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Balthazar
- Narrated by: Nigel Anthony
- Length: 3 hrs and 55 mins
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Balthazar
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Publisher's summary
The politics of love, the intrigues of desire, love and murder, moved obscurely in the dark corners of Alexandria's streets and squares, brothels and drawing rooms- moved like a great congress of eels in the slime of plot and counter-plot.
In this second volume in Durrell's Alexandria Quartet, the story and the characters come more clearly into focus. Darley, the reflective Englishman, receives from Balthazar, the pathologist, a mass of notes which attempts to explain what really happened between the tempestuous Justine, her husband Nessim, Clea the artist, and Pursewarden the writer.
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4 out of 5 stars
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An Audiophile's Dream
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Booker Prize-winning author Salman Rushdie combines a ferociously witty family saga with a surreally imagined and sometimes blasphemous chronicle of modern India and flavors the mixture with peppery soliloquies on art, ethnicity, religious fanaticism, and the terrifying power of love. Moraes "Moor" Zogoiby, the last surviving scion of a dynasty of Cochinese spice merchants and crime lords, is also a compulsive storyteller and an exile.
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3 out of 5 stars
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The performance is enchanting.
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Justine
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- Narrated by: Nicholas Boulton
- Length: 8 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 33
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 26
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Story4 out of 5 stars 26
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3 out of 5 stars
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Too highly regarded by critics?
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 1,844
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 1,600
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5 out of 5 stars
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Use an audiobook to really enjoy Satanic Verses
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 51
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The Gift is the last of the novels Nabokov wrote in his native language and the crowning achievement of that period in his literary career. It is also his ode to Russian literature, evoking the works of Pushkin, Gogol, and others in the course of its narrative: the story of Fyodor Godunov-Cherdyntsev, an impoverished émigré poet living in Berlin, who dreams of the book he will someday write - a book very much like The Gift itself.
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4 out of 5 stars
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- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 265
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 236
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The Barbarossa family’s roots are far more ancient and ethereal, but they are bound to the Gearys by a shared history of murder, insanity, and adultery. When Rachel Geary and Galilee, the seductive prince of the Barbarossa clan, fall in love, they unleash powerful enmities that could destroy both dynasties. Shorter and more conventional than some of Barker’s other work, this novel is especially rich with complex, passionate, three-dimensional characters, lush settings, and elegant language.
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5 out of 5 stars
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-
Story4 out of 5 stars 991
To the Lighthouse is Virginia Woolf’s arresting analysis of domestic family life, centering on the Ramseys and their visits to the Isle of Skye in Scotland in the early 1900s. Nicole Kidman (Moulin Rouge, Eyes Wide Shut), who won an Oscar for her portrayal of Woolf in the film adaptation of Michael Cunningham’s Pulitzer Prize-winning novel
The Hours, brings the impressionistic prose of this classic to vibrant life.
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4 out of 5 stars
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A book that will challenge you to think.
- By Kelly on 04-23-17
By: Virginia Woolf
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The Moor's Last Sigh
- By: Salman Rushdie
- Narrated by: Sunil Malhotra
- Length: 20 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 69
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 66
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 66
Booker Prize-winning author Salman Rushdie combines a ferociously witty family saga with a surreally imagined and sometimes blasphemous chronicle of modern India and flavors the mixture with peppery soliloquies on art, ethnicity, religious fanaticism, and the terrifying power of love. Moraes "Moor" Zogoiby, the last surviving scion of a dynasty of Cochinese spice merchants and crime lords, is also a compulsive storyteller and an exile.
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3 out of 5 stars
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The performance is enchanting.
- By Kelly on 05-04-18
By: Salman Rushdie
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The Stories of Vladimir Nabokov
- By: Vladimir Nabokov
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 31 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 94
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 66
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Story4 out of 5 stars 66
From Vladimir Nabokov, the writer who shocked and delighted the world with his novels Lolita, Pale Fire, and Ada, or Ardor, comes a magnificent collection of stories. Written between the 1920s and the 1950s, these 68 tales — 14 of which have been translated into English for the first time - display all the shades of Nabokov’s imagination.
