Classic Audiobook Collection

In Defense of Harriet Shelley by Mark Twain audiobook. Genre: biography In Defense of Harriet Shelley is Mark Twain's sharp, meticulously argued case for a woman history has often treated as a footnote - and a villain. Taking aim at popular biographies of the Romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley, Twain reopens the story of Shelley's first marriage to Harriet Westbrook Shelley and challenges the comf...

Goldsmith’s Friend Abroad Again by Mark Twain audiobook. Genre: comedy In Goldsmith's Friend Abroad Again, Mark Twain delivers a sharp, darkly funny epistolary satire in the form of letters from Ah Song Hi, a Chinese traveler who sets his sights on America, the celebrated land of liberty and equal rights. Writing home with careful politeness and mounting disbelief, Ah Song Hi describes the long jo...

Following the Equator by Mark Twain audiobook. Genre: adventure Following the Equator (American English title) or More Tramps Abroad (English title) is a non-fiction travelogue published by American author Mark Twain in 1897. Twain was practically bankrupt in 1894 due to a failed investment into a 'revolutionary' typesetting machine. In an attempt to extricate himself from debt of $100,000 (equiva...

Those Extraordinary Twins by Mark Twain audiobook. Genre: comedy In Those Extraordinary Twins, Mark Twain spins a sharp, mischievous tale set in the small river town of Dawson's Landing, Missouri, where reputation is everything and gossip travels faster than the current. The town is shaken up by the arrival of Luigi and Angelo Capello, two Italian brothers who are conjoined twins - distinct in tem...

Europe and Elsewhere by Mark Twain audiobook. Genre: comedy In Europe and Elsewhere, Mark Twain turns his sharp eye and sharper wit on the rituals, pretensions, and everyday oddities he encounters abroad and at home. Drawn from his travel pieces and occasional writings, this collection follows Twain as he sizes up grand monuments and small inconveniences alike, comparing Old World traditions to Am...

A Double Barrelled Detetive Story by Mark Twain audiobook. Genre: comedy In A Double Barrelled Detective Story, Mark Twain loads his satire with two interlocking barrels: one aimed at revenge, the other at the smug certainties of detective fiction. The tale begins with a wealthy young woman whose marriage to the resentful Jacob Fuller turns vicious, leaving her humiliated, abandoned, and determine...

The Death Disk by Mark Twain audiobook. Genre: drama Mark Twain's 'Death Disk' was inspired by the historical account of the execution of Colonel John Poyer of Pembroke, Wales on April 21, 1649. A small child was given the responsibility of selecting which of three rebel leaders of a civil uprising would receive a death penalty. The unfortunate fate was given to Poyer who was shot in front of a la...

Fennimore Cooper’s Literary Offences by Mark Twain audiobook. Genre: comedy In Fennimore Coopers Literary Offences, Mark Twain turns his sharp wit on one of America's early bestselling novelists, James Fenimore Cooper, and invites listeners into a gleefully rigorous takedown of what Twain sees as careless storytelling. Framed as a mock-serious piece of criticism, the essay begins with Twain's baff...

Christian Science by Mark Twain audiobook. Genre: religion Christian Science is a 1907 collection of essays Mark Twain wrote about Christian Science, beginning with an article that was published in Cosmopolitan in 1899. Although Twain was interested in mental healing and the ideas behind Christian Science, he was hostile towards its founder, Mary Baker Eddy (1821–1910). He called her, according to...

Alonzo Fitz & Other Stories by Mark Twain audiobook. Genre: comedy Alonzo Fitz & Other Stories gathers a handful of Mark Twain's sharpest late-career short pieces - brisk, mischievous, and built to be read aloud. Across these compact tales and sketches, Twain turns everyday American confidence into comedy: earnest people chase grand plans, argue over respectable opinions, and stumble into conseque...

Ultima Thule by Mack Reynolds audiobook. Genre: scifi Ronny Bronston has spent his whole life dreaming of an off-world posting with United Planets, the sprawling interstellar authority that promises peace, progress, and a place for ambitious young men to prove themselves. When he finally lands a provisional slot in the Bureau of Investigation, Section G, he expects glamorous diplomacy and clear-cu...

Good Wives by Louisa May Alcott audiobook. Genre: family In Good Wives, Louisa May Alcott returns to the March family as the four sisters step beyond girlhood and into the complicated, exhilarating work of becoming adults. Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy each face choices that test their ideals and reshape their bonds: love that asks for sacrifice, ambition that demands courage, and duty that can both stea...

