Gordon Griffin has narrated 136 audiobooks on Listento.it by 63 authors, with an average listener rating of 4.4★ across 116 ratings. The most-rated is The Razor's Edge.
The Razor's Edge
Summary
Larry Darrell is a young American in search of the absolute. The progress of this spiritual odyssey involves him with some of Maugham's most brilliant characters: his fiancée Isabel, whose choice between love and wealth have lifelong repercussions; and Elliot Templeton, her uncle, a classic expatriate American snob. The most ambitious of Maugham's novels, this is also one in which Maugham himself plays a considerable part as he wanders in and out of the story, to observe his characters struggling with their fates. William Somerset Maugham (25 January 1874 – 16 December 1965) was an English playwright, novelist and short story writer. He was among the most popular writers of his era and reputedly the highest paid author of the 1930s. Maugham was orphaned by the age of ten, but after an unhappy childhood, he flourished when he moved to London to study medicine as a young man, giving him plenty of inspiration for his literary ambitions. His first novel, Liza Of Lambeth, sold out in a matter of weeks, prompting Maugham to leave medicine and embark on a 65-year career as a man of letters. By 1914 he was famous, with ten successful plays produced and ten novels published. In 1917, he was asked by the British Secret Intelligence Service (now MI6) to undertake a special mission in Russia; an experience which would go on to inspire Ashenden, a collection of short stories about a gentlemanly spy that influenced Ian Fleming’s James Bond series. Maugham’s most famous works include Of Human Bondage, a semiautobiographical novel, The Moon and Sixpence, Cakes and Ale and The Razor's Edge. His writing has inspired a string of over 35 film adaptations and has influenced many notable authors, including Anthony Burgess, George Orwell and Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
©1944 Somerset Maugham (P)2012 Audible Ltd
The Phantom of the Opera
Summary
The lights dim at the Paris Opera House. The exquisite Christine Daae enraptures the audience with her mellifluous voice. Immediately, Raoul de Chagny falls deeply in love. But the legend of the disfigured opera ghost haunts the performance, and as Raoul begins his pursuit of Christine, he is pulled into the depths of the opera house, and into the depths of human emotions. Soon Raoul discovers that the ghost is real and that he wields a terrifying power over Christine; a power as unimaginable as the ghost's masked face. As Raoul and the ghost vie for Christine's love, a journey begins into the dark recesses of the human heart, where desire, vulnerability, fear, and violence unravel in a tragic confrontation.
Public Domain (P)2017 Dreamscape Media, LLC
The Island of Dr. Moreau
Summary
Englishman Edward Prendick finds himself shipwrecked on the open ocean. When a passing ship takes him aboard and revives him, things are starting to look less gloomy for the young scientist. Yet little does he know things about to get much worse. He is taken to an abandoned island occupied only by Dr. Moreau, a disgraced English scientist for his unethical treatment of live creatures. Prendick finds that the Doctor has been up to old habits, using the island's animals to create animal-human hybrids. Prendick must learn to survive among these creatures, while uncovering even more deadly mysteries about the doctor and the strange inhabitants of the island in this classic sci-fi tale.
©public domain (P)2016 Dreamscape Media, LLC
Tell it to the Bees
Summary
Lydia Weekes is distraught at the break-up of her marriage. When her young son, Charlie, makes friends with the local doctor, Jean Markham, her life is turned upside down. Charlie tells his secrets to no one but the bees, but even he can’t keep his mother’s friendship to himself. The locals don’t like things done differently. As Lydia and the doctor become closer, the rumours start to fly and threaten to shatter Charlie’s world.
