Lorna Raver has narrated 44 audiobooks on Listento.it by 49 authors, with an average listener rating of 4.5★ across 314 ratings. The most-rated is Cujo.
Marion Zimmer Bradley's Sword of Avalon
Summary
Epic in its sweep and peopled by the remarkable women who have always inhabited Avalon, Marion Zimmer Bradley's Sword of Avalon expands the legendary saga that has enchanted millions of readers over the years and is sure to please Bradley's loyal readership and anyone who loves wonderfully told stories of history, myth, and fantasy. A boy raised in secret after traitors kill his parents will return to Avalon---and when he does, he'll be faced with a formidable task: to prove his worth as a son of the kings and priestesses of his land and lead his followers to victory, wielding the newly forged sword Excalibur.
©2009 The Marion Zimmer Bradley Literary Trust and Diana L. Paxson (P)2009 Tantor
Lady Blue Eyes
Summary
Thirty years after she first heard his voice singing on the jukebox at her local drive-in, Barbara Ann Blakely heard Frank Sinatra take the wedding vows that began his fourth, final, and most enduring marriage. In Lady Blue Eyes, Barbara Sinatra's first public love letter to the husband she adored, she celebrates the sensational singer, possessive mate, sexy heartthrob, and devoted friend that she found in Frank. For more than two decades, Barbara was always by his side, traveling the globe and hosting glittering events for their famous friends, including presidents, kings, queens, Hollywood royalty, and musical legends. Among them were Sammy Davis, Jr., Princess Grace of Monaco, Bob Dylan, and Ronald Reagan. Each night, as Frank publicly wooed his bride with love songs from a concert stage, she'd fall in love with him all over again. From her own humble beginnings in a small town in Missouri to her time as a fashion model and her marriage to Zeppo Marx, Barbara Sinatra reveals a life lived with passion, conviction, and grace. A founder of the Miss Universe pageant and a onetime Vegas showgirl, she raised her only son almost single-handedly in often dire circumstances until, after five years of tempestuous courtship, she and Frank committed to each other wholeheartedly. In stories that leap off the page, she takes us behind the scenes of her iconic husband's legendary career and paints an intimate portrait of a man who was variously generous, jealous, witty, and wicked. Coupled with revealing insights about many of Frank's celebrated songs, this is much more than the story of a showbiz marriage. It is a story of passion and of a deep and lifelong love.
©2011 Barbara Sinatra (P)2011 Random House Audio
The Nine of Us
Summary
In this evocative and affectionate memoir, Ambassador Jean Kennedy Smith, the last surviving child of Joe and Rose Kennedy, offers an intimate and illuminating look at a time long ago when she and her siblings, guided by their parents, laughed and learned a great deal under one roof. Prompted by interesting tidbits in the newspaper, Rose and Joe Kennedy would pose questions to their nine children at the dinner table. "Where could Amelia Earhart have gone?" "How would you address this horrible drought?" "What would you do about the troop movements in Europe?" It was a nightly custom that helped shape the Kennedys into who they would become. Before Joe and Rose's children emerged as leaders on the world stage, they were a loving circle of brothers and sisters who played football, swam, read, and pursued their interests. They were children inspired by parents who instilled in them a strong work ethic, a deep love of country, and an intense appreciation for the sacrifices their ancestors made to come to America. "No whining in this house!" was their father's regular refrain. It was his way of reminding them not to complain, to be grateful for what they had, and to give back. In her remarkable memoir, Kennedy Smith - the last surviving sibling - revisits this singular time in their lives. Filled with fascinating anecdotes and vignettes, The Nine of Us vividly depicts this large, close-knit family during a different time in American history. Kennedy Smith offers indelible, elegantly rendered portraits of her larger-than-life siblings and her parents. "They knew how to cure our hurts, bind our wounds, listen to our woes, and help us enjoy life," she writes. "We were lucky children indeed."
