Classic Audiobook Collection

Latest Episodes:

The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale by Joseph Conrad ~ Full Audiobook [thriller] Jun 19, 2023

Show notes

The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale by Joseph Conrad audiobook.

Genre: thriller

Set in the fog and ferment of late-Victorian London, The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale follows Adolf Verloc, a mild-mannered shopkeeper whose dingy storefront hides a more dangerous trade in secrets. Verloc drifts between two worlds: the shabby circles of self-styled revolutionaries who gather in back rooms to talk of upheaval, and the cold, bureaucratic machinery of a foreign embassy that expects results rather than excuses. Pressured to prove his usefulness, Verloc is pushed toward a reckless act meant to jolt the public into fear and the government into overreaction. At home, his seemingly quiet domestic life with his practical wife Winnie and her vulnerable younger brother Stevie becomes entangled with his covert obligations, turning private loyalties into potential casualties. As suspicion tightens and the city reacts, an inspector with a patient, methodical mind begins to pull at the loose threads, revealing how ideology, greed, and inertia can combine into catastrophe. Tense, darkly ironic, and sharply psychological, Conrad's novel examines the ordinary faces behind political violence and the devastating cost of living a double life.

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 01

(00:16:36) Chapter 02

(01:14:43) Chapter 03

(01:54:51) Chapter 04

(02:29:29) Chapter 05

(03:15:14) Chapter 06

(04:11:16) Chapter 07

(04:42:57) Chapter 08

(05:40:11) Chapter 09

(06:38:26) Chapter 10

(07:05:59) Chapter 11

(07:53:34) Chapter 12

(08:20:17) Chapter 13

(08:55:45) Chapter 14

(09:30:37) Chapter 15

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The Letters of Jane Austen by Jane Austen ~ Full Audiobook [biography] Jun 17, 2023

Show notes

The Letters of Jane Austen by Jane Austen audiobook.

Genre: biography

This recording includes a selection of Jane Austen's letters, edited by Susan Coolidge and chosen from the collection of Austen's great-nephew, Edward, Lord Brabourne. The letters are mostly addressed to Austen's sister Cassandra, with whom she was very close. There are also some letters written to two of her nieces, Anna Austen Lefroy and Fanny Knight. They include some references to her published work, including Sense and Sensibility (abbreviated 'S and S'), Pride and Prejudice (also called First Impressions, or P and P), Mansfield Park ('MP') and Emma. They are also replete with details about her family life, including the extended families and careers of her brothers, James, Edward, Frank, Henry, and Charles.

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 00

(00:11:43) Chapter 01

(00:21:07) Chapter 02

(00:30:48) Chapter 03

(00:41:58) Chapter 04

(00:56:49) Chapter 05

(01:07:45) Chapter 06

(01:21:55) Chapter 07

(01:33:27) Chapter 08

(01:45:01) Chapter 09

(01:55:08) Chapter 10

(02:11:41) Chapter 11

(02:26:31) Chapter 12

(02:42:34) Chapter 13

(02:59:15) Chapter 14

(03:15:01) Chapter 15

(03:28:55) Chapter 16

(03:47:28) Chapter 17

(04:04:26) Chapter 18

(04:15:33) Chapter 19

(04:35:20) Chapter 20

(04:44:17) Chapter 21

(05:08:54) Chapter 22

(05:24:07) Chapter 23

(05:39:30) Chapter 24

(05:50:51) Chapter 25

(06:04:00) Chapter 26

(06:15:14) Chapter 27

(06:28:39) Chapter 28

(06:40:16) Chapter 29

(06:51:32) Chapter 30

(07:02:57) Chapter 31

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The Dead by James Joyce ~ Full Audiobook [drama] Jun 17, 2023

Show notes

The Dead by James Joyce audiobook.

Genre: drama

On a snowy Epiphany night in Dublin, Gabriel Conroy and his wife Gretta arrive at the annual holiday dance hosted by Gabriel's aunts, the warm-hearted Morkan sisters, whose crowded house fills with music, laughter, and talk that cuts as sharply as the winter air outside. As Gabriel moves through the evening - giving a speech, navigating old friendships, and sparring with a young nationalist's barbed questions - small tensions surface beneath the party's glow: class and culture, Ireland and the wider world, public polish and private unease. The festivities culminate in a lavish supper and spirited dancing, yet Gabriel cannot shake a sense that he is slightly out of step with everyone around him, including the woman he loves. When a song stirs an unexpected emotion in Gretta, Gabriel is drawn into a more intimate reckoning, where desire, jealousy, and tenderness collide with the weight of memory. In Joyce's most celebrated story, a simple gathering becomes a haunting meditation on marriage, identity, and the thin boundary between the living present and the past that still speaks.