©2009 Fiona Shaw (P)2010 Random House Audio
The Gift of Rain
Summary
In the tradition of celebrated wartime storytellers Somerset Maugham and Graham Greene, Tan Twan Eng's debut novel casts a powerful spell. For the first time, available as an audiobook. The recipient of extraordinary acclaim from critics and the book-selling community, Tan Twan Eng's debut novel casts a powerful spell and has garnered comparisons to celebrated wartime storytellers Somerset Maugham and Graham Greene. Set during the tumult of World War II, on the lush Malayan island of Penang, The Gift of Rain tells a riveting and poignant tale about a young man caught in the tangle of wartime loyalties and deceits. In 1939, 16-year-old Philip Hutton - the half-Chinese, half-English youngest child of the head of one of Penang's great trading families - feels alienated from both the Chinese and British communities. He at last discovers a sense of belonging in his unexpected friendship with Hayato Endo, a Japanese diplomat. Philip proudly shows his new friend around his adored island, and in return Endo teaches him about Japanese language and culture and trains him in the art and discipline of aikido. But such knowledge comes at a terrible price. When the Japanese savagely invade Malaya, Philip realizes that his mentor and sensei - to whom he owes absolute loyalty - is a Japanese spy. Young Philip has been an unwitting traitor, and must now work in secret to save as many lives as possible, even as his own family is brought to its knees.
©2009 Tan Twan Eng (P)2018 Hachette Audio
Plaidoyer pour l'altruisme
Summary
Abreuvés d'images violentes, confrontés à une société en crise, on sous-estime la force de la bienveillance, la banalité du bien et le pouvoir de transformation qu'une attitude altruiste peut avoir sur nos vies au plan individuel et, partant, sur la société tout entière. Plaidoyer pour l'altruisme est la somme de cinq années de recherches, de rencontres, d'expériences, d'observation et de réflexion. Ainsi, pour l'auteur, l'homme est d'abord un "coopérateur". Rétablir la pratique de l'altruisme et de la bienveillance au niveau individuel et social changerait la face du monde, libérant des forces créatrices bien plus efficaces que celles générées par la compétition. Ces morceaux choisis ont pour dessein d'offrir à l'auditeur une première approche de cet ouvrage passionnant, fondé sur l'observation et les sciences du comportement ; ainsi que les outils lui permettant de restaurer la pratique de l'altruisme. Et surtout ils redonnent à l'altruisme la place éminente qu'il occupe au sein d'une humanité dont il assure l'épanouissement. Une interprétation maîtrisée qui décuple la force d'un texte refondateur de valeurs essentielles à l'humanité.
©2013 NiL éditions, Paris (P)2013 Audiolib
Alan Turing: The Enigma
Summary
Listed as one of the essential 50 books of all time in The Guardian Inspired the Academy Award-nominated film, The Imitation Game It’s only a slight exaggeration to say that the British mathematician Alan Turing (1912-1954) saved the Allies from the Nazis, invented the computer and artificial intelligence, and anticipated gay liberation by decades--all before his suicide at age forty-one. This classic biography of the founder of computer science, reissued on the centenary of his birth with a substantial new preface by the author, is the definitive account of an extraordinary mind and life. A gripping story of mathematics, computers, cryptography, and homosexual persecution, Andrew Hodges's acclaimed book captures both the inner and outer drama of Turing's life.Hodges tells how Turing's revolutionary idea of 1936--the concept of a universal machine--laid the foundation for the modern computer and how Turing brought the idea to practical realization in 1945 with his electronic design. The book also tells how this work was directly related to Turing's leading role in breaking the German Enigma ciphers during World War II, a scientific triumph that was critical to Allied victory in the Atlantic. At the same time, this is the tragic story of a man who, despite his wartime service, was eventually arrested, stripped of his security clearance, and forced to undergo a humiliating treatment program--all for trying to live honestly in a society that defined homosexuality as a crime.
©2012 Andrew Hodges (P)2012 Audible Ltd
Rooftoppers
Summary
Everyone thinks that Sophie is an orphan. Found floating in a cello case, she is the only recorded female survivor of a shipwreck on the English Channel. But Sophie remembers seeing her mother wave for help… When the child welfare agency threatens to send Sophie to an orphanage, Sophie and her guardian flee to Paris to find her mother, starting with the only clue she has - the address of the cello maker.
