Erik Bergmann has narrated 17 audiobooks on Listento.it by 15 authors, with an average listener rating of 4.4★ across 131 ratings. The most-rated is When to Rob a Bank.
When to Rob a Bank
Summary
Why do educated women get fewer responses on online dating websites? Is buying local food economically efficient? Does bribing kids improve their performance on school tests? Steven Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, the quirky geniuses behind Freakonomics, SuperFreakonomics, and Think Like a Freak, are back at it. For the last 10 years, they've used the tools of economics to answer some of our most unanswerable questions on the Freakonomics.com blog. Here, for the first time, the very best of their more than 8,000 posts are together in a single place. We learn why it's so hard to predict the Kentucky Derby, why babies born in summer tend to score lower on standardized tests, and why rich people tend to be happier than poor people but rich countries no happier than poor ones. When to Rob a Bank showcases the brilliance that has made Levitt and Dubner an international sensation and the eloquence and wit that has always made them such a joy to read and listen to.
©2015 Steven D. Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner (P)2015 HarperCollins Canada
Trident
Summary
Decorated Navy SEAL Lieutenant Jason Redman served his country courageously and with distinction in Columbia, Peru, Afghanistan, and Iraq, where he commanded mobility and assault forces. But his journey was not without its supreme challenges. He was critically wounded in 2007 when he was struck by machine-gun fire at point blank range. During his intense recovery period, Redman posted a sign on his door, warning all who entered not to "feel sorry for [his] wounds." His sign became both a statement and a symbol for wounded warriors everywhere. Vivid and powerful, emotionally resonant and illuminating, The Trident traces the evolution of a modern warrior, husband, and father, a man who has come to embody the never-say-die spirit that defines one of America's elite fighting forces.
©2013 Jason Redman (P)2013 HarperCollins Publishers
Smartcuts
Summary
Entrepreneur and journalist Shane Snow (Wired, Fast Company, The New Yorker, and cofounder of Contently) analyzes the lives of people and companies that do incredible things in an implausibly short time. How do some startups go from zero to billions in mere months? How did Alexander the Great, YouTube tycoon Michelle Phan, and Tonight Show host Jimmy Fallon climb to the top in less time than it takes most of us to get a promotion? What do high-growth businesses, world-class heart surgeons, and underdog marketers do in common to beat the norm? One way or another, they do it like computer hackers. They employ what psychologists call "lateral thinking": rethinking convention and breaking "rules" that aren't rules. These are not shortcuts, which produce often dubious short-term gains, but ethical "smartcuts" that eliminate unnecessary effort and yield sustainable momentum. In Smartcuts, Snow shatters common wisdom about success, revealing how conventions like "paying dues" prevent progress, why kids shouldn't learn times tables, and how, paradoxically, it's easier to build a huge business than a small one. From SpaceX to The Cuban Revolution, from Ferrari to Skrillex, Smartcuts is a narrative adventure that busts old myths about success and shows how innovators and icons do the incredible by working smarter - and how perhaps the rest of us can, too.
©2014 Shane Snow (P)2014 HarperCollins Publishers
Dark Predator
Summary
All new from the number-one New York Times best-selling author. As brutal as the undead he hunted, Zacarias De La Cruz was a master executioner. Now his stark and savage journey has ended. For his brothers, Zacarias had walked to the edge of madness, but with centuries as a killing machine now left to the past and without a hunt to define him, Zacarias wonders, for the first time in his life, who he really is. The answer awaits him back home, in Peru, in the betrayal of a woman who is readying her trap, in the vengeance of an old enemy, in the inevitable consequences of a bloody family legacy - and in the deliverance of a lifemate he never could have imagined.
©2011 Christine Feehan (P)2011 Penguin
Stand on Zanzibar
Summary
The brilliant 1969 Hugo Award-winning novel from John Brunner, Stand on Zanzibar, now includes a foreword by Bruce Sterling Niblock House is a rising executive at General Technics, one of a few all-powerful corporations. His work is leading General Technics to the forefront of global domination, both in the marketplace and politically - it's about to take over a country in Africa. Donald Hogan is his roommate, a seemingly sheepish bookworm. But Hogan is a spy, and he's about to discover a breakthrough in genetic engineering that will change the world...and kill him. These two men's lives weave through one of science fiction's most praised novels. Written in a way that echoes John Dos Passos' USA Trilogy, Stand on Zanzibar is a cross-section of a world overpopulated by the billions. Where society is squeezed into hive-living madness by god-like mega computers, mass-marketed psychedelic drugs, and mundane uses of genetic engineering. Though written in 1968, it speaks of now, and is frighteningly prescient and intensely powerful.
