David Shaw-Parker has narrated 22 audiobooks on Listento.it by 15 authors, with an average listener rating of 4.4★ across 126 ratings. The most-rated is The Pilgrim's Progress.
The Pilgrim's Progress
Summary
For 300 years, The Pilgrim's Progress has remained perhaps the best-loved and most read of devotional fictions. In plain yet powerful and moving language, Bunyan tells the story of Christian's struggle to attain salvation and the Gates of Heaven. He must pass through the Slough of Despond, ward off the temptations of Vanity Fair, and fight the monstrous Apollyon. In Part II, his wife and children follow the same path, helped and protected by Great-heart, until for them, too, "the trumpets sound on the other side." PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your My Library section along with the audio.
Public Domain (P)2013 Naxos AudioBooks
The Warden - Chronicles of Barsetshire, Book 1
Summary
The first novel in Trollope’s Chronicles of Barsetshire, The Warden is a compassionate portrait of the gentle, thoughtful warden and precentor of Barchester Cathedral, Mr. Septimus Harding. Loved and appreciated by all with whom he works, Harding lives an ordered, regular life in his protected religious environment. Then one day, a young reformer feels he has uncovered a mismanagement of funds and Harding is held to blame. The accusation comes as a shock not only to Harding himself but also to the cathedral community. It then comes to wider notice when the cause is taken up by a national newspaper. Trollope’s insight into character, his abundant imagination, and his sheer narrative skill are at their peak in The Warden.
Public Domain (P)2013 Naxos AudioBooks
The Politics Book
Summary
This invaluable, easy-to-understand guide to world politics and government offers an accessible introduction to more than 80 of the most important theories and big ideas of leaders and politicians throughout history.
The Politics Book makes government and politics easy to understand by explaining the big ideas simply. The key events in political history are outlined from the origins of political thinking by Confucius and Aristotle to modern-day activists such as Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela. This audiobook breaks down their important concepts into bite-size chunks to make the subject accessible to students of politics and anyone with an interest in how government works.
Filled with thought-provoking quotes from great political thinkers such as Nietzsche, Malcolm X, Karl Marx, and Mao Zedong, The Politics Book, narrated by David Shaw-Parker, gives context to the world of government and power.
©2013 Dorling Kindersley Ltd (P)2019 DK Audio
Can You Forgive Her?
Summary
Young, attractive and wealthy, Alice Vavasor is a woman in the prime of her life. And yet one question torments her: "What should a woman do with her life?" Torn between the kind but dull Mr. Grey and her dangerous and exciting cousin George, she is prone to constant indecision and uncertainty, much to the detriment of Mr. Grey. Can You Forgive Her? is a crisp and engaging novel, brimming with romance, humor, and pathos. It is the first of six in Trollope's celebrated Palliser series.
Public Domain (P)2017 Naxos AudioBooks
The Way We Live Now
Summary
The Way We Live Now is a complex and compulsive tale that traces the career of Augustus Melmotte, a strange and mysterious financier who bursts into London society like a guided missile. In setting up a dubious scheme based on speculative money and stock market gambles, Melmotte manages to lure in several members of the English aristocracy, for whom money is the summum bonum. The world is at his feet - until the corruption catches up with him. Considered one of Trollope's greatest works, The Way We Live Now leaves the listener questioning whether much has changed in the last century or whether this, after all, is the way we live now.
Public Domain (P)2016 Naxos AudioBooks
The Prime Minister
Summary
When the liberal government falls and neither party is able to form a cabinet, Plantagenet Palliser is called upon to lead a coalition government. He is reluctant at first, and displays none of the charisma of his predecessors, but eventually he grows into the role. However, his confidence is short-lived as he becomes embroiled in a scandal involving the villainous Ferdinand Lopez - unintentionally brought about by Lady Glencora Palliser. Pronounced "a beautiful book" by Leo Tolstoy, The Prime Minister is a superb portrait of marriage and politics, and the compromises necessary for success in both. It is the fifth novel in Trollope's Palliser series. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying PDF will be available in your Audible Library along with the audio.
Public Domain (P)2019 Naxos AudioBooks
Phineas Finn
Summary
Phineas Finn, a handsome young man of 23, comes to England to make his fortune in parliamentary politics. But despite all his aspirations, Finn is haunted by ethical questions as his personal convictions conflict with his duty towards his party. Loyalty versus honor, love versus money, and privacy versus prominence: our eponymous hero faces a variety of dilemmas as he navigates his way through the House of Commons. The second installment of Trollope's celebrated Palliser series, Phineas Finn is a delightful and humorous look at the complexity of human relationships and the politics surrounding the Second Reform Bill of the 1860s. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.
Public Domain (P)2017 Naxos AudioBooks
Cursed
Summary
When Hedda Hellberg fails to return from a retreat in Italy where she has recently been grieving for her dead father, her husband discovers that her life is tangled in mystery. Hedda never left Oslo, the retreat has no record of her and, what's more, she appears to be connected to the murder of an old man gunned down on the first day of the hunting season in the depths of the Swedish forests....
