Fiction audiobooks page 39

Four Max Carrados Detective Stories

Ernest Bramah is mainly known for his ‘Kai Lung’ books – Dorothy L Sayers often used quotes from them for her chapter headings. In his lifetime however he was equally well known for his detective stories. Since Sherlock Holmes we have had French detectives, Belgian detectives, aristocratic detectives, royal detectives, ecclesiastical detectives, drunken detectives and even a (very) few quite normal happily married detectives. Max Carrados was however probably the first blind detective.

The Harvester

The Harvester is one of Gene Stratton-Porter’s romantic novels which combine a love of nature, high moral ideals and a good plot.

This is the story of a young man who lives in the country side with his dog and other animals and grows herbs to sell to medical drug supply houses.

One evening, he has a vision of his Dream Girl and this is the story of his search for her and what happens when he finds her.

Lilith

A fantasy novel first published in 1895, Lilith follows a young man on his inter-dimensional journey of spiritual discovery, as he acquaints himself with his family’s past and unearths a life-changing secret. Moreover, it deals with the introspection of its protagonist, as he is hurled into a mysterious setting where he encounters bizarre creatures that challenge the validity of his temporal values. Examining issues including the essence of life, wisdom, death, redemption, and salvation, the novel presents a masterfully woven plot that marks the piece as one of MacDonald’s darkest and most intense contributions to the fantasy genre.

The novel begins with the introduc...

Way Of The Lawless
Young Andrew Lanning made one mistake in the beginning, and now the most feared lawman in the mountain desert, Hal Dozier, is on his trail and will stop at nothing to bring the outlaw Lanning to justice. But is Andrew guilty of all the things he is being accused of? There is one, a pretty young girl, who doesn't believe all she hears about him. Again, Max Brand shows us why he is the master of the pulp western. (Introduction by Richard Kilmer)
Abandoned

As she walks up the aisle to her waiting husband, a young bride undergoes a sudden change of heart. She goes through the marriage ceremony in a daze, but refuses to talk to her new husband, a seafaring man. Her family is stunned and bewildered. After the ceremony, the bride stays shut in her bedroom. The bewildered groom departs in despair. The next day, the family receives news that the groom has been mortally injured in an accident. The bride rushes to his side on board a ship. When she enters his cabin, instead of a bedridden invalid, she finds him sitting strong and hearty at his desk...

Abandoned was published in 1904. It is the story of Francis (Frank) Reynolds, ...

The Dead

This novella is the final story in Joyce’s collection Dubliners. It describes a Christmas party given by Kate and Julia Morkan, two elderly Dublin ladies, that is attended by their nephew, Gabriel Conroy, and his wife. While the party is festive, full of dancing, drinking, and eating, it is also pervaded by political, religious, and sexual tensions, as well as memories of loss. When Gabriel and his wife go home at the end of the night, she reveals a long-kept secret that leads to an epiphany.

A Master Hand
This murder mystery, written in 1903 by Richard Dallas (pseudonym), describes a fictional crime that took place in the New York City of 1883. A fine period piece as well as a clever detective story. (Introduction by Delmar H. Dolbier)
Dubliners

A young boy falls in love with his friend's much older sister and is desperate to get her the perfect gift from the Araby Fair.

After a party, a man discovers something he had never known about his wife, which has a devastating impact on their marriage.

An ambitious mother schemes to get her daughter a role in a series of concerts.

A drunken legal clerk takes out his frustrations on his helpless young son.

These and other brilliant stories are contained in the collection entitled Dubliners. Published in 1914 during the height of the Irish Nationalist Movement, the fifteen stories are an invaluable record of the life and times of the middle...

Revelations of Divine Love

Julian of Norwich (c. November 8, 1342 – c. 1416) is considered to be one of the greatest English mystics. Little is known of her life aside from her writings. Even her name is uncertain, the name “Julian” coming from the Church of St Julian in Norwich, where she occupied a cell adjoining the church as an anchoress.

At the age of thirty, suffering from a severe illness and believing she was on her deathbed, Julian had a series of intense visions. (They ended by the time she overcame her illness on May 13, 1373). These visions would twenty years later be the source of her major work, called Sixteen Revelations of Divine Love (circa 1393). This is believed to be the first book wri...

The Cinema Murder

Phillip Romilly is a poor art teacher in London. He finds out that his wealthy cousin Douglas has been seeing his girl friend Beatrice behind his back. He strangles Douglas, throws him in the canal, and assumes his identity. Douglas had booked passage to America for the next day, so after a pleasant sea voyage Phillip arrives at the Waldorf Hotel in New York as Douglas Romilly. An hour after checking in he disappears again, and assumes yet another identity, one that his cousin had set up for himself. Douglas was facing massive financial problems, and he, too, had planned to avoid his problems by getting lost in the crowd in New York. Now, in chapter two….