Greatest Selection of Get Your Full Audiobook in Bios & Memoirs, Personal Memoirs

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Title: C

Author: John Diamond

Narrator: Neil Pearson

Format: Abridged

Length: 2 hrs and 55 mins

Language: English

Release date: 04-28-06

Publisher: Random House AudioBooks

Ratings: 4.5 of 5 out of 2 votes

Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Personal Memoirs

Publisher's Summary:

Shortly before his 44th birthday, John Diamond received a call from the doctor who had removed a lump from his neck. Having been assured for the previous 2 years that this was a benign cyst, Diamond was told that it was, in fact, cancerous. Suddenly, this man who'd until this point been one of the world's greatest hypochondriacs, was genuinely faced with mortality. And what he saw scared the wits out of him. Out of necessity, he wrote about his feelings in his Times column and the response was staggering. Mailbag followed Diamond's story of lifewith, and without, a lump, the humiliations, the ridiculous bits, the funny bits, the tearful bits. It's compelling, profound, witty, in the mould of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly.

©1998 John Diamond; (P)2001 Random House AudioBooks

Critic Reviews:

"Diamond is unstintingly honest, so we get the whole man with all his personal strengths and foibles." (Amazon.co.uk)

Members Reviews:

Laugh until you cry

This is one of the first books that I read when I was diagnosed with the same cancer as Mr. Diamond. It's an incredible book and I have recommended it to everyone I know, not just family and friends but health care professionals who treat cancer patients. It will take you inside what it is like to have cancer but at the same time it is also a really funny book. Somehow in the midst of the horror that is head & neck cancer Mr. Diamond is able to see the absurdity, irony and humor and show it to us. The same book is also available with the titleBecause Cowards Get Cancer Too: A Hypochondriac Confronts His Nemesis.

Wonderfully real, witty, droll and sad....

I hadn't heard of John Diamond till his wife Nigella Lawson became so well known- I wish I had known of him earlier and followed his various columns. It's always terrible when someone has an awful illness and dies, but wonderful to get some small insight into it and the real suffering encountered. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants a book they simply cannot put down- as strange as it seems! Extraordinarily written and full of integrity.

Five Stars

Very moving book.

Well written.

Well written with candor.

And it is testament to his terrific prose and probing insights that I managed to read ...

Being a reasonably squeamish individual, I am not in the habbit of picking up books devoted to any kind of illness - let alone cancer. But then I was drawn to the strangely chirpy cover of this book not by its title but by the name John Diamond. I was familiar with his writing long before his cancer columns in The Times. And it is testament to his terrific prose and probing insights that I managed to read this book in no more than a few days. His definition of cancer at the begining of the book is memorable for both its clarity and wit. But if there's one thing that strikes the reader throughout, it is the overwhelming passion for life. Even when things get tough - and they get pretty damn tough - Diamond manages to find something worth living for - whether it's the simple pleasures of being in one's own home and experiencing the smells of domestic life, or simply going to buy new clothes.

Don't be put off by the 'c' word. This is a minor masterpiece. A celebration of life - not the dwelling on death.

God bless you, John Diamond.

Alex Pearl, author of 'Sleeping with the Blackbirds'

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Title: A Castle in Spain

Subtitle: A Mountain Ruin and an Impossible Dream

Author: Matthew Parris

Narrator: Matthew Parris

Format: Abridged

Length: 3 hrs and 29 mins

Language: English

Release date: 02-03-06

Publisher: Penguin Books Ltd

Ratings: 2 of 5 out of 1 votes

Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Personal Memoirs

Publisher's Summary:

A few years ago, Matthew (with his family's help) went back and bought the place. Astonishing and arguably idiotic, his decision resulted in a phenomenal amount of hard work, and this hugely enjoyable book. Inspirational, instructional, and utterly irresistible, this is the story of one man's dream to turn a forgotten ruin into his very own Castle in Spain.

Members Reviews:

What! Was that it!