©2013 Katherine Rundell (P)2014 W F Howes Ltd
The Mallen Streak
Summary
Thomas Mallen of High Banks Hall had many sons, most of them bastards. But to all of them he passed on his mark - a distinctive flash of white hair running to the left temple, known as the Mallen Streak. It was said that those who bore the streak seldom reached old age and that nothing good ever came of a Mallen. In 1851, Thomas Mallen found himself a ruined man, forced amid scandal and disgrace to sell the hall. With him went his two young wards and their indomitable governess. Then the Radlet brothers of Wilbur Farm arrived, one of whom bore the unmistakable Mallen Streak.
©2013 The Catherine Cookson Charitable Trust 1978 (P)2018 Isis Publishing Ltd
Earthly Powers
Summary
Kenneth Toomey is an eminent novelist of dubious talent; Don Carlo Campanati is a man of God, a shrewd manipulator who rises through the Vatican to become the architect of church revolution and a candidate for sainthood. These two men are linked not only by family ties but by a common understanding of mankind's frailties. In this epic masterpiece, Anthony Burgess plumbs the depths of the essence of power and the lengths men will go for it.
©1980 Anthony Burgess (P)2014 Audible Studios
Shadows in Bronze
Summary
I was the new boy, so they saddled me with the worst jobs. Rome, AD 71. Against his better judgement, Falco secretly disposes of a decayed corpse for the Emperor Vespasian, then heads for the beautiful Bay of Naples with his best friend Petronius. He conveniently forgets to mention to his companion that this will be no holiday. They have been sent to investigate the murderous members of a failed coup, now sunning themselves in luxurious villas and on fancy yachts. The idyllic seaside location further complicates his seemingly doomed romance with Helena Justina. The deeper he probes, the more it seems Helena is inextricably connected to the elite plotters, in ways that the smitten Falco cannot bear to contemplate.
©1991 Lindsey Davis (P)2014 Audible Studios
Horses, Heifers and Hairy Pigs
Summary
From his childhood love of animals, through his training and first steps in the profession and the pressures and challenges faced by vets, dealing with unexpected exotic pets - and handling excitable humans too - Julian Norton has seen all sides of the veterinary world and writes about it all with humour and affection. Just as happy calving a cow, treating a dehydrated chameleon or tending to the overgrown teeth of a rabbit, his passion for his work shines through in every chapter, as does his love for Yorkshire. With a foreword by James Herriott's son Jim Wight, Julian's story brings to life the world of the working vet and the highs and lows he and his colleagues face on a daily basis.
©2016 Julian Norton (P)2017 Soundings
Saigon
Summary
Joseph Sherman first visits Saigon, the capital of French colonial Cochin-China, in 1925 on a hunting expedition with his father, a US senator. He is lured back again and again as a traveler, a soldier, and then as a reporter by his fascination for the exotic land and for Lan, a mandarin's daughter he cannot forget. Over five decades, Joseph's life becomes enmeshed with the political intrigues of two of Saigon's most influential families, the French colonist Devrauxs, and the native Trans - and inevitably with Vietnam's turbulent, war torn fate. He is there when the hatred of a million coolies rises against the French, and when the French Foreign Legion fights it's bloody last stand at Dien Bien Phu.
©2016 Anthony Grey (P)2016 Dreamscape Media, LLC
The History Book
Summary
Discover the key themes and big ideas behind more than 80 of the world's most important historical events - from the dawn of civilization to the 21st century.
From the origins of Homo sapiens to the Space Race, and from the French Revolution to the Digital Revolution, this installment in the best-selling Big Ideas series offers an essential exploration of the human timeline up to and including the rise of modern Islam, the World Wide Web, and the global financial crisis. Making big historical ideas accessible and easy to understand, with stunning facts and memorable quotes, The History Book audiobook is perfect for students, adults, or anyone who wants to travel back in time and understand the fascinating past of mankind.
Narrated by Gordon Griffin, a prolific audiobook narrator who, for many years, has been a voiceover specialist recording over 850 audiobooks. AudioFile Magazine wrote: "Griffin is not just a narrator, but an artist of the Spoken Word. He is in the top five of the most borrowed audiobook narrators in the world." In 2017, Griffin was appointed MBE in the Queen's Birthday Honours List "for services to people with sight impairment".