©2017 Thomas Enger (P)2017 Audible, Ltd
Phineas Redux
Summary
Returned from Ireland after the death of his wife, Phineas Finn has a newfound ambition to rise through the ranks of English politics. But not long after regaining his seat in parliament, Phineas's luck begins to desert him. His reputation is tarnished after the press circulate rumours of an affair with Laura Kennedy, and his ambitions are frustrated by opposition from within the Party. Then, when his Party rival Mr Bonteen is discovered dead, all fingers point towards Phineas, leading to his incarceration and humiliation at the dock. How will he redeem himself, and who will come to his aid? Phineas Redux is a gripping look at the political stage in Victorian England. It is perhaps the most personal of Trollope's Palliser series, being coloured by the author's own experiences as a Liberal candidate between the time he wrote this and Phineas Finn.
Public Domain (P)2018 Naxos Audiobooks
Between Worlds
Summary
Ancient, rich, and strange, this collection of eerie tales from across Britain and Ireland have influenced our culture and the folklore that followed.
©2019 Dreamscape Media, LLC (P)2019 Dreamscape Media, LLC
Framley Parsonage
Summary
In Framley Parsonage, the fourth novel of Trollope's Chronicles of Barsetshire, the author leaves the confines of Barchester and looks to the countryside, where he relates the moral difficulties of Mark Robarts, the young clergyman who has recently been appointed Vicar of Framley. Desperate to keep up with the local aristocracy, the country parson is persuaded to underwrite the debts of Sowerby, a well-respected peer. However, when the debts are called in, Robarts finds himself in a serious predicament. Written with acute insight, together with a great deal of warmth and humour toward his characters' attendant charms and foibles, Framley Parsonage is sure to delight.
Public Domain (P)2014 Naxos AudioBooks
Dr Thorne
Summary
Dr Thorne, the third novel in Anthony Trollope's Chronicles of Barsetshire, sees Trollope steer away from the clergy and the church politics of The Warden and Barchester Towers and move towards the scandals and prejudice of the upper tiers of Victorian era aristocracies. It tells the tale of Frank Gresham and Mary Thorne, a couple intent on marriage despite their conflicting social backgrounds. Frank is engaged in a fierce battle with his family as his mother vehemently opposes the marriage and pushes him to marry a wealthy heiress; however, Frank shuns her attempts and is determined to accept Mary on her own terms. Dr Thorne contains all of Trollope’s beloved prose: always solicitous, gentle and kind to his audience, Trollope never shies away from poking fun at the pretentions of some of his characters as he peppers the narrative with wonderfully witty observations that will leave you smiling.
Public Domain (P)2014 Naxos AudioBooks
The Mammoth Book of Travel in Dangerous Places
Summary
The great explorers were the celebrities of their day - the romance and danger of their daring expeditions captured the public imagination and the world's headlines to an extraordinary degree. Not all of them lived to tell the tale, of course, but those who emerged triumphant from jungle, desert, or polar wasteland were hailed as if returning from beyond the grave. Journalists vied for their stories and publishers rushed their firsthand accounts of exciting and dangerous journeys into print for a wide and voracious readership. Acclaimed travel historian John Keay introduces this selection of the best of these firsthand narratives, including those of John Ross and John Franklin, writing about their experiences in the Arctic; Richard Burton's account of his search for the source of the Nile; John Speke on Lake Victoria; David Livingstone and Henry Stanley's adventures in central Africa; Alexander McKenzie's first crossing of America and Meriwether Lewis's encounter with the Shoshonee; Robert Peary and Roald Amundsen's voyages to the poles; and the poignant last words of William Wills in Australia and Robert Scott's In Extremis. Keay includes the experiences of four remarkable 20th-century explorers: Hiram Bingham on the discovery of Machu Picchu; Wilfred Thesiger on Arabia's Empty Quarter; Edmund Hillary on reaching the summit of Everest; and Harry St John Bridger Philby facing despair and defeat in the Arabian desert.
©2011 Jean Keay (P)2012 Constable & Robinson
The Monk and the Philosopher
Summary
Twenty-seven years ago, Matthieu Ricard gave up a promising career as a scientist to study Tibetan Buddhism - not as a detached observer but by immersing himself in its practice under the guidance of its greatest living masters. Years later, this project was born, and Richard met with his father, Jean-Francois Revel - a French philosopher who became world famous for his challenges to both Communism and Christianity. At an inn overlooking Kathmandu, these two profoundly thoughtful men explored questions that have occupied humankind throughout its history: Does life have meaning? What is consciousness? Is man free? What is the value of scientific and material progress? Why is there suffering, war, and hatred? Utterly absorbing, inspiring, and accessible, that conversation became this remarkable dialogue - one that engages East with West, ideas with life, and science with the humanities, providing wisdom concerning how to enrich the way we live our lives.
