High-Quality Free Audiobooks in Biography & Memoir, History & Culture

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/628847 to listen full audiobooks. Title: The Interloper: Lee Harvey Oswald inside the Soviet Union Author: Peter Savodnik Narrator: Stefan Rudnicki Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 8 hours 10 minutes Release date: October 8, 2013 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: Lee Harvey Oswald's assassination of President Kennedy in 1963 remains one of the most horrifying and hotly debated crimes in American history. Just as perplexing as the assassination is the assassin himself; the twenty-four-year-old Oswald's hazy background and motivations—and his subsequent murder at the hands of Jack Ruby—make him an intriguing yet frustratingly enigmatic figure. Because Oswald briefly defected to the Soviet Union, some historians allege he was a Soviet agent. But as Peter Savodnik shows in The Interloper, Oswald's time in the USSR reveals a stranger, more chilling story. Oswald ventured to Russia at the age of nineteen, after a failed stint in the US Marine Corps and a childhood spent shuffling from address to address with his unstable, needy mother. Like many of his generation, Oswald struggled for a sense of belonging in postwar American society, which could be materialistic, atomized, and alienating. The Soviet Union, with its promise of collectivism and camaraderie, seemed to offer an alternative. While traveling in Europe, Oswald slipped across the Soviet border, soon settling in Minsk, where he worked at a radio and television factory. But Oswald quickly became just as disillusioned with his adopted country as he had been with the United States. He spoke very little Russian, had difficulty adapting to the culture of his new home, and found few trustworthy friends—indeed most, it became clear, were informing on him to the KGB. After nearly three years, Oswald returned to America feeling utterly defeated and more alone than ever, and as Savodnik shows, he began to look for an outlet for his frustration and rage. Drawing on groundbreaking research, including interviews with Oswald's friends and acquaintances in Russia and the United States, The Interloper brilliantly evokes the shattered psyche not just of Oswald himself but also of the era he so tragically defined.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/627558 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Autobiography of Mark Twain, Vol. 2 Author: Mark Twain Narrator: Grover Gardner Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 26 hours 17 minutes Release date: October 5, 2013 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: Mark Twain's complete, uncensored Autobiography was an instant bestseller when the first volume was published in 2010, on the centennial of the author's death, as he requested. Published to rave reviews, the Autobiography was hailed as the capstone of Twain's career. It captures his authentic and unsuppressed voice, speaking clearly from the grave and brimming with humor, ideas, and opinions. The eagerly awaited second volume delves deeper into Twain's life, uncovering the many roles he played in his private and public worlds. Filled with his characteristic blend of humor and ire, the narrative ranges effortlessly across the contemporary scene. He shares his views on writing and speaking, his preoccupation with money, and his contempt for the politics and politicians of his day. Affectionate and scathing by turns, his intractable curiosity and candor are everywhere on view.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/624338 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr. Author: Ron Chernow Narrator: Grover Gardner Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 35 hours 4 minutes Release date: August 15, 2013 Ratings: Ratings of Book: 4.5 of Total 2 Ratings of Narrator: 3 of Total 1 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: John D. Rockefeller, Sr., history’s first billionaire and the patriarch of America’s most famous dynasty, is an icon whose true nature has eluded three generations of historians. Now Ron Chernow, a National Book Award–winning biographer, gives us a detailed and insightful history of the mogul. Titan is the first full-length biography based on unrestricted access to Rockefeller’s exceptionally rich trove of papers. A landmark publication full of startling revelations, the book indelibly alters our image of this most enigmatic capitalist. Born the son of a flamboyant, bigamous snake-oil salesman and a pious, straitlaced mother, Rockefeller rose from rustic origins to become the world’s richest man by creating America’s most powerful and feared monopoly, Standard Oil. Branded “the Octopus” by legions of muckrakers, the trust refined and marketed nearly 90 percent of the oil produced in America. Rockefeller was likely the most controversial businessman in our nation’s history. Critics charged that his empire was built on unscrupulous tactics: grand-scale collusion with the railroads, predatory pricing, industrial espionage, and wholesale bribery of political officials. The titan spent more than thirty years dodging investigations until Teddy Roosevelt and his trustbusters embarked on a marathon crusade to bring Standard Oil to bay. While providing abundant evidence of Rockefeller’s misdeeds, Chernow discards the stereotype of the cold-blooded monster to sketch an unforgettably human portrait