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4 out of 5 stars
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A Kaleidoscope of Nabokov Bábochkas
- By Darwin8u on 01-11-15
By: Vladimir Nabokov
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The Magus
- By: John Fowles
- Narrated by: Nicholas Boulton
- Length: 26 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 900
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 795
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Story4 out of 5 stars 804
John Fowles’s The Magus was a literary landmark of the 1960s. Nicholas Urfe goes to a Greek island to teach at a private school and becomes enmeshed in curious happenings at the home of a mysterious Greek recluse, Maurice Conchis. Are these events, involving attractive young English sisters, just psychological games, or an elaborate joke, or more? Reality shifts as the story unfolds. The Magus reflected the issues of the 1960s perfectly, and it continues to create tension and concern today.
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4 out of 5 stars
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One of the best novels that I really think I hate.
- By Darwin8u on 01-29-14
By: John Fowles
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Orlando
- By: Virginia Woolf
- Narrated by: Clare Higgins
- Length: 8 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 1,032
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 866
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Story4 out of 5 stars 871
Fantasy, love and an exuberant celebration of English life and literature, Orlando is a uniquely entertaining story. Originally conceived by Virginia Woolf as a playful tribute to the family of her friend and lover, Vita Sackville-West, Orlando's central character, a fictional embodiment of Sackville-West, changes sex from a man to a woman and lives throughout the centuries, whilst meeting historical figures of English literature.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Magical
- By Mayca on 05-31-05
By: Virginia Woolf
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Sophie's Choice
- By: William Styron
- Narrated by: Norman Snow
- Length: 2 hrs and 53 mins
- Abridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 245
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 207
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Story4 out of 5 stars 207
In this brilliant, multi-layered novel, a young Southerner, Stingo, wants to become a writer. In Brooklyn, he meets Nathan, a brilliant Jewish intellectual involved in a turbulent love-hate affair with Sophie, a beautiful Polish woman. She has a terrible wound in her past, one that impels both Sophie and Nathan toward destruction.
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1 out of 5 stars
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THIS IS ABRIDGED
- By J. Flynn on 07-25-16
By: William Styron
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The Mark of the Beast
- By: Rudyard Kipling
- Narrated by: B.J. Harrison
- Length: 33 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 284
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 254
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Story4 out of 5 stars 253
When a carousing Englishman disgraces the consecrated effigy of Hanuman, a leprous "Silver Man" marks him with a hideous curse. The ensuing night brings new terrors to the house of the doomed man.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Must listen again
- By uffdasuzanne on 10-06-17
By: Rudyard Kipling
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Letter from an Unknown Woman
- By: Stefan Zweig
- Narrated by: Heather Wood, K. Anderson Yancy
- Length: 1 hr and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 84
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 76
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 75
Immediately following the death of her young son, distraught and heartbroken, a woman sends a heart-wrenching letter to the only man she has ever loved, chronicling their love affair, opening with, "To you, who have never known me."
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3 out of 5 stars
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Tough 2 Hear With Background Music & Sound Effects
- By DK on 09-19-15
By: Stefan Zweig
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The Good Apprentice
- By: Iris Murdoch
- Narrated by: Christopher Cazenove
- Length: 20 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 64
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 57
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 55
Stuart Cuno has decided to become good. Not believing in God, he invents his own methods, which include celibacy, chastity, and the abandonment of a promising academic career. Interfering friends and relations question his sincerity, his sanity, and his motives.