©1968 John Brunner (P)2011 Macmillan Audio
Dark Storm
Summary
A dark storm is on the horizon.... Return to Christine Feehan’s “steamy and dreamy” (Publishers Weekly) world of her New York Times best-selling Carpathian novels as roiling passions collide in a perfect storm of dangerous desire that only a precious few can hope to outrun.... Awakening after all this time in a world of absolute darkness and oppressive heat, Dax wonders in how many ways the world above must have changed. But it is how he has changed that fills him with dread and loathing. Buried alive for hundreds of years in a volcano in the Carpathian Mountains, Dax fears that he has become the full-fledged abomination that every Carpathian male fears, a victim of the insidious evil that has crept relentlessly into his mind and body over the centuries. But there are some things that never change. His name is Mitro, the vampire Dax had hunted all these long centuries. Second in command to the prince of the Carpathian people he is the epitome of everything malevolent, and perpetrator of one of the most shocking killing sprees known to man - and beast. Even his friends and family weren’t safe from Mitro’s bloodlust. Neither was Mitro’s lifemate, Arabejila, an extraordinary woman with extraordinary gifts. But now that Dax has re-emerged, so too has Mitro. The ultimate battle between good and evil has been re-engaged. Between Dax and Mitro, a violent game has begun - one that has marked Riley Parker, the last descendent of Arabejila, as the reward.
©2012 Christine Feehan (P)2012 Penguin Audio
This Dark Road to Mercy
Summary
Hailed as "mesmerizing" (New York Times Book Review) and "as if Cormac McCarthy decided to rewrite Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird" (Richmond Times-Dispatch), A Land More Kind Than Home made Wiley Cash an instant literary sensation. His resonant new novel, This Dark Road to Mercy, is a tale of love and atonement, blood and vengeance, a story that involves two young sisters, a wayward father, and an enemy determined to see him pay for his sins. When their mother dies unexpectedly, twelve-year-old Easter Quillby and her six-year-old sister, Ruby, are shuffled into the foster care system in Gastonia, North Carolina, a little town not far from the Appalachian Mountains. But just as they settle into their new life, their errant father, Wade, an ex-minor-league baseball player whom they haven't seen in years, suddenly reappears and steals them away in the middle of the night. Brady Weller, the girls' court-appointed guardian, begins looking for Wade, and quickly turns up unsettling information linking him to a multimillion-dollar robbery. But Brady isn't the only one hunting him. Also on the trail is Robert Pruitt, a mercurial man nursing a years-old vendetta, a man determined to find Wade and claim what he believes he is owed. The combination of Cash's evocative and intimate Southern voice and those of the alternating narrators, Easter, Brady, and Pruitt, brings this soulful story vividly to life. At once captivating and heartbreaking, This Dark Road to Mercy is a testament to the unbreakable bonds of family and the primal desire to outrun a past that refuses to let go.
©2014 Wiley Cash (P)2014 HarperCollinsPublishers
How the World Sees You
Summary
In How the World Sees You, author and personal branding expert Sally Hogshead applies the principles of fascination triggers to understanding "personality brands" - how individuals use different triggers to influence, persuade, and captivate others. You already know how you see yourself and the world. But how does the world see you? If you want to be heard and remembered, if you want people to take action on your ideas and opinions, then you need to get the full picture. Effective messages build a cause-and-effect cycle that creates action. Each time you communicate, you will either be heard, or you will be ignored. In How the World Sees You, Sally Hogshead reveals which triggers individuals inherently use when interacting with others. Through her extensive, in-depth proprietary research ranging from market studies to neuroscience, she presents a set of archetypes, or style of persuasion, of different personality brands designed to help individuals understand their strengths and weaknesses and the pros and cons of each. Inviting listeners to take an online assessment, she then explains their results and helps them develop new talents, create more productive teams, and hire ideal employees. How the World Sees You coaches listeners to focus not only on their strengths, but on the distinctive qualities and characteristics that make them different, not just better. As she persuasively shows, Different beats Good ever time. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.