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 1

(00:23:40) Chapter 2

(00:41:26) Chapter 3

(01:01:09) Chapter 4

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The Room in the Dragon Volant by J. Sheridan LeFanu ~ Full Audiobook [mystery] Jun 16, 2023

Show notes

The Room in the Dragon Volant by J. Sheridan LeFanu audiobook.

Genre: mystery

In Napoleonic-era Paris, young English traveler Richard Beckett arrives full of money, confidence, and the thrill of being anonymous in a glittering foreign city. An evening visit to a church delivers an instant obsession: a veiled, aristocratic beauty, the Comtesse de St Alyre, whose sadness and mystery seem to beckon him closer. A chance introduction pulls Richard into her orbit, where whispers of family danger, secret meetings, and urgent pleas for discretion make him feel both chosen and indispensable. But Paris has its own predators, and Richard's romantic certainty begins to collide with unsettling details: watchful strangers, oddly timed invitations, and a growing sense that every step has been anticipated. When he is steered toward a secluded inn called the Dragon Volant and assigned a particular room, the story tightens into a claustrophobic spiral of suspicion and dread. Blending gothic atmosphere with a sharp-eyed look at greed and manipulation, LeFanu spins a tense tale about the perils of desire, the ease of self-deception, and how quickly a traveler can become a target.

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 01

(00:08:29) Chapter 02

(00:17:02) Chapter 03

(00:24:41) Chapter 04

(00:33:31) Chapter 05

(00:48:04) Chapter 06

(00:59:34) Chapter 07

(01:12:56) Chapter 08

(01:21:29) Chapter 09

(01:30:46) Chapter 10

(01:41:10) Chapter 11

(01:51:00) Chapter 12

(02:00:52) Chapter 13

(02:11:39) Chapter 14

(02:25:49) Chapter 15

(02:39:20) Chapter 16

(02:53:00) Chapter 17

(03:01:54) Chapter 18

(03:14:37) Chapter 19

(03:24:36) Chapter 20

(03:33:19) Chapter 21

(03:40:36) Chapter 22

(03:49:02) Chapter 23

(03:57:33) Chapter 24

(04:06:14) Chapter 25

(04:13:19) Chapter 26

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Carmilla by J. Sheridan LeFanu ~ Full Audiobook [horror] Jun 16, 2023

Show notes

Carmilla by J. Sheridan LeFanu audiobook.

Genre: horror

In a lonely corner of Styria, a sheltered young woman named Laura lives with her widowed father in an old estate surrounded by forest and superstition. Their quiet routine is broken when a carriage accident delivers a mysterious, elegant stranger into their care: Carmilla, a girl of Laura's age who seems both fragile and strangely commanding. As the two grow inseparable, Laura is drawn into a relationship that feels like friendship, infatuation, and something darker all at once. Then unsettling changes begin to spread through the household and nearby villages - exhausted servants, fearful neighbors, and a pattern of illness that no doctor can explain. Laura herself starts to suffer vivid dreams and a weakening that deepens with Carmilla's nightly visits and cryptic confessions. With the help of a determined general, a skeptical physician, and a learned investigator of old legends, Laura's father is forced to confront the possibility that the threat is not a natural disease but an ancient predator hidden behind a beautiful face. Gothic, intimate, and charged with forbidden longing, Carmilla explores desire, secrecy, and the danger of trusting what you most want to believe.

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 01

(00:14:16) Chapter 02

(00:32:32) Chapter 03

(00:49:41) Chapter 04

(01:14:12) Chapter 05

(01:23:12) Chapter 06

(01:33:06) Chapter 07

(01:46:58) Chapter 08

(01:55:12) Chapter 09

(02:06:38) Chapter 10

(02:13:47) Chapter 11

(02:25:12) Chapter 12

(02:36:21) Chapter 13

(02:48:00) Chapter 14

(02:59:07) Chapter 15

(03:08:04) Chapter 16

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What Maisie Knew by Henry James ~ Full Audiobook [drama] Jun 16, 2023

Show notes

What Maisie Knew by Henry James audiobook.

