History audiobooks

Come Fly The World

By: Julia Cooke

Narrated by: Andi Arndt

Length: 7 hours 32 minutes

Abridged: No

Glamour, danger, liberation: in a Mad Men–era of commercial flight, Pan Am World Airways attracted the kind of young woman who wanted out, and wanted up

Required to have a college education, speak two languages, and possess the political savvy of a Foreign Service officer, a jet-age stewardess serving on iconic Pan Am between 1966 and 1975 also... Read more

1491

By: Charles C. Mann

Narrated by: Darrell Dennis

Length: 16 hours 15 minutes

Abridged: No

A groundbreaking study that radically alters our understanding of the Americas before the arrival of the Europeans in 1492.

Traditionally, Americans learned in school that the ancestors of the people who inhabited the Western Hemisphere at the time of Columbus’s landing had crossed the Bering Strait twelve thousand years ago; existed mainly in... Read more

Frederick Douglass

By: David W. Blight

Narrated by: Prentice Onayemi

Length: 36 hours 56 minutes

Abridged: No

**Winner of the Pulitzer Prize in History**

“Extraordinary…a great American biography” (The New Yorker) of the most important African American of the 19th century: Frederick Douglass, the escaped slave who became the greatest orator of his day and one of the leading abolitionists and writers of the era.

As a young man Frederick Douglass... Read more

Leadership

By: Doris Kearns Goodwin

Narrated by: Intro and Afterword Read by the Author

Length: 18 hours 5 minutes

Abridged: No

From Pulitzer Prize–winning author and esteemed presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, an invaluable guide to the development and exercise of leadership from Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Lyndon B. Johnson, and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The inspiration for the multipart HISTORY Channel series Abraham Lincoln and Theodore... Read more

Palo Alto

By: Malcolm Harris

Narrated by: Patrick Harrison

Length: 28 hours 19 minutes

Abridged: No

The history of Silicon Valley, from railroads to microchips, is an “extraordinary” story of disruption and destruction, told for the first time in this comprehensive, jaw-dropping narrative (Greg Grandin, Pulitzer Prize-winning author of The End of the Myth). Palo Alto’s weather is temperate, its people are educated and enterprising, its... Read more

New Cold Wars

By: David E. Sanger

Narrated by: Robertson Dean & David E. Sanger

Length: 18 hours 5 minutes

Abridged: No

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The fast-paced inside story of America’s plunge into a volatile rivalry with the other two great nuclear powers—Xi Jinping’s China and Vladimir Putin’s Russia—from the Pulitzer Prize–winning journalist and bestselling author of The Perfect Weapon
 
“[A] cogent, revealing account of how a generation of American... Read more

The Stonewall Reader

By: New York Public Library

Narrated by: Various

Length: 10 hours 44 minutes

Abridged: No

"...a remarkable audio experience that emphasizes the revolutionary power of LGBTQ voices and provides an invaluable record of a community that refuses to be silenced." -AudioFile magazine Earphones Award winner

For the fiftieth anniversary of the Stonewall uprising, an anthology chronicling the tumultuous fight for LGBTQ rights in the 1960s and... Read more

A Ben Of All Trades

By: Michael J. Rosen & Matt Tavares

Narrated by: Qarie Marshall

Length: 44 minutes

Abridged: No

Young Benjamin Franklin wants to be a sailor, but his father won’t hear of it. The other trades he tries—candle maker, joiner, boot closer, turner—bore him through and through. Curious and inventive, Ben prefers to read, swim, fly his kite, and fly his kite while swimming. But each time he fails to find a profession, he takes some important bit... Read more

Man's Search for Meaning

By: Viktor E. Frankl

Narrated by: Theo Solomon

Length: 5 hours 43 minutes

Abridged: No

As relevant today as it was when it was first published, Man’s Search for Meaning is a book for finding strength and purpose in times of great despair.“This is a book I reread a lot … it gives me hope … it gives me a sense of strength.”—Anderson Cooper, Anderson Cooper 360/CNNViktor E. Frankl was a medical doctor at a psychiatric hospital in... Read more

South to America

By: Imani Perry

Narrated by: Imani Perry

Length: 16 hours 32 minutes

Abridged: No

“An elegant meditation on the complexities of the American South—and thus of America—by an esteemed daughter of the South and one of the great intellectuals of our time. An inspiration.” —Isabel Wilkerson, New York Times bestselling author of The Warmth of Other Suns and Caste: The Origins of Our DiscontentsAn essential, surprising journey... Read more

On Our Best Behavior

By: Elise Loehnen

Narrated by: Elise Loehnen

Length: 11 hours 54 minutes

Abridged: No

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • A groundbreaking exploration of the ancient rules women unwittingly follow in order to be considered “good,” revealing how the Seven Deadly Sins still control and distort our lives and illuminating a path toward a more balanced, spiritually complete way to live

Why do women equate self-denial with being good?

We... Read more

Burning Boy

By: Paul Auster

Narrated by: Paul Auster

Length: 35 hours 48 minutes

Abridged: No

This program is read by the author.

Booker Prize-shortlisted and New York Times bestselling author Paul Auster's comprehensive, landmark biography of the great American writer Stephen Crane.

With Burning Boy, celebrated novelist Paul Auster tells the extraordinary story of Stephen Crane, best known as the author of The Red Badge of Courage, who... Read more

Heroes

By: Stephen Fry

Narrated by: Stephen Fry

Length: 15 hours 1 minute

Abridged: No

In this sequel to the bestselling Mythos, legendary author and actor Stephen Fry moves from the exploits of the Olympian gods to the deeds of mortal heroes.