©1999 Jean-Francois Revel and Matthieu Ricard (P)2017 Dreamscape Media, LLC
Islamic Poetry - Volume 1 - The Mystics
Summary
Islam is one of the world’s great religions and over the centuries one of its strongest voices. For peace. For tolerance. For the realisation that we are all in this world together. Whatever our individual beliefs much of its teachings are wise words for us all. As Islam moved from its Arabian heartland to a wider geographic area, its core message remained albeit adapted to different lands, to different ears. Poets were ever eager to provide an alternate way of delivering the ‘message’ in beautiful verse. Their simplicity was embracing, their ornateness a humble offering to greater forces. The poems here are both profound and wide-ranging. They give verse to thoughts that still preoccupy mankind as central to their message of love and humility. Civilisations may come and go, rise and fade, but culture and its arts linger on in oral histories and the written word. The contribution of these Mystic or Sufi poets comes in many forms. They view the world in ways that give us pause to reconsider our own. Obviously, translations come in many shades and hues, and even if the translator colours the original meaning of the poem, the essential truths remain. In this volume we have gathered many of the most celebrated of these ancient and classical verses by poets of the caliber and brilliance of Rumi, Kabir, Hafiz and many others. Their wise words illuminate much of what we search for.
©2019 Deadtree Publishing (P)2019 Copyright Group
The Duke's Children
Summary
Bereft of his beloved wife, Glencora, and his role as prime minister, Plantagenet Palliser enters the realm of family politics as he struggles to guide and connect with his three wayward children. Lord Silverbridge, the Duke's first born and natural inheritor, expelled from Oxford, a gambler at the racetrack and an elected Conservative, further troubles his father when he becomes engaged to Isabel Boncassen, a vibrant and witty American heiress of low social status. Lady Mary, his daughter, falls in love with a penniless young gentleman named Frank Tregear, while his second son, Gerald, displays similar behavior to his brother. The beleaguered duke must set aside his pride and accept their desires in order to restore happiness and harmony in the Palliser home. The Duke's Children brings Trollope's Palliser saga to a satisfying conclusion, and is here presented in its entirety, with over 65,000 words restored from the original manuscript by Steven Amarnick, assisted by Robert Wiseman, with Susan Humphreys.
©2015 The Trollope Society (P)2019 Naxos Audiobooks
The Eustace Diamonds
Summary
Before Sir Florian Eustace dies, he gives his beloved wife Lizzie a beautiful and expensive diamond necklace valued over £10,000. Dispute soon rages between the Eustace family and the manipulative and conniving Lizzie: it's claimed that the diamonds are a precious family heirloom, but Lizzie argues they were a gift. Is she lying? As the family's lawyer determines to reunite them with the jewels, Lizzie resorts to increasingly desperate measures, until one day the jewels are stolen. Who is responsible? The third novel in Trollope's Palliser series, The Eustace Diamonds is a wonderfully absorbing blend of dark cynicism and humor. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.
Public Domain (P)2017 Naxos AudioBooks
Last of the Few
Summary
After the fall of France in May 1940, the British Expeditionary Force was miraculously evacuated from Dunkirk. Britain now stood alone to face Hitler’s inevitable invasion attempt. For the German Army to be landed across the Channel, Hitler needed mastery of the skies – the RAF would have to be broken – so every day, throughout the summer, German bombers pounded the RAF air bases in the southern counties. Greatly outnumbered by the Luftwaffe, the pilots of RAF Fighter Command scrambled as many as five times a day, and civilians watched skies criss-crossed with the contrails from the constant dogfights between Spitfires and Me-109s. Britain’s very freedom depended on the outcome of that summer’s battle. Britain’s air defences were badly battered and nearly broken, but against all odds, ‘The Few’, as they came to be known, bought Britain’s freedom – many with their lives. These are the personal accounts of the pilots who fought and survived that battle. We will not see their like again.
©2010 Max Arthur (P)2010 Random House Audiobooks
Barchester Towers, Book 2
Summary
Barchester Towers, the sequel to The Warden, is the second novel in Trollope's major series, the Chronicles of Barsetshire. It focuses on the power struggle between Archdeacon Grantly, Mr. Slope and the Proudies as they fight for control of the diocese of Barchester. Meanwhile, another struggle is taking place for the heart of Eleanor Bold. Who will win her? The vile Mr. Slope, the idling Bertie Stanhope or someone else entirely? This is a witty and sparkling novel about greed, hate and love; Trollope captures the intricacy of human emotion and character with warmth, humor, wonderful characterization and, of course, perfect dialogue.PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.
Public Domain (P)2014 Naxos AudioBooks
The Mammoth Book of Bizarre Crimes
Summary
A gripping collection of stories of human criminality at its most bizarre. These unusual, sensational murders recall not only gruesome historical crimes, but also touch on shocking and macabre modern murders. Included are details of groundbreaking advances in crime detection, law enforcement, and forensic science. This is the top-secret report on the most grisly, and unusual, criminal activity of our time.
©2010 Constable & Robinson (P)2012 Constable & Robinson