Genre: drama

In late-19th-century England, young Maisie Farange becomes the unwilling prize in a bitter divorce, passed back and forth between two self-absorbed parents who treat custody as leverage and their child as a messenger, witness, and weapon. As Maisie grows, her world fills with shifting households, new marriages, and flirtations that blur the lines between guardianship and desire. With a keen, observant mind and a hunger for stability, she tries to make sense of adult motives that are rarely spoken plainly and never entirely innocent. Around her orbit a small cast of caretakers and would-be protectors - some genuinely kind, others opportunistic - each claiming to know what is best for her while pursuing private agendas. Through Maisie's limited but sharpening perspective, Henry James builds a tense moral drama about innocence and knowledge, manipulation and responsibility, and the quiet resilience it takes for a child to claim an inner life amid relentless emotional bargaining. As pressure mounts and loyalties fracture, Maisie must decide whom to trust and what kind of future she can choose for herself.

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 00

(00:09:53) Chapter 01

(00:17:44) Chapter 02

(00:25:32) Chapter 03

(00:31:34) Chapter 04

(00:39:56) Chapter 05

(00:49:03) Chapter 06

(01:00:40) Chapter 07

(01:14:24) Chapter 08

(01:33:42) Chapter 09

(01:49:05) Chapter 10

(02:01:57) Chapter 11

(02:20:31) Chapter 12

(02:38:48) Chapter 13

(02:54:10) Chapter 14

(03:10:55) Chapter 15

(03:27:13) Chapter 16

(03:44:17) Chapter 17

(04:01:50) Chapter 18

(04:19:30) Chapter 19

(04:42:47) Chapter 20

(05:11:45) Chapter 21

(05:32:05) Chapter 22

(05:45:02) Chapter 23

(06:00:56) Chapter 24

(06:21:09) Chapter 25

(06:39:46) Chapter 26

(07:00:01) Chapter 27

(07:13:51) Chapter 28

(07:29:12) Chapter 29

(07:49:43) Chapter 30

(08:15:31) Chapter 31

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The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James ~ Full Audiobook [drama] Jun 15, 2023

Show notes

The Portrait of a Lady by Henry James audiobook.

Genre: drama

The Portrait of a Lady is a novel by Henry James, first published as a serial in The Atlantic Monthly and Macmillan's Magazine in 1880–81 and then as a book in 1881. It is one of James's most popular long novels, and is regarded by critics as one of his finest. The Portrait of a Lady is the story of a spirited young American woman, Isabel Archer, who 'affronts her destiny' and finds it overwhelming. She inherits a large amount of money and subsequently becomes the victim of Machiavellian scheming by two American expatriates. Like many of James's novels, it is set in Europe, mostly England and Italy. Generally regarded as the masterpiece of James's early period, this novel reflects James's continuing interest in the differences between the New World and the Old, often to the detriment of the former. It also treats in a profound way the themes of personal freedom, responsibility, and betrayal

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 01

(00:24:56) Chapter 02

(00:39:30) Chapter 03

(01:00:04) Chapter 04

(01:16:31) Chapter 05

(01:46:03) Chapter 06

(02:08:11) Chapter 07

(02:30:46) Chapter 08

(02:45:41) Chapter 09

(03:01:13) Chapter 10

(03:28:25) Chapter 11

(03:44:20) Chapter 12

(04:10:20) Chapter 13

(04:42:12) Chapter 14

(05:04:29) Chapter 15

(05:38:57) Chapter 16

(06:07:02) Chapter 17

(06:23:07) Chapter 18

(06:59:56) Chapter 19

(07:48:22) Chapter 20

(08:20:22) Chapter 21

(08:36:50) Chapter 22

(09:20:39) Chapter 23

(09:41:41) Chapter 24

(10:14:29) Chapter 25

(10:28:10) Chapter 26

(10:59:33) Chapter 27

(11:24:31) Chapter 28

(11:39:30) Chapter 29

(12:01:17) Chapter 30

(12:14:13) Chapter 31

(12:30:47) Chapter 32

(12:47:23) Chapter 33

(13:03:02) Chapter 34

(13:25:41) Chapter 35

(13:44:31) Chapter 36

(14:05:08) Chapter 37

(14:30:05) Chapter 38

(14:55:24) Chapter 39

(15:24:48) Chapter 40

(15:57:22) Chapter 41

(16:16:33) Chapter 42

(16:52:46) Chapter 43

(17:19:54) Chapter 44

(17:53:28) Chapter 45

(18:19:39) Chapter 46

(18:45:00) Chapter 47

(19:16:47) Chapter 48

(19:53:48) Chapter 49

(20:24:21) Chapter 50

(20:42:38) Chapter 51

(21:18:56) Chapter 52

(21:45:00) Chapter 53

(22:04:41) Chapter 54

(22:31:06) Chapter 55

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A Guide to Men by Helen Rowland ~ Full Audiobook [comedy] Jun 15, 2023