I couldn't believe the story was over. In a nut-shell: well-off people buy run down place, do it up. The End. Apart from a mildly interesting falling out with the neighbour and one passage where he actually gets his hands dirty building some steps there isn't much of a story here at all. It needed more gritty details of the trials of DIY renovation. Really this should have been one episode of a lifestyle TV series.

more of an ad for his holiday rentals

I was looking forward to listening to this and it had a few good anecdotes. It turned into a detail of how he renovated this old house detail by detail, with not enough about the people that he met. Seemed to spend an eternity describing his bedrooms and bathrooms.... Driving over Lemons was much more interesting

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Title: A Grief Observed

Author: C.S. Lewis

Narrator: Ralph Cosham

Format: Unabridged

Length: 1 hr and 50 mins

Language: English

Release date: 01-20-06

Publisher: Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Ratings: 4.5 of 5 out of 527 votes

Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Personal Memoirs

Publisher's Summary:

This is a beautiful and unflinchingly honest record of how even a stalwart believer can lose all sense of meaning in the universe, and how he can gradually regain his bearings.

Critic Reviews:

"A very personal, anguished, luminous little book about the meaning of death, marriage, and religion." (Publishers Weekly)

Members Reviews:

A Grief Observed (Unabridged)

Excellent reader. I bought this book due to the loss of someone very close to me. C.S. Lewis wrote this book after the loss of his wife, and documented in a journal his grieving.

The grieving process, though personal to each individual, is some what universal in how our mind responds to an event such as this.

I highly recommend.

Read This One

If your life burst like a balloon and you want to be dead, because you can't believe the one you love has died, this book is for you. This is no poem. This is no nice story. This is your story after death kicks the crap out of you, takes your most priced possession, and leaves you gasping for breath. This is the grief book you are looking for.

Thought-provoking and relentless

I've both read and listened to this very fine if sad tome and in both media the hurt and pain that Lewis feels on the death of his beloved H comes through in spades. Lewis spares no feelings as he lashes out at this world and the Other World for taking the one woman in his life that had made a difference. In the end, he reconciles himself to fate and to Fate and Faith, but the journey is long, and the days of pain numerous. I usually warn someone not to read/listen to a book if one is depressed. In this case, I encourage it. You will find yourself identifying with Lewis' travails and, hopefully, when done you will find new joy and a renewed hope at the end of the journey. This book is a book of Faith, but in order to get there, one has to cross the chasm of Doubt. This Lewis does, but the journey is painful, and full of personal introspection. Give him the benefit of the doubt and trust him as he finally concluded that he must trust Him for all outcomes.

The reader is British. What else is there to say. He reads well, adds the correct amount of emphasis where needed. His accent does not get in the way, and even adds a small amount of charm to the narration, but at the same time, he is British and in passages that rubbed me the wrong way. Still, his voice added to Lewis' voice produced a remarkable work worthy of consideration, especially if one is going through grief him/herself. This is a treasure. Pick it up and learn from it.

Read This One

If your life burst like a balloon and you want to be dead, because you can't believe the one you love has died, this book is for you. This is no poem. This is no nice story. This is your story after death kicks the crap out of you, takes your most priced possession, and leaves you gasping for breath. This is the grief book you are looking for.

Fantastic perspective

My mother just passed, and I had purchased this book over a year ago. God knows the right time for all things.

This is a must read (or listen) for anyone wanting to share death's bitter pill.

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Title: I Should Have Been at Work

Author: Des Lynam

Narrator: Des Lynam

Format: Abridged

Length: 3 hrs and 15 mins

Language: English

Release date: 01-11-06

Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers Limited

Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Personal Memoirs

Publisher's Summary:

Famously guarded about his private life, Des will set the record straight and talk about his relationships, his childhood days in Ireland, as well as his early marriage and life in 70s London. Des takes us through his 30 years at the BBC from a reporter on local radio to the drama of his top-secret move to ITV, which was front page news on every national newspaper. The World Cups; the Olympic Games, including his reporting of the Israeli shootings in Munich; following Muhammad Ali to his fights in Zaire, Malaysia, and the USA; the Grand National that never was, the IRA threatened race; the programmes he turned down, the ones he wished he had! Des offers a candid account of life behind the scenes as a national broadcaster, the people he has met, the triumphs, the disasters.

In the unique role of top presenter on both main channels, he tells of his five years at ITV, his reasons for going there, and why his decision was justified but in other ways disastrous. One of the most long-awaited autobiographies of recent years, this book gives a frank and opinionated insight into the man behind the myth.

Members Reviews:

Don't Bother

Delivered in such a monotone style that it appears that Mr Lynam was as bored reading this misogynistic tome as I was listening to it.

That said, a couple of parts are quite amusing, even interesting,, however they are the very rare exceptions and certainly not the rule. The enjoyable sections could have been covered in 10 minutes max.