©2014 Sally Hogshead (P)2014 HarperCollins Publishers
Robert Ludlum's The Moscow Vector
Summary
At an international medical conference in Prague, Dr. Fiona Devin, an American scientist attached to the Department of Defense, is contacted by one of her Russian colleagues. Dr. Valentin Petrenko, a specialist in rare diseases, is concerned about a small cluster of deaths in Moscow but even more concerned by the Russian government's refusal to publicly release any information or data on the outbreak. When he meets with Devin to pass on his case notes and samples, the two are attacked; Petrenko is killed while Devin barely escapes with the notes and medical samples. Covert-One operative Lt. Col. Jon Smith is dispatched to Prague to get Devin and her information safely back to the U.S. As Devin begins to analyze the information, a series of highly placed figures in the U.S. government become ill with a mysterious illness that bears a close resemblance to the disease described in Petrenko's notes. The disease is the perfect assassination tool: a bioweapon that, using each target's DNA, is undetectable, unstoppable, and incurable. With few clues and little time, Jon Smith must find the mysterious figure who stands at the center of this nefarious plot.
©2005 Myn Pyn, LLC (P)2005 Audio Renaissance, a division of Holtzbrinck Publishers, LLC
The Jury
Summary
Paul Madriani has ample reason to suspect he's representing a guilty man. Dr. David Crone, a respected medical researcher and principal in mapping the human genome, is charged with the murder of a young colleague: 26-year-old Kalista Jordan, an African-American research physician whose body washed up on a beach in San Diego Bay. Forensic evidence links her murder with material in Crone's garage. Crone had both opportunity and motive: Kalista had recently ended their affair, and may have been deserting him professionally as well, moving on to a rival genetic research facility. However, when a key witness for the prosecution dies unexpectedly, leaving an incriminating note behind, Crone's innocence seems confirmed - until Madriani hits upon a potentially damning loose end.
©2001 SPM, Inc. (P)2014 HarperCollins Publishers
The Attorney
Summary
"Riveting…a suspenseful tale, right up to the satisfying climax", wrote Publishers Weekly in praise of The Judge. "Legal thrillers don't get much better than this." Kirkus Reviews hailed Undue Influence as the "courtroom novel of the year". Now Martini delivers Paul Madriani's most challenging case yet: One pitting a drug-addicted mother against her daughter's newly rich grandfather in a contentious custody case that leads to criminal accusations and ultimately murder. Having moved to San Diego to be closer to the woman in his life, Madriani takes on the case of Jonah Hale, an elderly man in terrible straits. As a result of their only child Jessica's longtime drug addiction, Jonah and his wife have been raising their eight-year-old granddaughter, Amanda. On the heels of Jonah's multimillion-dollar state lottery win, Jessica revives her interest in mothering. When Jonah won't deal - maternal rights for a mega-bucks payoff - Jessica plays dirty: She accuses the old man of having sexually abused her as a child and similarly abusing Amanda now. Enter Zo Suade - a flamboyant, feminist activist with a penchant for making the objects of custody battles and their mother/plaintiffs "disappear". True to form, a week after Zo takes on Jessica's case, mother and daughter vanish. When Zo's body turns up, Jonah becomes the prime suspect. And Madriani is the man who can prove his innocence. Filled with action in and out of court, rich in characters with motives obvious and subtle, The Attorney marks the much-anticipated return of Paul Madriani.
©2000 SPM, Inc. (P)2014 HarperCollins Publishers
The Arraignment
Summary
"Lean, speedy, and packing a wallop of a plot twist" was Publishers Weekly's verdict of Steve Martini's The Jury. Now Martini crafts yet another legal nail-biter featuring perennial favorite attorney Paul Madriani. After a lawyer friend is killed along with his client in a hail of gunfire outside the federal courthouse in San Diego, Madriani takes on another client who he believes is involved at the edges of the double murder. He takes the case not to defend the man, but to find out who killed his friend and why. Madriani is tortured by questions of conflict, his duty to a client who may have killed his friend, and the need to know the truth, wondering whether he himself had been marked for death only to have a friend die in his place. Soon he is drawn into a vortex of crime that spans the Americas. As he searches for the killer, Madriani rides the crest of a dangerous wave of international drug deals and people who murder for money. Suddenly he realizes it is not heroin or cocaine that resulted in the murder of his friend, but a priceless piece of pre-Columbian art - something so dazzling in the information it holds as to be one of the treasures of the ages. In a quest that takes Madriani from California to Mexico and the Guatemalan border, he discovers that while the motive to kill may be driven by distant, exotic, and ancient artifacts, the killer, like a serpent, lies much closer at hand.
