Jonathan Eig has 4 audiobooks on Listento.it, narrated by 4 narrators, with an average listener rating of 4.8★ across 43 ratings. The most-rated is Ali.
Ali
Summary
The definitive biography of an American icon, from a New York Times best-selling author with unique access to Ali's inner circle He was the wittiest, the prettiest, the strongest, the bravest, and, of course, the greatest (as he told us over and over again). Muhammad Ali was one of the 20th century's greatest radicals and most compelling figures. At his funeral in 2016, eulogists said Ali had transcended race and united the country, but they got it wrong. Race was the theme of Ali's life. He insisted that America come to grips with a black man who wasn't afraid to speak out or break the rules. He didn't overcome racism. He called it out. "I am America," he once declared. "I am the part you won't recognize. But get used to me - black, confident, cocky; my name, not yours; my religion, not yours; my goals, my own. Get used to me." Ali went from being one of the most despised men in the country to one of the most beloved. But until now, he has never been the subject of a complete, unauthorized biography. Jonathan Eig, hailed by Ken Burns as one of America's master storytellers, breaks new ground and radically reshapes our understanding of the slippery figure who was Muhammad Ali. Eig had access to all the key people in Ali's life, including his three surviving wives and his managers. He also had access to thousands of pages of new FBI and Justice Department files as well dozens of hours of newly discovered audiotaped interviews from the 1960s. Jonathan Eig's Ali breaks bold new ground, revealing Ali in the complexity he deserves, shedding important new light on his politics and his neurological condition. Ali is a story about race, about a brutal sport, and about a fascinating man who shook up the world.
©2017 Jonathan Eig (P)2017 Recorded Books
Luckiest Man
Summary
Lou Gehrig was the Iron Horse, baseball's strongest and most determined superstar, struck down in his prime by a disease that now bears his name. But who was Lou Gehrig, really?
Lou Gehrig is regarded as the greatest first baseman in baseball history. A muscular but clumsy athlete who grew up in New York City, he idolized his hardworking mother and remained devoted to her all his life. Shy and socially awkward, Gehrig was a misfit on a Yankee team that included drinkers and hell-raisers, most notably Babe Ruth.
Gehrig and Ruth formed the greatest slugging tandem in baseball history. They were the heart of the first great Yankee dynasty. After Ruth's retirement, Gehrig and a young Joe DiMaggio would begin a new era of Yankee dominance. But Luckiest Man reveals that Gehrig was afflicted with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) much sooner than anyone believes, as early as the spring of 1938. Despite the illness, he didn't miss a game that year, keeping intact his astonishing consecutive-games streak, which stood for more than half a century.
In Luckiest Man, Jonathan Eig brings to life a figure whose shyness and insecurity obscured his greatness during his lifetime. Gehrig emerges as more human and more heroic than ever.
©2005 Jonathan Eig (P)2010 Simon and Schuster Audio
Get Capone
Summary
Acclaimed journalist and best-selling author Jonathan Eig blows the lid off the Al Capone story. Based on never-before-seen government documents and newly discovered letters written by Al Capone himself, Get Capone presents America's greatest gangster as you’ve never seen him before. In addition to IRS files, Eig got hold of the personal papers of the U.S. attorney in Chicago who prosecuted Capone. He even found family members who would share stories about their notorious relative. The author, a former reporter for the Wall Street Journal, brings his uncompromising standards for research and his superb knack for storytelling to one of the most thrilling stories in American history. This eye-opening biography reveals that Capone was the target of one of the most intense criminal investigations in American history - with orders coming directly from the White House. Capone flaunted his criminal success so openly that President Hoover insisted the gangster be stopped. And, despite his many misdeeds, Capone may have been the victim of a rigged trial. Get Capone also offers a bold new theory to explain the Valentine's Day Massacre and sheds new light on Capone's connection - or lack thereof - to the crime.
©2010 Jonathan Eig (P)2010 Tantor
Opening Day
Summary
April 15, 1947, marked the most important opening day in baseball history. When Jackie Robinson stepped onto the diamond that afternoon at Ebbets Field, he became the first Black man to break into major-league baseball. World War II had just ended. Democracy had triumphed. Now Americans were beginning to press for justice on the home front, and Robinson had a chance to lead the way. He was an unlikely hero. He had little experience in organized baseball. His swing was far from graceful. And he was assigned to play first base, a position he had never tried before that season. But the biggest concern was his temper. Robinson was an angry man who played an aggressive style of ball. In order to succeed, he would have to control himself in the face of what promised to be a brutal assault by opponents of integration. Drawing on interviews with surviving players, sportswriters, and eyewitnesses, as well as newly discovered material from archives around the country, Jonathan Eig presents a fresh portrait of a ferocious competitor who embodied integration's promise and helped launch the modern civil-rights era. Full of new details and thrilling action, Opening Day brings to life baseball's ultimate story.
©2007 Jonathan Eig (P)2007 Tantor Media Inc.