Matthew Brenher has narrated 24 audiobooks on Listento.it by 10 authors, with an average listener rating of 4.5★ across 34 ratings. The most-rated is Alone on the Ice.
Alone on the Ice
Summary
His two companions were dead, his food and supplies had vanished in a crevasse, and Douglas Mawson was still 100 miles from camp. On January 17, 1913, alone and near starvation, Mawson, leader of the Australasian Antarctic Expedition, was hauling a sledge to get back to base camp. The dogs were gone. Now Mawson himself plunged through a snow bridge, dangling over an abyss by the sledge harness. A line of poetry gave him the will to haul himself back to the surface. Mawson was sometimes reduced to crawling, and one night he discovered that the soles of his feet had completely detached from the flesh beneath. On February 8, when he staggered back to base, his features unrecognizably skeletal, the first teammate to reach him blurted out, “Which one are you?” This thrilling and almost unbelievable account establishes Mawson in his rightful place as one of the greatest polar explorers and expedition leaders.
©2013 David Roberts (P)2013 Blackstone
The Late Scholar
Summary
Lord Peter Wimsey and his detective novelist wife Harriet Vane return in Jill Paton Walsh's brilliant new continuation of Dorothy L. Sayers's classic mysteries. When a dispute among the fellows of St. Severin's College, Oxford University, reaches a stalemate, Lord Peter Wimsey discovers that as the Duke of Denver he is "the Visitor" - charged with the task of resolving the issue. It is time for Lord Peter and his detective novelist wife Harriet to revisit their beloved Oxford, where their long and literate courtship finally culminated in their engagement and marriage. At first, the dispute seems a simple difference of opinion about a valuable manuscript that some of the fellows regard as nothing but an insurance liability, which should be sold to finance a speculative purchase of land. The voting is evenly balanced. The warden would normally cast the deciding vote, but he has disappeared. And when several of the fellows unexpectedly die as well, Lord Peter and Harriet set off on an investigation to uncover what is really going on at St. Severin's. With this return to the Oxford of Gaudy Night, which many readers regard as their favorite of Sayers's original series, Jill Paton Walsh revives the wit and brilliant plotting of the golden age of detective fiction.
©2013 Jill Paton Walsh and the Trustees of Anthony Fleming, deceased. (P)2015 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
The Great Escape
Summary
The world is a better place than it used to be. People are healthier, wealthier, and live longer. Yet the escapes from destitution by so many has left gaping inequalities between people and nations. In The Great Escape, Angus Deaton - one of the foremost experts on economic development and on poverty - tells the remarkable story of how, beginning 250 years ago, some parts of the world experienced sustained progress, opening up gaps and setting the stage for today's disproportionately unequal world. Deaton takes an in-depth look at the historical and ongoing patterns behind the health and wealth of nations and addresses what needs to be done to help those left behind. Deaton describes vast innovations and wrenching setbacks: the successes of antibiotics, pest control, vaccinations, and clean water on one hand and disastrous famines and the HIV/AIDS epidemic on the other. He examines the United States, a nation that has prospered but is today experiencing slower growth and increasing inequality. He also considers how economic growth in India and China has improved the lives of more than a billion people. Deaton argues that international aid has been ineffective and even harmful. He suggests alternative efforts - including reforming incentives to drug companies and lifting trade restrictions - that will allow the developing world to bring about its own great escape. Demonstrating how changes in health and living standards have transformed our lives, The Great Escape is a powerful guide to addressing the well-being of all nations.