of a quirky, eccentric original. A devout Baptist and temperance advocate, Rockefeller gave money more generously than anyone before him—his chosen philanthropies included the Rockefeller Foundation, the University of Chicago, and what is today Rockefeller University. Titan presents a finely nuanced portrait of a fascinating, complex man, synthesizing his public and private lives and disclosing numerous family scandals, tragedies, and misfortunes that have never before come to light. John D. Rockefeller’s story captures a pivotal moment in American history, documenting the dramatic post–Civil War shift from small business to the rise of giant corporations that irrevocably transformed the nation. With cameos by Joseph Pulitzer, William Randolph Hearst, Jay Gould, William Vanderbilt, Ida Tarbell, Andrew Carnegie, Carl Jung, J. P. Morgan, William James, Henry Clay Frick, Mark Twain, and Will Rogers, Titan turns Rockefeller’s life into a vivid tapestry of American society in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It is Ron Chernow’s signal triumph that he writes this monumental saga with all the sweep, drama, and insight that this giant subject deserves.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/628812 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Kissinger: A Biography Author: Walter Isaacson Narrator: Malcolm Hillgartner Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 34 hours 30 minutes Release date: July 10, 2013 Ratings: Ratings of Book: 5 of Total 1 Ratings of Narrator: 5 of Total 1 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: By the time Henry Kissinger was made secretary of state in 1973, he had become, according to a Gallup poll, the most admired person in America and one of the most unlikely celebrities ever to capture the world's imagination. Yet Kissinger was also reviled by large segments of the American public, ranging from liberal intellectuals to conservative activists. Kissinger explores the relationship between this complex man's personality and the foreign policy he pursued. Drawing on extensive interviews with Kissinger as well as 150 other sources, including US presidents and his business clients, this first full-length biography makes use of many of Kissinger's private papers and classified memos to tell his uniquely American story. The result is an intimate narrative, filled with surprising revelations, that follows this grandly colorful statesman from his childhood as a persecuted Jew in Nazi Germany, through his tortured relationship with Richard Nixon, to his later years as a globe-trotting business consultant.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/624222 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Over the Top Author: Arthur Guy Empey Narrator: Joe Barrett Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 6 hours 40 minutes Release date: May 21, 2013 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: In 1915, the British ocean liner Lusitania was making its way from New York to Liverpool when it was sunk by a German U-boat, shocking the world with the massive death toll. Infuriated by the tragedy, Arthur Guy Empey, an American citizen, traveled to England to enlist in the Royal Fusiliers, as the United States had not yet entered the war. Over the Top tells the story of Empey's experiences in a voice straight from the western front, causing listeners to feel as if they are right there in the trenches. This book was the biggest bestseller of the war, with sales totaling a million copies. Perhaps one of its most entertaining features is the appendix entitled 'Tommy's Dictionary of the Trenches,' which defines slang and other terms used by British soldiers. The book remains a classic, the fascinating story of an American soldier fighting in the British Army.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/628809 to listen full audiobooks. Title: How to Be a Friend to a Friend Who’s Sick Author: Letty Cottin Pogrebin Narrator: Pam Ward Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 9 hours 26 minutes Release date: April 9, 2013 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: Everyone knows someone who's sick or suffering. Yet when a friend or relative is under duress many of us feel uncertain about how to cope. Throughout her recent bout with breast cancer, Letty Cottin Pogrebin became fascinated by her friends' and family's diverse reactions to her and her illness: how awkwardly some of them behaved, how some misspoke or misinterpreted her needs, and how wonderful it was when people read her right. She began talking to her fellow patients and dozens of other veterans of serious illness, seeking to discover what sick people wished their friends knew about how best to comfort, help, and even simply talk to them. Now Pogrebin has distilled their collective stories and opinions into this wide-ranging compendium of pragmatic guidance and usable wisdom. Her advice is always infused with sensitivity, warmth, and humor. It is embedded in candid stories from her own and others' journeys and their sometimes imperfect interactions with well-meaning friends. How to Be a Friend to a Friend Who's Sick is an invaluable guidebook for anyone hoping to rise to the challenges of this most important and demanding passage of friendship.