Show notes

A Guide to Men by Helen Rowland audiobook.

Genre: comedy

A series of occasionally witty one-liners, poems and considerations on the subject of Men, Women and their Conjunction. By turns tender, bland, sexist (in both directions!) and funny.

From the text:

A man is like a park squirrel; if you fling your favors or your charms at his head he will never come up and eat out of your hand.

Even Satan could find a woman to call him 'Dearie,' if he would simply tell her that all he needed was 'a beautiful woman's uplifting influence.'

Every bride fancies that she married the original 'cave-man' until she tries to persuade him to go out and argue with the furniture-movers.

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 01

(00:05:20) Chapter 02

(00:15:40) Chapter 03

(00:22:07) Chapter 04

(00:30:21) Chapter 05

(00:41:54) Chapter 06

(00:50:54) Chapter 07

(00:57:57) Chapter 08

(01:05:30) Chapter 09

(01:13:40) Chapter 10

(01:21:47) Chapter 11

(01:26:51) Chapter 12

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Aunt Crete's Emancipation by Grace Livingston Hill ~ Full Audiobook [family] Jun 15, 2023

Show notes

Aunt Crete's Emancipation by Grace Livingston Hill audiobook.

Genre: family

In Aunt Crete's Emancipation, Grace Livingston Hill introduces Miss Lucretia 'Crete' Ward, a gentle, capable maiden aunt who has spent years making herself indispensable in her sister Carrie's household. Crete cooks, cleans, mends, and manages quietly in the background, while Carrie and her spoiled daughter, Luella, take her sacrifices for granted and treat her more like unpaid help than family. The fragile peace of their small-town respectability is jolted by the announcement that a relative from the West, Donald Grant, is coming to visit. Carrie and Luella dread the possibility of a so-called backwoods cousin embarrassing them in polite society, and they scramble to protect Luella's social ambitions. Crete, however, dares to hope that the visitor might be the first person in years to see her kindness and worth. When Donald arrives, old assumptions are tested, loyalties shift, and Crete is offered something she has almost forgotten to want: a life with room for joy, confidence, and self-respect. Part Cinderella tale, part moral domestic drama, this story explores gratitude, pride, and the quiet courage it takes to step out of a lifetime of being overlooked.

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 01

(00:17:17) Chapter 02

(00:33:48) Chapter 03

(01:01:14) Chapter 04

(01:24:31) Chapter 05

(01:44:53) Chapter 06

(02:10:29) Chapter 07

(02:27:46) Chapter 08

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The Island by George Gordon Byron ~ Full Audiobook [poetry] Jun 15, 2023

Show notes

The Island by George Gordon Byron audiobook.

Genre: poetry

In The Island, Lord George Gordon Byron turns a famous act of rebellion at sea into a lush, urgent tale of exile, desire, and survival. Loosely inspired by the aftermath of the mutiny on the HMS Bounty, the poem follows Torquil, a young sailor cast adrift from the rigid world of the British navy and thrust into the blazing freedom and peril of the Pacific. On an island that seems at first like paradise, Torquil encounters Neuha, a woman whose intelligence and courage match the wild beauty of her home. Their growing bond offers refuge from the pursuit closing in around them, but it also forces Torquil to confront what he has escaped and what he is willing to risk for a life not governed by empire and command. Byron blends sweeping seascapes, romantic intensity, and sharp moral skepticism, asking whether innocence can exist under the shadow of power, and whether love can be a shelter when the wider world insists on possession and punishment. Vivid, sensual, and restless, The Island is both an adventure and a meditation on freedom's cost.

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Chapters (Approximate)

(00:00:00) Chapter 1

(00:13:47) Chapter 2

(00:43:34) Chapter 3

(00:56:32) Chapter 4

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