©2016 Angus Deaton (P)2016 Blackstone Audio
My Brief History
Summary
Stephen Hawking has dazzled listeners worldwide with a string of best sellers exploring the mysteries of the universe. Now, for the first time, perhaps the most brilliant cosmologist of our age turns his gaze inward for a revealing look at his own life and intellectual evolution. My Brief History recounts Stephen Hawking’s improbable journey, from his postwar London boyhood to his years of international acclaim and celebrity. This concise, witty, and candid account introduces listeners to a Hawking rarely glimpsed in previous books: the inquisitive schoolboy whose classmates nicknamed him Einstein; the jokester who once placed a bet with a colleague over the existence of a particular black hole; and the young husband and father struggling to gain a foothold in the world of physics and cosmology. Writing with characteristic humility and humor, Hawking opens up about the challenges that confronted him following his diagnosis of ALS at age 21. Tracing his development as a thinker, he explains how the prospect of an early death urged him onward through numerous intellectual breakthroughs, and talks about the genesis of his masterpiece A Brief History of Time - one of the iconic books of the 20th century. Clear-eyed, intimate, and wise, My Brief History opens a window for the rest of us into Hawking’s personal cosmos.
©2013 Stephen Hawking (P)2013 Random House Audio
The Greatest Challenge of Them All
Summary
Lord Drake Varisey, Marquess of Winchelsea, eldest son and heir of the Duke of Wolverstone, must foil a plot that threatens to shake the foundations of the realm, but the very last lady - nay, noblewoman - he needs assisting him is Lady Louisa Cynster, known throughout the ton as Lady Wild. For the past nine years, Louisa has suspected that Drake might well be the ideal husband for her, even though he's assiduous in avoiding her. But she's now 27, and enough is enough. She believes propinquity will reveal exactly what it is that lies between them, and what better opportunity to work closely with Drake than this latest mission, with which he patently needs her help? Unable to deny Louisa's abilities or the value of her assistance and powerless to curb her willfulness, Drake is forced to grit his teeth and acquiesce to her sticking by his side if only to ensure her safety. But all too soon, his true feelings for her surface sufficiently for her, perspicacious as she is, to see through his denials, which she then interprets as a challenge. Even while they gather information, tease out clues, increasingly desperately search for the missing gunpowder, and doggedly pursue the killer responsible for an ever-escalating tally of dead men, thrown together through the hours, he and she learn to trust and appreciate each other. And fed by constant exposure - and blatantly encouraged by her - their desires and hungers swell and grow.... As the barriers between them crumble, the attraction he has for so long restrained burgeons and balloons until, goaded by her near death, it erupts, and he seizes her - only to be seized in return. Linked irrevocably, and with their wills melded and merged by passion's fire, with time running out and the evil mastermind's deadline looming, together they focus their considerable talents and make one last push to learn the critical truths - to find the gunpowder and unmask the villain behind this far-reaching plot. Only to discover that they have significantly less time than they'd thought, that the villain's target is even more crucially fundamental to the realm than they'd imagined, and that it's going to take all that Drake is - as well as all that Louisa as Lady Wild can bring to bear - to defuse the threat, capture the villain, and make all safe and right again. As they race to the ultimate confrontation, the future of all England rests on their shoulders.
©2017 Stephanie Laurens (P)2017 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Churchill
Summary
Churchill: The Prophetic Statesman reveals the astonishingly accurate predictions of Britain's most famous prime minister and how his critics' perceptions of them shaped his political career. Who could have foreseen the start of World War I twenty-five years before the assassination of a Serbian archduke plunged Europe into war? Who could have predicted the rise of al-Qaeda nearly eight decades before anyone had heard of Osama bin Laden? Winston Churchill did. Now for the first time, bestselling author James C. Humes reveals these and other shocking predictions made by this legendary figure. Churchill didn't need a crystal ball to tell the future. Using his skills as a historian, he studied patterns of the past to make his eerily accurate forecasts, including the rise of European fascism, the fall of the Iron Curtain, and the exact day of his own death as he entered his final years. In fascinating detail, Humes' astonishing biography documents the spot-on prophecies Churchill foretold and the political consequences he endured for sharing them. James C. Humes, a former White House speechwriter for five presidents, is a Pulitzer Prize–nominated author of more than thirty books. He is currently a historian at the University of Colorado at Colorado Springs.