©2016 Jean Kennedy Smith (P)2016 HarperCollins Publishers
Mrs. Astor Regrets
Summary
The fate of Brooke Astor, the endearing philanthropist with the storied name, has generated worldwide headlines since her grandson Philip sued his father in 2006, alleging mistreatment of Brooke. And shortly after her death in 2007, Anthony Marshall, Mrs. Astor's only child, was indicted on charges of looting her estate. Rarely has there been a story with such an appealing heroine, conjuring up a world so nearly forgotten: a realm of lavish wealth and secrets of the sort that have engaged Americans from the era of Edith Wharton to the more recent days of Truman Capote and Vanity Fair. New York journalist Meryl Gordon has interviewed not only the elite of Brooke Astor's social circle but also the large staff who cosseted and cared for Mrs. Astor during her declining years. The result is the behind-the-headlines story of the Astor empire's unraveling, filled with never-before-reported scenes. This powerful, poignant saga takes the listener inside the gilded gates of an American dynasty to tell of three generations' worth of longing and missed opportunities. Even in this territory of privilege, no riches can put things right once they've been torn asunder. Here is an American epic of the bonds of money, morality, and social position.
©2008 Meryl Gordon (P)2009 Tantor
Room to Breathe
Summary
Between the smartphone, the laptop, the tablet, and whatever else is demanding your attention, sometimes you just need to unplug! Room to Breathe brings you a refreshing series of beginner-friendly guided meditations and mindfulness techniques to help you regain a sense of spaciousness and ease. Presented by renowned meditation teacher and best-selling author Sharon Salzberg, these 10 core practices were created to give you the feel of a meditation retreat at home - but can be enjoyed in any place conducive to a period of undisturbed quiet. Room to Breathe brings listeners eight core exercises: Calming the Mind, Facing Challenges, Being Present, Letting Go, Trusting Yourself, and more. Includes a guidebook with tips for breaking free from habitual stressful patterns along with contemplations to remind you of what's really important to you. PLEASE NOTE: When you purchase this title, the accompanying reference material will be available in your Library section along with the audio.
©2016 Sharon Salzberg (P)2016 Sounds True
Healing After Loss
Summary
After the loss of a loved one, once the services are over and the relatives and friends have gone home, we are left to enter a strange new land, where someone who has given meaning to our life is gone. Drawing on her own experience as well as that of others, author Martha Whitmore Hickman presents a year's worth of meditations for people dealing with this profound loss, offering solace and illuminating a way forward. From January 1 to December 31, each day's meditation considers a meaningful quotation or passage on grief or suffering, with sources ranging Shakespeare to Emily Dickinson, from the Christian Bible to Hindu proverbs. A thoughtful, sensitive collection, Healing After Loss will comfort and inspire listeners on their journeys through grief toward recovery.
©1994 Martha Whitmore Hickman (P)2011 Tantor
I Am Madame X
Summary
Even before John Singer Sargent painted her portrait, Virginie Gautreau's reputation for promiscuity and showy self-display made her the subject of vicious Paris gossip. In this remarkable novel, the author tells Virginie's story, drawing on the sketchy facts of the notorious beauty's life to recreate her tempestuous personality, the captivating milieu of Belle Epoch Paris, and the struggle between artist and model to control the painting that would change their lives and affect the course of art history.
©2003 Gioia Diliberto (P)2003 Blackstone Audiobooks
Stone Mattress
Summary
A collection of highly imaginative short pieces that speak to our times with deadly accuracy. Vintage Atwood creativity, intelligence, and humor: think Alias Grace. Margaret Atwood turns to short fiction for the first time since her 2006 collection, Moral Disorder, with nine tales of acute psychological insight and turbulent relationships bringing to mind her award-winning 1996 novel, Alias Grace. A recently widowed fantasy writer is guided through a stormy winter evening by the voice of her late husband in Alphinland, the first of three loosely linked stories about the romantic geometries of a group of writers and artists. In The Freeze-Dried Bridegroom, a man who bids on an auctioned storage space has a surprise. In Lusus Naturae, a woman born with a genetic abnormality is mistaken for a vampire. In Torching the Dusties, an elderly lady with Charles Bonnet syndrome comes to terms with the little people she keeps seeing, while a newly formed populist group gathers to burn down her retirement residence. And in Stone Mattress, a long-ago crime is avenged in the Arctic via a 1.9 billion-year-old stromatolite. In these nine tales, Margaret Atwood is at the top of her darkly humorous and seriously playful game. This audiobook edition includes a Reading Group Guide.
©2014 O.W. Toad, Ltd. (P)2015 Audible Inc.