The Lost Princess of Oz by L. Frank Baum audiobook. Genre: fantasy Who is stealing all the magic in Oz? Dorothy and her friends set out to comb all of Oz, not only for magic stolen from Glinda and the Wizard, but also for the kidnapped princess, Ozma. Along the way, they explore regions never seen in other Oz books, meeting strange and interesting people and animals, and falling into peril more th...

Greylorn by Keith Laumer audiobook. Genre: scifi Commander Greylorn has a problem. No, actually he has two of them. It's not enough that the remaining residents of Earth have pinned their last hope of salvation on him and his mission. He has to find a colony that presumedly was established at an unknown star two centuries before and beg their help. But first, he has the small matter of a mutiny on...

The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran audiobook. Genre: philosophy The prophet Al Mustafa, before leaving the city where he has been living twelve years, stops to address the people. They call out for his words of wisdom on many sides of the human condition, and he addresses them in terms of love and care. He has much to offer from his observations of the people, and he illustrates with images they can rel...

The Master of the World by Jules Verne audiobook. Genre: scifi Chief Inspector Strock gets the tough cases. When a volcano suddenly appears to threaten mountain towns of North Carolina amid the non-volcanic Blue Ridge Mountains, Strock is posted to determine the danger. When an automobile race in Wisconsin is interrupted by the unexpected appearance of a vehicle traveling at multiples of the top s...

The Blockade Runners by Jules Verne audiobook. Genre: adventure Writing at the end of the American Civil War, Verne weaves this story of a Scottish merchant who, in desperation at the interruption of the flow of Southern cotton due to the Union blockade, determines to build his own fast ship and run guns to the Confederates in exchange for the cotton piling up unsold on their wharves. His simple p...

The Point of Honor by Joseph Conrad audiobook. Genre: drama Set during the Napoleonic Wars, this story features two French Hussar officers, D'Hubert and Feraud. Their quarrel over an initially minor incident turns into a bitter, long-drawn out struggle over the following fifteen years, interwoven with the larger conflict that provides its backdrop. At the beginning, Feraud is the one who jealously...

New Discoveries at Jamestown by John L. Cotter audiobook. Genre: history Chances are, you are reading this because you are aware that Jamestown, Virginia, celebrated its 400th birthday in 2007. It was the first 'successful' English settlement in America. Although the colonists eventually moved upriver to be quit of the hard luck and difficult conditions on the small island, they left behind a trov...

Nights With Uncle Remus by Joel Chandler Harris audiobook. Genre: folklore That the little boy loved Uncle Remus and his stories was so obvious that the tale-spinning sessions began drawing additional listeners. Daddy Jack, an old 'Africa man' visiting from down-state; Sis Tempy, the strong chief of the mansion's servants; and Tildy, a young and pretty servant-girl - all found their way to Uncle R...

The Diary of a Country Parson by James Woodforde audiobook. Genre: biography The Revd. James Woodforde was an English clergyman, best known for his vivid account of parish life in the 18th century. His diary, edited by John Beresford, remained unpublished until the 20th century. The diary provides a wonderfully full account of the small community in which the diarist lived — of the births and deat...

The Pathfinder by James Fenimore Cooper audiobook. Genre: adventure Natty Bumppo goes by many names: La Longue Carabine, Hawk Eye, Leatherstocking, and in this tale, The Pathfinder. Guide, scout, hunter, and when put to it, soldier, he also fills a lot of roles in pre-Revolution upstate New York. An old friend, Sergeant Dunham of the 55th Regiment of Foot, asks him to guide his daughter through th...

The Call of the Wild by Jack London audiobook. Genre: adventure When Buck, a powerful and pampered dog living an easy life in California, is stolen and sold into the brutal world of the Yukon during the Klondike Gold Rush, everything he knows is stripped away. Thrown onto the frozen trails as a sled dog, Buck must quickly learn the law of club and fang - a ruthless code ruled by violence, hierarch...

The Piazza Tales by Herman Melville audiobook. Genre: adventure A collection of six short stories by American writer Herman Melville, published in May 1856. Except for the newly written title story, 'The Piazza,' all of the stories had appeared in Putnam's Monthly between 1853 and 1855. The collection includes what has long been regarded as three of Melville's most important achievements in the ge...

Bartleby, The Scrivener by Herman Melville audiobook. Genre: drama Set in the cramped offices of Wall Street, Herman Melville's Bartleby, the Scrivener follows a cautious, self-satisfied lawyer who prides himself on running an orderly business with minimal disturbance. To keep up with an increasing workload, he hires a new copyist, Bartleby, a pale, quiet man whose diligence at the desk initially...