©2012 James C. Humes (P)2012 Blackstone Audio
The Inevitable Fall of Christopher Cynster
Summary
Christopher Cynster has finally accepted that to have the life he wants, he needs a wife, but before he can even think of searching for the right lady, he’s drawn into an investigation into the distribution of counterfeit banknotes. London born and bred, Ellen Martingale is battling to preserve the fiction that her much-loved uncle, Christopher’s neighbor, still has his wits about him, but Christopher’s questions regarding nearby Goffard Hall trigger her suspicions. As her younger brother attends card parties at the Hall, she feels compelled to investigate. While Ellen appears to be the sort of frippery female Christopher abhors, he quickly learns that, in her case, appearances are deceiving. And through the twists and turns in an investigation that grows ever more serious and urgent, he discovers how easy it is to fall in love, while Ellen learns that love hasn’t, after all, passed her by. But then the villain steps from the shadows, and love’s strengths and vulnerabilities are put to the test - just as Christopher has always feared. Will he pass muster? Can they triumph? Or will they lose all they’ve so recently found?
©2020 Stephanie Laurens (P)2020 Blackstone Publishing
A Conquest Impossible to Resist
Summary
Number-one New York Times best-selling author Stephanie Laurens returns to the Cynsters' next generation to bring you a thrilling tale of love, intrigue, and fabulous horses. Prudence Cynster has turned her back on husband-hunting in favor of horse-hunting. As the head of the breeding program underpinning the success of the Cynster racing stables, she's on a quest to acquire the necessary horses to refresh the stable's breeding stock. On his estranged father's death, Deaglan Fitzgerald, now earl of Glengarah, left London and the hedonistic life of a wealthy, well-born rake and returned to Glengarah Castle determined to rectify the harm caused by his father's neglect. Driven by guilt that he hadn't been there to protect his people during the Great Famine, Deaglan holds against the lure of his father's extensive collection of horses and, leaving the stable to the care of his brother, Felix, devotes himself to returning the estate to prosperity. Deaglan had fallen out with his father and had been exiled from Glengarah over his drive to have the horses pay their way. Knowing Deaglan's wishes and that restoration of the estate is almost complete, Felix writes to the premier thoroughbred breeding program in the British Isles to test their interest in the Glengarah horses. On receiving a letter describing exactly the type of horses she's seeking, Pru overrides her family's reluctance and sets out for Ireland's West coast to visit the now-reclusive, wicked earl of Glengarah. Yet her only interest is in his horses, which she cannot wait to see. When Felix tells Deaglan that a P. H. Cynster is about to arrive to assess the horses with a view to a breeding arrangement, Deaglan can only be grateful. But then P. H. Cynster turns out to be a lady - one utterly unlike any other he's ever met. Yet they are who they are, and both understand their world. They battle their instincts and attempt to keep their interactions businesslike, but the sparks are incandescent and inevitably ignite a sexual blaze that consumes them both - and opens their eyes. But before they can find their way to their now-desired goal, first one accident, then another distracts them. Someone, it seems, doesn't want them to strike a deal. Who? Why? They need to find out before whoever it is resorts to the ultimate sanction.
©2019 Stephanie Laurens (P)2019 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
The Lady by His Side
Summary
Sebastian Cynster knows time is running out. If he doesn't choose a wife soon, his female relatives will line up to assist him. Yet the current debutantes do not appeal. Where is he to find the right lady to be his marchioness? Then Drake Varisey, eldest son of the Duke of Wolverstone, asks for Sebastian's aid. Having assumed his father's mantle in protecting queen and country, Drake must go to Ireland in pursuit of a dangerous plot. But he's received an urgent missive from Lord Ennis, an Irish peer - Ennis has heard something Drake needs to know and insists Drake attend an upcoming house party at his Kent estate so he can reveal his information face-to-face. Sebastian has assisted Drake before and, long ago, had a liaison with Lady Ennis. Drake insists Sebastian is just the man to be his surrogate at the house party - the guests will imagine all manner of possibilities and be blind to Sebastian's true purpose. Unsurprisingly, Sebastian is reluctant, but Drake's need is real. And with only more debutantes on his horizon, Sebastian allows himself to be persuaded. His first task is to inveigle Antonia Rawlings, a lady he has known all her life, to include him as her escort to the house party. Although he's seen little of Antonia in recent years, Sebastian is confident of gaining her support. Eldest daughter of the Earl of Chillingworth, Antonia has abandoned the search for a husband and plans to use the week of the house party to decide what to do with her life. There has to be some purpose, some role, she can claim for her own. Consequently, on hearing Sebastian's request and an explanation of what lies behind it, she seizes on the call to action. Suppressing her senses' idiotic reaction to Sebastian's nearness, she agrees to be his partner in intrigue. But while joining the house party proves easy, the gathering is thrown into chaos when Lord Ennis is murdered - just before he was to speak with Sebastian. Worse, Ennis's last words, gasped to Sebastian, are "Gunpowder. Here." Gunpowder? And here? Where? With a killer continuing to stalk the halls, side by side Sebastian and Antonia search for answers, and all the while the childhood connection that has always existed between them strengthens and blooms into something so much more.