Odd Partners
Summary
Unlikely pairs join forces to crack a slew of intriguing cases in an anthology edited by New York Times best-selling author Anne Perry, featuring original stories by Jacqueline Winspear, Jeffery Deaver, Allison Brennan, Charles Todd, and many more, including Perry herself. Throughout the annals of fiction, there have been many celebrated detective teams: Sherlock Holmes and John Watson. Nick and Nora Charles. Hercule Poirot and Arthur Hastings. Thomas and Charlotte Pitt. That last pair is the creation of beloved mystery writer Anne Perry, who, as the editor of Odd Partners and in conjunction with Mystery Writers of America, has enlisted some of today’s best mystery writers to craft all-new stories about unlikely duos who join forces - sometimes unwillingly - to solve beguiling whodunits. From Perry’s entry, in which an English sergeant and his German counterpart set out to find a missing soldier during World War I, to a psychological tale of an airplane passenger who wakes up unsure of who he is, each story deals in the wonderful complexities of human interactions. Featuring work by New York Times best-selling authors, Edgar Award winners, and up-and-coming members of the Mystery Writers of America, these tales of friends, enemies, and pairs who lie somewhere in the middle will satisfy every type of mystery listener. Audio Contents: Introduction by Anne Perry, read by Anne Perry “Reconciliation” by Anne Perry, read by Simon Prebble “The Nature of the Beast” by William Kent Krueger, read by Ray Porter “Sad Onions: A Hap and Leonard Story” by Joe R. Lansdale, read by Christopher Ryan Grant “The Wagatha Labsy Secret Dogtective Alliance: A Dog Noir Story” by Jacqueline Winspear, read by Macleod Andrews “Glock, Paper, Scissors” by Shelley Costa, read by Lorna Raver “Blood Money: An Inspector Rutledge Story” by Charles Todd, read by Simon Prebble “The Violins Played Before Junshan” by Lou Kemp, read by Edoardo Ballerini “What Ever Happened to Lorna Winters?” by Lisa Morton, read by Macleod Andrews “Oglethorpe's Camera” by Claire Ortalda, read by Amy Landon “The Last Game” by Robert Dugoni, read by Edoardo Ballerini “NO 11 SQUATER” by Adele Polomski, read by Lorna Raver “A Cold Spell” by Mark Thielman, read by Janina Edwards “What Would Nora Do?” by Georgia Jeffries, read by Amy Landon “Hector's Bees” by Amanda Witt, read by Janina Edwards “Georgia in the Wind” by William Frank, read by Ray Porter “From Four till Late: A Nick Travers Story” by Ace Atkins, read by Macleod Andrews “Bite out of Crime” by Allison Brennan, read by Amy Landon “Songbird Blues” by Stephen Ross, read by Edoardo Ballerini “Security” by Jeffery Deaver, read by Ray Porter
©2019 Anne Perry, Allison Brennan, Jeffery Deaver (P)2019 Random House Audio
I, Zombie
Summary
Warning: Not fit for human consumption This book contains foul language and fouler descriptions of life as a zombie. It will offend most anyone, so proceed with caution or not at all. And be forewarned: This is not a zombie book. This is a different sort of tale. It is a story about the unfortunate, about those who did not get away. It is a human story at its rotten heart. It is the reason we can't stop obsessing about these creatures, in whom we see all too much of ourselves.
©2012 Broad Reach Publishing (P)2012 Audible, Inc.
Better to Wish
Summary
Four generations. Four girls. One family. An amazing new four-book series from Ann M. Martin. In 1930, Abby Nichols is eight, and can't imagine what her future holds. The best things today would be having a dime for the fair, keeping her Pops from being angry, and saving up 87 cents to surprise her little sister with a tea set for Christmas. But Abby's world is changing fast. Soon there will be new siblings to take care of, a new house to move into, and new friends to meet. But there will also be good-byes to say and hard choices to make. As Abby grows older, how will she decide what sort of life will fit her best? In this incredible new series, best-selling author Ann M. Martin brings the past and the present together one girlhood at a time and shows readers the way a family grows.
©2013 Listening Library (P)2013 Ann M. Martin
Family Tree Book Four
Summary
Far and near. Lost and found. Four girls. Four generations. Georgia cannot figure out what's going on in her family. Her mother, Francie, is extremely overprotective. Her grandmother, Dana, and her great-grandmother, Abby, don't speak to each other. And Georgia's great-great-grandmother also had some secrets that nobody else knows about. Georgia knows this because she's found her great-great grandmother's diary hidden in a wall in the family's house in Maine. Reading the diary makes her think of her own struggles - and draws her even closer to the mysteries of her family as Abby's hundredth birthday approaches. Home Is the Place is the heartfelt, remarkable conclusion to Ann M. Martin's Family Tree series, which has followed Abby, Dana, Francie, and now Georgia from girlhood to womanhood, showing listeners the intertwining, extraordinary ways we grow up.