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/628803 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Thaddeus Stevens: Nineteenth-Century Egalitarian Author: Hans L. Trefousse Narrator: Tom Weiner Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 10 hours 50 minutes Release date: February 1, 2013 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: One of the most controversial figures in nineteenth-century American history, Thaddeus Stevens is best remembered for his role as congressional leader of the radical Republicans and as a chief architect of Reconstruction. Long painted by historians as a vindictive 'dictator of Congress,' out to punish the South at the behest of big business and his own ego, Stevens receives a more balanced treatment in Hans L. Trefousse's biography, which portrays him as an impassioned orator and a leader in the struggle against slavery. Trefousse traces Stevens' career through its major phases, from his days in the Pennsylvania state legislature, when he antagonized Freemasons, slaveholders, and Jacksonian Democrats, to his political involvement during Reconstruction, when he helped author the Fourteenth Amendment and spurred on the passage of the Reconstruction Acts and the impeachment of Andrew Johnson. Throughout, Trefousse explores the motivations for Stevens' lifelong commitment to racial equality, thus furnishing a fuller portrait of the man whose fervent opposition to slavery helped move his more moderate congressional colleagues toward the implementation of egalitarian policies.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/624562 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Up from Slavery Author: Booker T. Washington Narrator: Noah Waterman Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 6 hours 8 minutes Release date: November 26, 2012 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: Booker T. Washington fought his way out of slavery to become an educator, statesman, political shaper, and proponent of the “do it yourself” idea. In his autobiography, he describes his early life as a slave on a Virginia plantation, his steady rise during the Civil War, his struggle for education, his schooling at the Hampton Institute, and his years as founder and president of the Tuskegee Institute in Alabama, which was devoted to helping minorities learn useful, marketable skills. He gives an account of his travels, speeches, and meetings with various leaders, including Theodore Roosevelt in the White House. Employing a didactic tone, Washington deftly sets forth his belief that the black man’s salvation lies in education, industriousness, and self-reliance. This is the true-life story of a man of real courage and dedication.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/624557 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Churchill: The Prophetic Statesman Author: James C. Humes Narrator: Matthew Brenher Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 6 hours 8 minutes Release date: November 19, 2012 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: Churchill: The Prophetic Statesman reveals the astonishingly accurate predictions of Britain’s most famous prime minister and how his critics’ perceptions of them shaped his political career. Who could have foreseen the start of World War I twenty-five years before the assassination of a Serbian archduke plunged Europe into war? Who could have predicted the rise of al-Qaeda nearly eight decades before anyone had heard of Osama bin Laden? Winston Churchill did. Now for the first time, bestselling author James C. Humes reveals these and other shocking predictions made by this legendary figure. Churchill didn’t need a crystal ball to tell the future. Using his skills as a historian, he studied patterns of the past to make his eerily accurate forecasts, including the rise of European fascism, the fall of the Iron Curtain, and the exact day of his own death as he entered his final years. In fascinating detail, Humes’ astonishing biography documents the spot-on prophecies Churchill foretold and the political consequences he endured for sharing them.

Please visit https://thebookvoice.com/podcasts/1/audiobook/628157 to listen full audiobooks. Title: Son of the Wilderness: The Life of John Muir Author: Linnie Marsh Wolfe Narrator: James Armstrong Format: Unabridged Audiobook Length: 13 hours 57 minutes Release date: November 16, 2012 Genres: History & Culture Publisher's Summary: All who have admired John Muir's ruggedly individualistic lifestyle, or who desire a greater appreciation of the history of environmental preservation in America, will be enthralled and enlightened by this Pulitzer Prize–winning biography. Following Muir from his ancestral home in Scotland, through his early years in the harsh Wisconsin wilderness, to his historic pilgrimage to California, Linnie Marsh Wolfe creates a full and rounded portrait of her subject—not only as America's firebrand conservationist and founder of the national park system but as a committed husband, father, and friend. Muir was a multifaceted character, shaped as much by his stern and liberty-loving Scottish heritage as by his love of all things wild and free. His battles against the encroachment of civilization were actually born of his love for it, for he was one of the few to realize that the destruction of the wilderness would diminish man himself. This book, originally published in 1945 and based in large part on Wolfe's personal interviews with people who knew and worked with Muir, is one that could never be written again. It is, and will remain, the standard Muir biography.