©2017 Stephanie Laurens (P)2017 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
An Irresistible Alliance
Summary
With his older brother's betrothal announced, Lord Michael Cynster is freed of all familial expectations. But the allure of his previous hedonistic pursuits has paled. Then he learns of the mission his brother and his fiancée have been assisting with and volunteers to help by hunting down a hoard of gunpowder now stashed somewhere in London. Michael's quest leads him to the Hendon Shipping Company, where his sole source of information is the fetchingly attractive Miss Cleome Hendon. When Michael asks about the carters who transported the gunpowder, Cleo offers him a bargain: she will lead him to the carters he seeks, but only if he agrees to include her as an equal partner in the mission. But their investigation proves dangerous, and the further they go in tracing the gunpowder, the more deaths they uncover. Soon Michael and Cleo find themselves tangled in a fight for their lives - one that forces them to face what has grown between them, to seize and defend what they both see as their path to the greatest adventure of all: a shared life, a shared future, a shared love.
©2017 Stephanie Laurens (P)2017 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Too Bad to Die
Summary
A tense and enthralling historical thriller in which British Naval Intelligence officer Ian Fleming attempts to foil a Nazi plot to assassinate FDR, Churchill, and Stalin. November, 1943. Weary of his deskbound status in the Royal Navy, intelligence officer Ian Fleming spends his spare time spinning stories in his head that are much more exciting than his own life - until the critical Tehran Conference, when Winston Churchill, Franklin Roosevelt, and Josef Stalin meet to finalize the D-Day invasion. With the Big Three in one place, Fleming is tipped off that Hitler's top assassin has infiltrated the conference. Seizing his chance to play a part in a real-life action story, Fleming goes undercover to stop the Nazi killer. Between martinis with beautiful women, he survives brutal attacks and meets a seductive Soviet spy who may know more than Fleming realizes. As he works to uncover the truth and unmask the assassin, Fleming is forced to accept that betrayal sometimes comes from the most unexpected quarters - and that one's literary creations may prove eerily close to one's own life. Brilliantly inventive, utterly gripping and suspenseful, Too Bad to Die is Francine Mathews' best novel yet and confirms her place as a master of historical fiction.
©2015 Francine Mathews (P)2015 Penguin Audio
The Forest of Doom: Lost in Darkwood
Summary
When Vale Moonwing returns to Darkwood Forest, he discovers that her old friend, the wizard Yaztromo, has vanished...himself?
©2018 David N. Smith (P)2018 Fox Yason Music Productions Ltd
Enter Pale Death
Summary
One morning before dawn at her regal country estate, Lady Lavinia Truelove is crushed to death by a horse. Classified as "death by misadventure," this appears a gruesome accident, but Scotland Yard detective Joe Sandilands suspects foul play - a misgiving he is struggling to separate from his personal grievances toward Sir James Truelove, who is Lady Lavinia's widower and the influential academic patron of Dorcas Joliffe, whom Joe one day hopes to marry. As Joe's investigation yields surprising secrets about one of England's most powerful families, he discovers how little he knew about not only the gilded lives of the moneyed but also his relationship with Dorcas. Is Joe prepared to risk a future with the girl he loves to uncover the truth behind Lady Truelove's death?
