speak, but what she did with her voice when she found it. After the Miracle is a much-needed corrective to this antiquated narrative. In this first major biography of Keller in decades, Max Wallace reveals that the lionization of Sullivan at the expense of her famous pupil was no accident, and calls attention to Keller’s efforts as a card-carrying socialist, fierce anti-racist, and progressive disability advocate. Despite being raised in an era when eugenics and discrimination were commonplace, Keller consistently challenged the media for its ableist coverage and was one of the first activists to highlight the links between disability and capitalism, even as she struggled against the expectations and prejudices of those closest to her. Peeling back the curtain that obscured Keller’s political crusades in favor of her “inspirational” childhood, After the Miracle chronicles the complete legacy of one of the 20th century’s most extraordinary figures.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/603111 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Our Brave Foremothers: Celebrating 100 Black, Brown, Asian, and Indigenous Women Who Changed the Course of History Author: Rozella Kennedy Narrator: Deanna Anthony Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 5 hours 59 minutes Release date: April 11, 2023 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: Inspired by her own foremothers’ legacies and the friendships formed throughout her life, Rozella Kennedy centers and celebrates the stories of 100 Black, Brown, Asian, and Indigenous women—both famous and little-known—who changed the course of US history.   In the beautiful pages of Our Brave Foremothers, discover an intergenerational, intercultural bouquet of Black, Brown, Asian, and Indigenous women lifted into the significance that they deserve. • From Etel Adnan to Mary Jones, Thelma Garcia Buchholdt to Pura Belpré to Zitkála-Šá, here are 100 women of color who left a lasting mark on United States history. Including both famous and little-known names, the thoughtful profiles and detailed portraits of these women herald their achievements and passions. • Following each entry is a prompt that asks you to connect your life to theirs, an inspiring way to understand their influence and the power of their stories. To consider on a deeper level the devotedness of Clara Brown, the fearlessness of Jovita Idár, the guts of Grace Lee Boggs, or the selflessness of Martha Louise Morrow Foxx. And to be as brave as we each can be—and then beyond that.