Just enjoy your money and retirement Des but please dont write anything else.

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Title: Surprised by Joy

Subtitle: The Shape of My Early Life

Author: C.S. Lewis

Narrator: Ralph Cosham

Format: Unabridged

Length: 6 hrs and 37 mins

Language: English

Release date: 05-13-05

Publisher: Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Ratings: 4.5 of 5 out of 799 votes

Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Personal Memoirs

Publisher's Summary:

In this book, C.S. Lewis tells of his search for joy, a spiritual journey that led him from the Christianity of his early youth into atheism and then back to Christianity.

©1955 C. S. Lewis Pte. Ltd.; (P)2000 Blackstone Audiobooks

Members Reviews:

Not what I expected

3 stars as autobiography; 5 stars as beautifully written book about a spiritual journey, excellently narrated

If you want to read about CS Lewis, better try Alan Jacobs' The Narnian or other bio.

If you want to read CS Lewis the Christian apologist describe selected aspects of his boyhood and adolescence up to his early adulthood conversion (in beautiful and often humorous prose), download this. I think even those who take no interest in Lewis but who are interested in social history of the first half of 19th century Britian would find this a valuable listen.

If you are unfamiliar with the British school system or don't have a nodding acquaintance with schools of philosophy and major Brit Lit figures of the early 19th century, reading a bio such as Jacobs' first will make this a much more rewarding listen.

I wish that Lewis had lived to write a more complete autobiography. He selected "selectively" experiences that drew him toward the source of joy. His silence on others leaves the listener longing for a more complete travelogue of his journey.

Satisfied by Joy!

If you want to know about the man - C.S. Lewis - this is the book you want. His reluctant journey to faith is fascinating. The narrator, Geoffrey Howard, is perhaps the best I've ever heard. If the institutional church makes your skin crawl, but the idea of knowing God is more palatable, then you'll find a friend in Lewis.

Lewis is always great!

C. S. Lewis is one of the most thought-provoking writers in recent years. In this book, he tells about his early life and how it shaped his intellectual and spiritual later life. This was the one book of his I had not read, and am grateful to have heard it. It is not an easy listen...you have to pay attention. I went back and listened to some parts again, or grabbed my print copy and re-read for myself. That said, however, it has added to my appreciation of Lewis's writings to know where he came from. Well worth the listen!

Deep, but longer than necesssary

Would you consider the audio edition of Surprised by Joy to be better than the print version?

Yes. I never would have made it through the print version. The narrator made it somewhat easier to get through the first ten chapters to the meaty part of the book.

What did you like best about this story?

Chapter 11. That chapter was what I was looking for - encouragement and a real discussion of God's role in joy as well as the difference between true joy and anything else.

What about Ralph Coshams performance did you like?

He read with a beautiful and natural cadence. I have liked other narrators better, but he did justice to the book.

If you were to make a film of this book, what would the tag line be?

C.S.

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Title: The Reluctant Metrosexual

Subtitle: Dispatches From An Almost Hip Life

Author: Peter Hyman

Narrator: Peter Hyman

Format: Unabridged

Length: 6 hrs and 59 mins

Language: English

Release date: 09-01-04

Publisher: Blackstone Audio, Inc.

Ratings: 2 of 5 out of 17 votes

Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Personal Memoirs

Publisher's Summary:

If Peter Hyman is a metrosexual, a straight man with gay tastes, then he is one reluctantly, being loath to hitch himself to an au courant cultural trend, unless doing so would get him a movie deal or an actual girlfriend.

Peter Hyman's musings, more pop cultural than philosophical, range from the heartfelt to the absurd, whether he's describing the scotch-soaked grief of a bad breakup or his unfortunate attempt at a menage a trois. With sophistication and enviable wit, The Reluctant Metrosexual chronicles the promiscuity and perils of modern manhood.

Critic Reviews:

"Hyman's stories have funny setups, and his conversational, easy-to-read prose carries a weird poignancy." (Publishers Weekly)

"A master of self-deprecation in the spirit of Joe Queenan and P. J. O'Rourke, Hyman takes on contemporary culture with a scalpel and a smirk." (Booklist)

Members Reviews:

Boring...ZZZZZ

There is a limit to accounts of personal tales you can put in a book...at least, they should be interesting and a bit significant to other people. Not in this book...if you want to hear the story of his mother choosing shirts for him and stories like that, things your brother-in-law could tell you for free, buy the book.