©2014 Barbara Cleverly (P)2014 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
And Then She Fell
Summary
Number-one New York Times best-selling author Stephanie Laurens has returned to another utterly irresistible branch on her beloved Cynster family tree.... The only thing more troublesome than a Cynster man... ...is a Cynster lady who believes love is not her destiny. Famously known in London society as "The Matchbreaker", Henrietta Cynster's uncanny skill lies in preventing ill-fated nuptials - not in falling victim to Cupid's spell. But then she disrupts one match too many and feels honor-bound to assist dashing James Glossup in finding a suitable bride for a marriage of convenience. A task infernally complicated by the undeniable, unquenchable attraction that flares between James and Henrietta, who continues to believe she will never fall....
©2012 Savdek Management Proprietary Ltd. (P)2013 HarperCollins Publishers
A Match for Marcus Cynster
Summary
New York Times best-selling author Stephanie Laurens returns to rugged Scotland with a dramatic tale of passionate desire, unwavering devotion, and a match too powerful to deny. Restless and impatient, Marcus Cynster waits for fate to come calling. He knows his destiny lies in the lands surrounding his family home, but what will his future be, and with whom will he share it? Of one fact he feels certain: His fated bride will not be Niniver Carrick. His elusive neighbor attracts him mightily, yet he feels compelled to protect her - even from himself. Fate, he's sure, would never be so kind as to decree that Niniver should be his. The best he can do for them both is to avoid her. Niniver has vowed to return her clan to prosperity. The epitome of fragile femininity, her delicate and ethereal exterior cloaks a stubborn will and an unflinching devotion to the people in her care. She accepts that she cannot risk marrying and losing her grip on the clan's reins to an inevitably controlling husband. Unfortunately many local men see her as their opportunity. Soon she's forced to seek help to get rid of her unwelcome suitors. Powerful and dangerous, Marcus Cynster is perfect for the task. Suppressing her wariness over tangling with a gentleman who excites her passions, she appeals to him for assistance with her peculiar problem. Although at first he resists, Marcus discovers that, contrary to his expectations, his fated role is to stand by Niniver's side and, ultimately, to claim her hand. Yet in order to convince her to be his bride, they must plunge headlong into a journey full of challenges, unforeseen dangers, passion, and yearning, until Niniver grasps the essential truth - that she is indeed a match for Marcus Cynster.
©2015 Savdek Management Proprietary, Limited (P)2015 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
The Truth About Love
Summary
Bold, passionate, and possessive, the Cynster men let nothing stand in their way when it comes to claiming the women of their hearts. Gerrard Debbington, Vane Cynster's brother-in-law, is one of London's most eligible gentlemen. Uninterested in marriage, his driving passion is to paint the fabled gardens of Lord Tregonning's Hellebore Hall, an opportunity that is now at hand - if Gerrard agrees to create an honest portrait of Tregonning's daughter as well. Gerrard chafes at wasting his talents on some simpering miss, only to discover that Jacqueline Tregonning stirs him as no other. Certainly, she is beautiful, but it is her passionate nature that strikes sparks with Gerrard's own, igniting desire, sweeping them into each other's arms, and convincing Gerrard that he has found his ideal soul mate - the lady he must have as his wife. But something is horribly wrong at Hellebore Hall. Evil and lies are reaching out to ensnare Jacqueline, and Gerrard will have to move heaven and earth to protect the remarkable woman who, for him, personifies the truth about love.
©2016 Stephanie Laurens (P)2016 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
Viscount Breckenridge to the Rescue
Summary
You are cordially invited to the wedding of Miss Heather Cynster... but not before she encounters kidnappers, danger, and a daring rescue at the hands of Viscount Breckenridge. Determined to hunt down her very own hero, one who will sweep her off her feet and into wedded bliss, and despairing of finding him in London’s staid ballrooms, Heather Cynster steps out of her safe world and boldly attends a racy soiree. But her promising hunt is ruined by the supremely interfering Viscount Breckenridge, who whisks her out of scandal - and straight into danger, when a mysterious enemy seizes her, bundles her into a coach, and conveys her out of London. Now it’s up to the notorious Breckenridge to prove himself the hero she’s been searching for all along.... p>And coming next month, more unforgettable romance in the Cynster Sisters Trilogy.