©2014 Ann M. Martin (P)2014 Listening Library (Audio)
Bobbed Hair and Bathtub Gin
Summary
This is an exuberant group portrait of four extraordinary writers, Zelda Fitzgerald, Edna St. Vincent Millay, Dorothy Parker, and Edna Ferber, whose loves, lives, and literary endeavors captured the spirit of the 1920s. Marion Meade re-creates the aura of excitement, romance, and promise of the 1920s, a decade celebrated for cultural innovation, the birth of jazz, the beginning of modernism, and social and sexual liberation, bringing to light, as well, the anxiety and despair that lurked beneath the nonstop partying and outrageous, unconventional behavior. The literary heroines in Bobbed Hair and Bathtub Gin did what they wanted, said what they thought. They drank gallons of cocktails and knew how to have fun in New York, the Riviera, and Hollywood, where they met and played with all the people worth knowing. They kicked open the door for 20th-century female writers and set a new model for every woman trying to juggle the serious issues of economic independence, political power, and sexual freedom. In a style and tone that perfectly captures the jazzy rhythms and desperate gaiety that defined the era, Meade tells the individual stories of Parker, Fitzgerald, Millay, and Ferber, traces the intersections of their lives, and describes the men, including F. Scott Fitzgerald, Edmund Wilson, Harold Ross, and Robert Benchley, who influenced them, loved them, and sometimes betrayed them. She describes their social and literary triumphs (Parker's Round Table witticisms appeared almost daily in the newspapers and Ferber and Millay won Pulitzer Prizes) and writes movingly of the penances they paid: the crumbled love affairs, abortions, depression, lost beauty, nervous breakdowns, and, finally, overdoses and even madness. A vibrant mixture of literary scholarship, social history, and gossip, Bobbed Hair and Bathtub Gin is a rich evocation of a period that continues to intrigue and captivate listeners.
©2004 Marion Meade (P)2004 Blackstone Audiobooks
The Circular Staircase
Summary
”This is the story of how a middle-aged spinster lost her mind, deserted her domestic gods in the city, took a furnished house for the summer out of town, and found herself involved in one of those mysterious crimes that keep our newspapers and detective agencies happy and prosperous.” So begins The Circular Staircase, a book which has been hailed as the best novel by the most important American woman mystery writer of our time. Rachel Innes was relieved when Gertrude and Halsey arrived to keep their dear old aunt company and allow her the courtesy of a decent night’s sleep. Unfortunately, the explosive sound of a revolver shot the next night shattered Rachel’s hopes. And the body at the foot of the circular staircase ensured many sleepless nights to follow.
Public Domain (P)2011 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Bread and Roses, Too
Summary
Rosa's mother is singing again, for the first time since Papa died in an accident in the mills. But instead of filling their cramped tenement apartment with Italian lullabies, Mamma is out on the streets singing union songs, and Rosa is terrified that her mother and older sister, Anna, are endangering their lives by marching against the corrupt mill owners. After all, didn't Miss Finch tell the class that the strikers are nothing but rabble-rousers; an uneducated, violent mob? Suppose Mamma and Anna are jailed or, worse, killed? What will happen to Rosa and little Ricci? When Rosa is sent to Vermont with other children to live with strangers until the strike is over, she fears she will never see her family again. Then, on the train, a boy begs her to pretend that he is her brother. Alone and far from home, she agrees to protect him, even though she suspects that he is hiding some terrible secret. From a beloved, award-winning author, here is a moving story based on real events surrounding an infamous 1912 strike.
©2006 Minna Murra, Inc (P)2006 Random House, Inc. Listening Library, an imprint of the Random House Audio Publishing Group
What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank
Summary
These eight new stories from the celebrated novelist and short-story writer Nathan Englander display a gifted young author grappling with the great questions of modern life, with a command of language and the imagination that place Englander at the very forefront of contemporary American fiction. The title story, inspired by Raymond Carver’s masterpiece, is a provocative portrait of two marriages in which the Holocaust is played out as a devastating parlor game. In the outlandishly dark “Camp Sundown” vigilante justice is undertaken by a group of geriatric campers in a bucolic summer enclave. “Free Fruit for Young Widows” is a small, sharp study in evil, lovingly told by a father to a son. “Sister Hills” chronicles the history of Israel’s settlements from the eve of the Yom Kippur War through the present, a political fable constructed around the tale of two mothers who strike a terrible bargain to save a child. Marking a return to two of Englander’s classic themes, “Peep Show” and “How We Avenged the Blums” wrestle with sexual longing and ingenuity in the face of adversity and peril. And “Everything I Know About My Family on My Mother’s Side” is suffused with an intimacy and tenderness that break new ground for a writer who seems constantly to be expanding the parameters of what he can achieve in the short form. Beautiful and courageous, funny and achingly sad, Englander’s work is a revelation.