Nothing new but still entertaining

I am kind of surprised he got a book deal, because the topic is not that original--he is one of many male hipster New Yorkers dating and bewailing. Still, I was amused and occasionally touched. After all, male hipster New Yorkers are human too and have stories to tell. Other male hipster New Yorkers would probably find this book extremely annoying, but for me, a female Los Angeles nerd, it was kind of an anthropological curiosity.

Terrible

First, there's nothing "reluctant" about the author as he portrays himself in this book. He is that completely vain guy you meet at a party who spends most of his time name dropping. His only difference is the names that he drops are designer labels and trendy restaurants. He has the mistaken believe that his access to these "finer things" makes his life interesting and appealing to other people. Occasionally, he trys to look sophisticated by referencing books he read or his travels in Europe, but this also just reveals how shallow and self-obsessed he is. I'm sure someone would claim this book is meant to be satire, but if it is, they fogot to add the humorous edge to the commentary.

Enjoyed it

If your brother in law was as funny as Hyman I would pay him to tell me about shopping exploits. All told a very funny book. No real content, but witty insights. Not Sedaris, but worth listening to.

Maybe funny if you are American?

This book is possibly quite funny if you are American and therefore live slap-bang in the middle of American culture. However, it did not do anything for me.

I started listening to this and immediately skipped three hours in to see if it got more interesting - and it didn't. It's just a continuous ramble of 'anecdotes', though 'anecdote' implies to me that the stories are amusing.

This also would have been better narrated by a professional narrator with a more neutral accent, rather than the author whose accent I found really did not help.

I would advise anyone considering this book to listen to the audio sample to make sure that the very section that you hear is funny.

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Title: Another Shot

Author: Joe Kita

Narrator: Joe Kita

Format: Abridged

Length: 5 hrs and 58 mins

Language: English

Release date: 05-02-01

Publisher: Random House AudioBooks

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 11 votes

Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Personal Memoirs

Publisher's Summary:

Afraid of having the same pangs of regret at age 80, and no longer satisfied leaving good times to chance, Kita deliberately revisited 20 crossroads in his life and tried to relive them. In Another Shot, he chronicles his crazy year with humor and inspiration. Along the way, he gets to the bottom of what happened to his first car - a beautiful 1979 Camaro - and ponders whether choices really matter and what determines one's place in the world. Some of Kita's adventures border on the absurd: Never having the chance to fire a real gun, he enrolls in a shooting school. Not ever being filthy rich, Joe hires a Romanian butler to experience the lifestyle. Other stops on his journey are more common to men his age: He's lost his hair and he wants it back. His sexual peak came and went without him.

Critic Reviews:

"If you ever wanted a second chance, if you ever wanted to do it all over again and do it right, then listen to Joe Kita. He did it for all of us. Read this and even if you don't get out of your chair you'll feel better." (Regis Philbin)

Members Reviews:

Worth it - if you're a guy of a certain age

The book is uneven and the thread tying the various episodes together is somewhat thin. Nevertheless, I heartily enjoyed Kita's adventures. His narration is good - and I usually prefer authors who read their own material. What's more, I ended up liking Kita despite the shortcomings of the book, and that goes a long way with me. This is a good listen for guys like me who are within the target demographic (middle aged men); others might want to take a pass.

Nice shot!

A book about dealing with regrets...you can go back! The stories were wonderful, moving, and enlightening. I was rooting for him the whole way! I did find the author a little too gullible on three of his regret stories (the psychic, the cat-scan doctor and the "predator"). I would love to see a sequel.

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Title: No Man's Land

Author: Ruth Fowler

Narrator: Ruth Fowler

Format: Unabridged

Length: 8 hrs and 50 mins

Language: English

Release date: 01-08-09

Publisher: Penguin Audio

Ratings: 3 of 5 out of 1 votes

Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Personal Memoirs

Publisher's Summary:

With 43 countries, 12 boats, dozens of flights, a fistful of "life experience" behind her and a lot of ambition fueling her dreams, 25-year old Ruth Fowler arrives in New York City. A Brit with a Cambridge degree and a middle-class background, she doesn't think it will be too hard to start a new life. But getting a work visa in post-9/11 U.S.A. proves to be tricky, and to kick-start a writing career, Fowler starts documenting her experiences. She funds her efforts with cash-in-hand jobs and a stint writing for the Village Voice, but it doesn't take long for funds and hope to run out - sending her to the heart of Manhattan's dark underbelly, the strip clubs and "Champagne Rooms" of Times Square.