©2011 Savdek Management Proprietary Ltd. (P)2011 HarperCollins Publishers
The Tempting of Thomas Carrick
Summary
What happens when fate, love, and passion collide? The number one New York Times best-selling author Stephanie Laurens returns to Scotland with a tale of two lovers irrevocably linked by destiny and passion. Thomas Carrick is a gentleman driven to control all aspects of his life. As the wealthy owner of Carrick Enterprises, located in bustling Glasgow, he is one of that city's most eligible bachelors and fully intends to select an appropriate wife from the many young ladies paraded before him. He wants to take that necessary next step along his self-determined path, yet no young lady captures his eye, much less his attention - not in the way Lucilla Cynster does, even though she lives miles away. For over two years, Thomas has avoided his clan's estate because it borders Lucilla's home, but disturbing reports from his clansmen force him to return to the countryside - only to discover that his uncle, the laird, is ailing, a clan family is desperately ill, and the clan healer is unconscious and dying. Duty to the clan leaves Thomas no choice but to seek help from the last woman he wants to face. Strong-willed and passionate, Lucilla has been waiting - increasingly impatient - for Thomas to return and claim his rightful place by her side. She knows he is hers - her fated lover, husband, protector, and mate. He is the only man for her, just as she is his one true love. And, at last, he's back. Even though his returning wasn't on her account, Lucilla is willing to seize whatever chance fate hands her. Thomas can never forget Lucilla, much less the connection that seethes between them, but to marry her would mean embracing a life he's adamant he does not want. Lucilla sees that Thomas has yet to accept the inevitability of their union. But how can he ignore a bond such as theirs - one so much stronger than reason?
©2015 Savdek Management Proprietary Limited (P)2015 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
The Four-Dimensional Human
Summary
You are a four-dimensional human. Each of us exists in three-dimensional physical space. But as a constellation of everyday digital phenomena rewires our lives, we are increasingly coaxed from the containment of our predigital selves into a wonderful and eerie fourth dimension, a world of ceaseless communication, instant information, and global connection. Our portals to this new world have been wedged open, and the silhouette of a figure is slowly taking shape. But what does it feel like to be four-dimensional? How do digital technologies influence the rhythms of our thoughts, the style and tilt of our consciousness? What new sensitivities and sensibilities are emerging with our exposure to the delights, sorrows, and anxieties of a networked world? And how do we live in public with these recoded private lives? Laurence Scott - hailed as a "New Generation Thinker" by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and the BBC - shows how this four-dimensional life is dramatically changing us by redefining our social lives and extending the limits of our presence in the world. Blending tech philosophy with insights on everything from Seinfeld to the fall of Gaddafi, Scott stands with a rising generation of social critics hoping to understand our new reality. His virtuosic debut is a revelatory and original exploration of life in the digital age.
©2016 Laurence Scott (P)2016 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
In Pursuit of Eliza Cynster
Summary
The pleasure of your company is requested at the wedding of Miss Eliza Cynster ... but not until she’s rescued from a daring abduction by the mostunexpected of heroes! Brazenly kidnapped from her sister Heather’s engagement ball, Eliza Cynster is spirited north to Edinburgh. Desperate and determined to escape, she seizes upon the first possible champion who happens along - gentleman scholar Jeremy Carling. Villains and rescues are a far cry from Jeremy’s expertise, yet he cannot abandon a damsel in distress. But danger lurks and hurdles abound in their race to escape the mysterious laird, until a final confrontation on a windswept cliff reveals what their future life could hold - if both are bold enough to capture and own the unexpected love they now share.
©2011 Savdek Management Proprietary Limited (P)2011 HarperCollinsPublishers