©2012 Nathan Englander (P)2012 Random House Audio
Bloodroot
Summary
Named for a flower whose blood-red sap possesses the power both to heal and poison, Bloodroot is a stunning fiction debut about the legacies of magic and madness, faith and secrets, passion and loss that haunt one family across the generations, from the Great Depression to today. The novel is told in a kaleidoscope of seamlessly woven voices and centers around an incendiary romance that consumes everyone in its path: Myra Lamb, a wild young girl with mysterious, haint blue eyes who grows up on remote Bloodroot Mountain; her grandmother, Byrdie Lamb, who protects Myra fiercely and passes down the touch that bewitches people and animals alike; the neighbor boy who longs for Myra yet is destined never to have her; the twin children Myra is forced to abandon but who never forget their mothers deep love; and John Odom, the man who tries to tame Myra and meets with shocking, violent disaster. Against the backdrop of a beautiful but often unforgiving country, these lives come togetheronly to be torn apart as a dark, riveting mystery unfolds. With grace and unflinching verisimilitude, Amy Greene brings her native Appalachia and the faith and fury of its people to rich and vivid life. Here is a spellbinding tour de force that announces a dazzlingly fresh, natural-born storyteller in our midst. Read by a full cast.
©2009 Amy Greene (P)2009 Random House
Invisible Hands
Summary
Starting in the mid-1930s, a handful of prominent American businessmen forged alliances with the aim of rescuing America - and their profit margins - from socialism and the "nanny state." Long before the "culture wars" usually associated with the rise of conservative politics, these driven individuals funded think tanks, fought labor unions, and formed organizations to market their views. These nearly unknown, larger-than-life, and sometimes eccentric personalities - such as General Electric's zealous, silver-tongued Lemuel Ricketts Boulware and the self-described "revolutionary" Jasper Crane of DuPont - make for a fascinating, behind-the-scenes view of American history. The winner of a prestigious academic award for her original research on this book, Kim Phillips-Fein is already being heralded as an important new young American historian. Her meticulous research and narrative gifts reveal the dramatic story of a pragmatic, step-by-step, check-by-check campaign to promote an ideological revolution---one that ultimately helped propel conservative ideas to electoral triumph.
©2009 Kim Phillips-Fein (P)2009 Tantor
The Last Station
Summary
Set in the last tumultuous years of Leo Tolstoy's life, The Last Station centers on the battle for his soul waged by his wife, Sofya Andreyevna, and his leading disciple, Vladimir Cherkov. Torn between his professed doctrine of poverty and chastity and the reality of his enormous wealth, his 13 children, and a life of relative luxury, Tolstoy makes a dramatic flight from his home. Too ill to continue beyond the tiny rail station at Astapovo, he believes that he is dying alone, while over one hundred newspapermen camp outside awaiting hourly reports on his condition. A brilliant re-creation of the mind and tortured soul of one of the world's greatest writers, The Last Station is a richly inventive novel that dances between fact and fiction.
©2007 Jay Parini (P)2008 Random House
Where Are You Going, Baby Lincoln?
Summary
What if timid Baby Lincoln broke free of her bossy sister and set off on an unexpected journey? Kate DiCamillo presents a touching new adventure set in Mercy Watson's world. Baby Lincoln's older sister, Eugenia, is very fond of telling Baby what to do, and Baby usually responds by saying, "Yes, Sister." But one day Baby has had enough. She decides to depart on a Necessary Journey, even though she has never gone anywhere without Eugenia telling her what to take and where to go. And in fact Baby doesn't know where she is headed - only that she was entirely happy in the previous night's dream, sitting aboard a train with a view of shooting stars. Who might Baby meet as she strikes out on her own, and what could she discover about herself? Will her impulsive adventure take her away from Eugenia for good?
©2016 Kate DiCamillo (P)2016 Listening Library