©2003 SPM, Inc. (P)2014 HarperCollins Publishers
Robert Ludlum's The Moscow Vector
Summary
At an international medical conference in Prague, Dr. Fiona Devin, an American scientist attached to the Department of Defense, is contacted by one of her Russian colleagues. Dr. Valentin Petrenko, a specialist in rare diseases, is concerned about a small cluster of deaths in Moscow but even more concerned by the Russian government's refusal to publicly release any information or data on the outbreak. When he meets with Devin to pass on his case notes and samples, the two are attacked; Petrenko is killed while Devin barely escapes with the notes and medical samples. Covert-One operative Lt. Col. Jon Smith is dispatched to Prague to get Devin and her information safely back to the U.S. As Devin begins to analyze the information, a series of highly placed figures in the U.S. government become ill with a mysterious illness that bears a close resemblance to the disease described in Petrenko's notes. The disease is the perfect assassination tool: a bioweapon that, using each target's DNA, is undetectable, unstoppable, and incurable. With few clues and little time, Jon Smith must find the mysterious figure who stands at the center of this nefarious plot.
©2005 Myn Pyn, LLC (P)2005 Audio Renaissance, a division of Holtzbrinck Publishers, LLC
Area 51: Excalibur
Summary
EXCALIBUR:
LOST RELIC.
LEGENDARY TALISMAN.
ULTIMATE WEAPON.
Once thought of as myth, the legendary sword of King Arthur is now a fiercely pursued reality - the most important artifact in a worldwide chess game for control of man’s destiny.
Two rival factions have made their move for domination of the planet. And now former Green Beret Mike Turcotte and his elite team must answer the call of duty. Their dilemma: Which army to align with? Choose wrong and evil holds domination over what’s left of humanity.
Only by tracking down the mythic artifact can Turcotte hope to resolve the crisis. His search will take him to the top of the world, to the summit of Mount Everest. But he has more to fear than bone-chilling cold and the thin air of the Death Zone, for he is not alone in the search for Excalibur.
From the Great Wall of China to a fortress on Easter Island, the players span the globe in this ultimate high-stakes game. They’ll have to decipher complex clues from deceptive sources to find the key that unlocks Excalibur’s power - a secret that has been carefully, meticulously hidden for five millennia. But one thing is clear: Excalibur is more than a myth. It may be the key to our survival - a powerful and sophisticated weapon that, if mastered, will determine the fate of humanity....
©2002 Bob Mayer (P)2003 Random House Audio
Area 51: Nosferatu
Summary
The shadows of history are their home. The blood of humans is their sustenance. Now the future belongs to them.... It began at the dawn of history, when a darkness rose from deep within an Egyptian tomb. For thousands of years - long before earth was plunged into an intergalactic battle for its survival - four deathless creatures sowed seeds of destruction and chaos. Surviving on the spilled blood of warriors and innocents from ancient Greece to the ashes of Nazi Germany, the creatures have played a role in conflicts great and small. Now, bound by their common ancestry, separated by their own devious ambitions, and armed with mankind's own modern tools of destruction, the deathless ones know that their time has come - and they have been called together by one brilliant leader. His name is Nosferatu. His vision is to become a god on earth. His ultimate weapon will be a Holy Grail, a force that no mortal man can defeat...but his deadliest enemy may be one of his own....
©2011 Bob Mayer (P)2012 Random House
The Fly on the Wall
Summary
Ace reporter John Cotton is a fly on the wall, seeing all, hearing all, and keeping out of sight. But the game changes when he finds his best friend's corpse sprawled on the marble floor of the central rotunda of the U.S. Capitol. Suddenly Cotton knows too much about a scandal centered around a senatorial candidate, a million-dollar scam, and a murder. And he hears the pursuing footsteps of powerful people who have something to hide... and a willingness to kill to keep their secrets hidden.
©1971 Tony Hillerman (P)2013 HarperCollinsPublishers
Black Mask 5: The Ring on the Hand of Death
Summary
From its launch in 1920 until its demise in 1951, the magazine Black Mask published pulp crime fiction. The first hard-boiled detective stories appeared on its pages. Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler, Erle Stanley Gardner and John D. MacDonald got their start in Black Mask. The urban crime stories that appeared in the magazine helped to shape American culture. Modern computer games, films, and television are rooted in the fiction popularized by “the seminal and venerated mystery pulp magazine”. ( Booklist). Otto Penzler selected and wrote introductions to the best of the best, the darkest of these dark, vintage stories for the collection The Black Lizard Big Book of Black Mask Stories. Now that collection is available for the first time on audio. Includes: “Knights of the Open Palm” by Carroll John Daly; read by Erik Bergmann the “Rainbow Diamonds” series of stories (“Diamonds of Dread,” “The Man in White,” “The Blind Chinese,” “Red Dawn,” “Blue Glass,” and “Diamonds of Death”) by Ramon Decolta; read by Johnny Heller “The Ring on the Hand of Death” by William Rollins Jr.; read by Dan Bittner
©2010 Compilation by Otto Penzler (P)2012 HighBridge Company