Perseus. Jason. Atalanta. Theseus. Heracles. Rediscover the thrills, grandeur, and unabashed fun of the Greek myths. Whether recounting a tender love affair or a heroic triumph, Fry deftly... Read more

Filterworld

By: Kyle Chayka

Narrated by: Kaleo Griffith

Length: 11 hours 56 minutes

Abridged: No

A MOST ANTICIPATED BOOK • From New Yorker staff writer and author of The Longing for Less Kyle Chayka comes a timely history and investigation of a world ruled by algorithms, which determine the shape of culture itself.

"[Filterworld] is about how algorithms changed culture…[Chayka asks] what is taste? What is a sense of aesthetics? And what... Read more

Hero of Two Worlds

By: Mike Duncan

Narrated by: Mike Duncan

Length: 17 hours 19 minutes

Abridged: No

From the bestselling author of The Storm Before the Storm and host of the Revolutions podcast comes the thrilling story of the Marquis de Lafayette’s lifelong quest to defend the principles of liberty and equality
 
Few in history can match the revolutionary career of the Marquis de Lafayette. Over fifty incredible years at the heart of the Age... Read more

Don't Forget Us Here

By: Mansoor Adayfi

Narrated by: Roxanna Hope Radja & Mansoor Adayfi

Length: 12 hours 25 minutes

Abridged: No

This moving, eye-opening memoir of an innocent man detained at Guantánamo Bay for fifteen years tells a story of humanity in the unlikeliest of places and an unprecedented look at life at Guantánamo.At the age of 18, Mansoor Adayfi left his home in Yemen for a cultural mission to Afghanistan. He never returned. Kidnapped by warlords and then... Read more

Girly Drinks

By: Mallory O'Meara

Narrated by: Mallory O'Meara

Length: 11 hours 29 minutes

Abridged: No

“At last, the feminist history of booze we’ve been waiting for!” —Amy Stewart, author of The Drunken Botanist

From Los Angeles Times bestselling author Mallory O’Meara comes a lively and engrossing feminist history of women drinking through the ages

Strawberry daiquiris. Skinny martinis. Vodka sodas with lime. These are the cocktails that come in... Read more

Cuba (Winner of the Pulitzer Prize)

By: Ada Ferrer

Narrated by: Alma Cuervo

Length: 23 hours 13 minutes

Abridged: No

WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE IN HISTORY
WINNER OF THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE IN HISTORY

“Full of…lively insights and lucid prose” (The Wall Street Journal) an epic, sweeping history of Cuba and its complex ties to the United States—from before the arrival of Columbus to the present day—written by one of the world’s leading historians of... Read more

Indigenous Continent

By: Pekka Hamalainen

Narrated by: Kaipo Schwab

Length: 18 hours 44 minutes

Abridged: No

There is an old, deeply rooted story about America that goes like this: Columbus "discovers" a strange continent and brings back tales of untold riches. The European empires rush over, eager to stake out as much of this astonishing "New World" as possible. Though Indigenous peoples fight back, they cannot stop the onslaught. White imperialists... Read more

Travels with Charley in Search of America

By: John Steinbeck

Narrated by: Gary Sinise

Length: 7 hours 58 minutes

Abridged: No

An intimate journey across America, as told by one of its most beloved writers
 
To hear the speech of the real America, to smell the grass and the trees, to see the colors and the light—these were John Steinbeck's goals as he set out, at the age of fifty-eight, to rediscover the country he had been writing about for so many years.

With Charley,... Read more

Beaverland

By: Leila Philip

Narrated by: Christine Lakin

Length: 12 hours 38 minutes

Abridged: No

An intimate and revelatory dive into the world of the beaver—the wonderfully weird rodent that has surprisingly shaped American history and may save its ecological future.  From award-winning writer Leila Philip, Beaverland is a masterful work of narrative science writing, a book that highlights, though history and contemporary storytelling, how... Read more

Gay Bar

By: Jeremy Atherton Lin

Narrated by: Jeremy Atherton Lin

Length: 7 hours 52 minutes

Abridged: No

As gay bars continue to close at an alarming rate, a writer looks back to find out what’s being lost in this indispensable, intimate, and stylish celebration of history. In the era of Grindr and same-sex marriage, gay bars are closing down at an alarming rate. What, then, was the gay bar? Set between Los Angeles, San Francisco, and London, Gay... Read more

The Story of the World, Vol. 1 Audiobook

By: Susan Wise Bauer

Narrated by: Jim Weiss

Length: 8 hours 4 minutes

Abridged: No

History will never be the same again! This spirited reading of the first in Susan Wise Bauer's Story of the World history series brings to life the stories and records of the peoples of ancient times. Now more than ever, other countries and customs affect our everyday lives-and our children need to learn about the people who live all around the... Read more

Chasing Beauty

By: Natalie Dykstra

Narrated by: Maggi-Meg Reed

Length: 15 hours 57 minutes

Abridged: No

The vivid and masterful story of Isabella Stewart Gardner—creator of one of America’s most stunning museums—an American original whose own life was remade by art. Isabella Stewart Gardner’s museum, with its plain exterior enfolding an astonishing four-story Italian palazzo, rose from Boston’s Fens at the turn of the twentieth century. Its... Read more