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5 out of 5 stars
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A Squabble of Smartypants
- By Geoff Maddison on 09-10-12
By: Iris Murdoch
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The Leopard
- A Novel
- By: Giuseppe di Lampedusa, Archibald Colquhuon - translator
- Narrated by: Paul Woodson
- Length: 9 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 88
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 73
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Story4 out of 5 stars 72
Set in the 1860s, The Leopard tells the spellbinding story of a decadent, dying Sicilian aristocracy threatened by the approaching forces of democracy and revolution. The dramatic sweep and richness of observation, the seamless intertwining of public and private worlds, and the grasp of human frailty imbue The Leopard with its particular melancholy beauty and power, and place it among the greatest historical novels of our time.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Timeless
- By Robert Massarella on 12-05-23
By: Giuseppe di Lampedusa, and others
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The Picture of Dorian Gray
- By: Oscar Wilde
- Narrated by: Russell Tovey
- Length: 8 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 7,298
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 6,458
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Story4.5 out of 5 stars 6,426
A disturbing tale of a young man's uncanny ability to remain both young and beautiful while descending into a life of heartless debauchery, The Picture of Dorian Gray was considered proof of both Wilde's genius and his perversion. Oscar Wilde's scandalous best seller of 1891 was one of the most damning pieces of evidence used against him in the trial that brought about his downfall.
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4 out of 5 stars
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A twisted tale of vanity and poisonous people
- By Shantastic on 10-02-19
By: Oscar Wilde
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Three Daughters of Eve
- By: Elif Shafak
- Narrated by: Alix Dunmore
- Length: 10 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4.5 out of 5 stars 220
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Performance4.5 out of 5 stars 201
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Story4 out of 5 stars 202
Set across Istanbul and Oxford, from the 1980s to the present day, Three Daughters of Eve is a sweeping tale of faith and friendship, tradition and modernity, love and an unexpected betrayal. Peri, a wealthy Turkish housewife and mother, is on her way to a dinner party at a seaside mansion in Istanbul when a beggar snatches her handbag. As she wrestles to get it back, a photograph falls to the ground - an old polaroid of three young women and their university professor.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Review 3 daughters of Eve
- By CA on 04-28-18
By: Elif Shafak
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The Confessions of Max Tivoli
- By: Andrew Sean Greer
- Narrated by: Brian Keeler
- Length: 10 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 255
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 67
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Story4 out of 5 stars 66
Max Tivoli is uniquely cursed. His mind ages normally, but he is born with the withered body of a 70-year-old man, and his body ages in reverse. Despite this torment, Max manages three times to cross paths with Alice, the woman who captures his heart. Because he appears to be a different person each time they meet, Max has three chances for true love.
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5 out of 5 stars
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odd premise, but it works!
- By Sean Dunnahoo on 03-03-04
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The Death of Artemio Cruz
- A Novel
- By: Carlos Fuentes, Alfred MacAdam - translator
- Narrated by: Tony Chiroldes
- Length: 12 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall4 out of 5 stars 95
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Performance4 out of 5 stars 79
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Story3.5 out of 5 stars 79
As the novel opens, Artemio Cruz, the all-powerful newspaper magnate and land baron, lies confined to his bed and, in dreamlike flashes, recalls the pivotal episodes of his life. Carlos Fuentes manipulates the ensuing kaleidoscope of images with dazzling inventiveness, layering memory upon memory, from Cruz’s heroic campaigns during the Mexican Revolution, through his relentless climb from poverty to wealth, to his uneasy death. Perhaps Fuentes’ masterpiece, The Death of Artemio Cruz is a haunting voyage into the soul of modern Mexico.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Great Writing
- By Kelly B. on 05-01-14
By: Carlos Fuentes, and others
What listeners say about Balthazar
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
- mtparis
- 10-10-03
balthazar
This is great literature. The reader is excellent when reading lines of English male characters. But any lines of women or Egyptians are so awful as to grate on the ears.
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Overall3 out of 5 stars
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Performance1 out of 5 stars
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Story5 out of 5 stars
- Mardi Brayton
- 07-09-20
Wrong Narrator!!
I absolutely love the Alexandria Quartet, but Nigel is awful.
Does not fit the character at all and his portrayal of women is horrendous.
Too bad as it ruined the stories for me.
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