©2016 Dorling Kindersley Ltd. (P)2019 DK Audio
The Moth Snowstorm
Summary
Michael McCarthy, one of Britain's leading writers on the environment, proposes this joy as a defence of a natural world which is ever more threatened and which, he argues, is inadequately served by the two defences put forward hitherto: sustainable development and the recognition of ecosystem services. Drawing on a wealth of memorable experiences from a lifetime of watching and thinking about wildlife and natural landscapes, McCarthy presents a new way of looking at the world.
©2015 Michael McCarthy (P)2015 W F Howes Ltd
The Lake District Murder
Summary
Luke flung the light of his torch full onto the face of the immobile figure. Then he had the shock of his life. The man had no face! Where his face should have been was a sort of inhuman, uniform blank! When a body is found at an isolated garage, Inspector Meredith is drawn into a complex investigation where every clue leads to another puzzle: was this a suicide or something more sinister? Why was the dead man planning to flee the country? And how is this connected to the shady business dealings of the garage? This classic mystery tale is set amidst the stunning scenery of a small village in the Lake District.
©2014 Martin Edwards (P)2016 Soundings
Ode to a Banker
Summary
"The first concern of an author is to do down his colleagues." In the long, hot Roman summer of AD 74, Falco, private informer and spare-time poet, gives a reading for his family and friends. Things get out of hand, as usual. The event is taken over by Aurelius Chrysippus, a wealthy Greek banker and patron to a group of struggling writers, who offers to publish Falco's work. A visit to the Chrysippus scriptorium implicates Falco in a gruesome literary murder, so when commissioned to investigate, Falco is forced to accept. Lindsey Davis' twelfth novel wittily explores Roman publishing and banking, taking us from the jealousies of authorship and the mire of patronage to the darker financial world, where default can have fatal consequences.
©2000 Lindsey Davis (P)2015 Audible, Ltd
The Merchant's House
Summary
DS Wesley Peterson, newly arrived in the West Country town of Tradmouth, has his hands full when a child goes missing and a young woman is brutally murdered on a lonely cliff path. Then his old friend, archaeologist Neil Watson, unearths the skeletons of a strangled woman and a newborn baby in the cellar of an ancient merchant's house nearby. As the investigation continues, Wesley begins to suspect that these deaths, centuries apart, may be linked by age-old motives of jealousy, a sexual obsession and desperate longing. And the pressure is on if he is going to prevent a further tragedy....
©1998 Kate Ellis (P)2017 Soundings
Night Raid
Summary
The loss of British bombers over Occupied Europe began to reach alarming levels in 1941. Could it be that the Germans were using a sophisticated form of radar to direct their night fighters and anti-aircraft guns at the British bombers? British aerial reconnaissance discovered what seemed to be a rotating radar tower on a clifftop at Bruneval, near Le Havre. The truth must be revealed. The decision was taken to launch a daring raid on the Bruneval site to try and capture the technology for further examination. The planned airborne assault would be extremely risky. The parachute regiment had only been formed a year before on Churchill's insistence. This night raid would test the men to the extreme limits of their abilities. Night Raid tells the gripping tale of this mission from the planning stages, to the failed rehearsals when the odds seemed stacked against them, to the night of the raid itself, and the scientific secrets that were discovered thanks to the paras' precious cargo - the German radar. Its capture was of immense importance in the next stages of the war and the mission itself marked the birth of the legend of the 'Red Devils'.
©2013 Taylor Downing (P)2014 Soundings
Is There Life Outside the Box?
Summary
Peter Davison became a national treasure for having his arm up a cow in his role as Tristan Farnon in All Creatures Great and Small. Then, in 1981, he secured his place in science fiction history by becoming the fifth Doctor Who. The Time Lord connection continued with the marriage of his daughter Georgia to Dr Who number ten, David Tennant. Davison has starred in countless television series over the last 42 years including Love for Lydia, A Very Peculiar Practice, At Home with the Braithwaites and The Last Detective. This autobiography reveals life inside the box.
©2016 Peter Davison (P)2017 Story Sound