As "Mimi," she has a chance of survival. But when this persona threatens to consume every vestige of Fowler's identity, when her life spirals out of control and her true self remains so deeply buried that it seems impossible to resurrect, relying on "Mimi" seems like the biggest mistake she has ever made. No Man's Land is a shocking, raw account about losing identity - and finding it again.

Members Reviews:

bitter, honest, sometimes funny

Bitter account of stripping, but I like that the author was self-destructive and made no excuses or apolgies, which is rare in this age of self-pity memoirs. I've known a few strippers and this seemed to echo a lot of their complaints about the customers, the repetition and the difficulty of escaping it.

What do I think?

Interesting reading ... Took a while to get used to her writing style, then, I wanted to read her other book also!

"Dancer"

A chatty memoir about an English girl who after doing work on a boat ends up in NYC without the proper paperwork to obtain a visa to work in the United States. She does some waitressing and then ends up being a 'dancer'. She creates an alter ego which becomes Jekyll/Hyde-like as she begins a downward spiral of behavior in things that she had thought that she would not do. Initially whiney it does get more interesting as it goes along as she gets involved in a relationship that becomes heart-wrenching. Insight into the behaviors, swearing, adult content. Quality use of the language.

What One Would Expect

Ruth Fowler, thanks to her ability to write about the world with exactly the worldview that Christopher Lasch warned us would become more and more common, has managed to get published with some regularity In the last year or two. Just the other day I read her article about how that ex-cop running around LA and shooting civilians and policemen is, in her mind, some sort of dark hero out for justice. As I read, I thought maybe the Left had found its Ann Coulter. So, out of curiosity, I went into the stacks (I am a librarian) and picked up this book to take a look.

It's a very sad work by what appears to be a very sad person. The organization of the book is semi-coherent, kind of a brain-dead picaresque. Some flashes of real talent are here, but they aren't maintained for more than a sentence or two and seem inconsistent.

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Title: An Audience with Barry Norman

Author: Barry Norman

Narrator: Barry Norman

Format: Original Recording

Length: 1 hr and 48 mins

Language: English

Release date: 07-06-06

Publisher: Hodder Headline Limited

Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Personal Memoirs

Publisher's Summary:

In his popular one-man show Barry recalls the most memorable moments in his long career with a rich and varied selection of anecdotes about his encounters with Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor, Peter Sellers, John Wayne, Robert De Niro, Michelle Pfeiffer and many more.

Barry Norman is a knowledgeable and witty raconteur and this is a unique opportunity for film lovers to hear many great stories about Hollywood's most famous stars and their antics both on and off screen.

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Title: Parallel Community with Hamish Miller

Author: Hamish Miller

Narrator: Hamish Miller

Format: Unabridged

Length: 1 hr and 24 mins

Language: English

Release date: 06-04-08

Publisher: Reality Entertainment

Ratings: 3.5 of 5 out of 3 votes

Genres: Bios & Memoirs, Personal Memoirs

Publisher's Summary:

While using dowsing techniques to research the complex fields of earth energy around the globe, his contact with wise and experienced people of many nationalities has convinced him that we must do something now to change our way of relating to the earth and to each other.

This is the story of one man's passion, a man driven by a need to halt the deterioration of the quality of life on this beautiful planet. If we are to create a world we are proud to hand on to our grandchildren, we can no longer blindly accept the decisions imposed on us by a small number of unsuitable, uncaring people.

Parallel Community has been created as a platform empowering people throughout the world, acting and working together, to challenge the motives of our decision-makers and make a positive contribution to our future.

Members Reviews:

k7

Full of beautiful ideas! And completely applicable ones, too. Hamish Miller is a gifted man, who does a wonderful job giving the argument that we need to all reconnect with the forces of the earth to save ourselves & more importantly the earth itself. He is incredible, his knowledge & insight is very compelling. He is a powerful leader.

inspiring

This was very inspiring. Miller really has his ducks in a row & knows what is important in this world--and unfortunately it isn't what the majority of us are focusing on. The Earth, the energy contained therein, and joining together to do what is right--that is important. This was a very inspiring purchase.

Shane

this is like a reboot for your soul. Hamish (RIP) explores many topics but they all basically are centered around the earth's energy and our place within a peaceful world. Feeling overwhelmed by it all? I suggest you watch this.