Fantasy audiobooks page 9

Fenris isn't a hell planet, but it's nobody's bargain. With 2,000-hour days and an 8,000-hour year, it alternates blazing heat with killing cold. A planet like that tends to breed a special kind of person: tough enough to stay alive and smart enough to make the best of it. When that kind of person discovers he's being cheated of wealth he's risked his life for, that kind of planet is ripe for revolution. (Introduction from the Gutenberg text)

William ("Willie") is a student living in the British town of Clayton. As a Socialist, he tries to move power from the upper class to the working class. Interestingly, in a fictitious confrontation Britain declares war on Germany. Willie falls in love with Nettie, but when she elopes with an upper-class man, Willie resolves to kill them both. Throughout the novel there is present in the sky a large comet which gives off a green glow. As Willie prepares to shoot the lovers, two battleships appear and begin shelling the coast, causing Willie to nearly lose his targets. As the comet enters the atmosphere, it gives off a green gas which envelopes everyone including Willie, who falls asleep. W...

War in the Air was written during a prolific time in H. G. Wells's writing career. Having withdrawn from British politics to spend more time on his own ideas, he published twelve books between 1901 and 1911, including this one. while many British citizens were surprised by the advent of World War I, Wells had already written prophetically about such a conflict. War in the Air predicted use of airplanes in modern war.

The novel is a humorous oriental romance and allegory written in the style of the Arabian Nights. Like its model, it includes a number of stories within the story, along with poetic asides.

“The variety of scenes and images, the untiring evolution of plot, the kaleidoscopic shifting of harmonious colours, all these seem of the very essence of Arabia, and to coil directly from some bottle of a genie. Ah! what a bottle!” -Edmund Gosse in Gossip in a Library

Beth Danson was about twenty-five and, besides her deep auburn-brown hair and lovely face, she boasted an equally attractive body. He found himself captivated by the warm thrust of her breasts beneath the silk blouse. The clear milk of her flesh, at the “V” of her throat excited him in a strange way. When he thought of her as his wife, it was frightening. It was as though someone had tossed him a woman and expected him to just fall into the routine of marriage. It wouldn’t be hard to come to love this woman, but it would take awhile. Hell, he didn’t know her. She was a complete stranger who had suddenly told him they were married. There was nothing familiar about her; even the fingers tha...

Ten-year old Peggy Clayton and her two younger brothers, Teddy and Harry, live with their father, Dr. Clayton, and Nurse, a woman who has taken care of them since the death of their mother when Peggy was five. Peggy is a sweet and kind little girl with a big imagination and a great sense of fun. Peggy's Trial follows her adventures with her friends at school, the mischief she and her brothers cause poor old Nurse, and even Peggy’s being chased by a bull. But nothing can prepare Peggy, Teddy and Harry when they fear they may lose their beloved father to a stepmother.

The Metal Monster is an Abraham Merritt fantasy novel.
Dr. Goodwin is on a botanical expedition in the Himalayas. There he
meets Dick Drake, the son of one of his old science acquaintances. They are witnesses of a strange aurora-like effect, but seemingly a deliberate one. As they go out to investigate, they meet Goodwin’s old friends Martin and Ruth Ventnor, brother and sister scientists. The two are besieged by Persians as Darius III led when Alexander of Macedon conquered them more than two thousand years ago.
(Wikipedia)

One pleasant summer day, as the fairy-tale lover sat reading a book beneath the low spreading branches of an oak tree, he heard a hum of wings, and looking up startled from his book, he discovered the Fairy Goldenwand standing close by. "Are you still seeking new fairy tales?" said the Fairy Goldenwand. "Yes," said the reader. "Will you write them down if I tell you some really new ones?" said the Fairy. "Oh yes, indeed," said the reader. "And I'll put them into a book;..." "Oh, that will be fine!" said the Fairy Goldenwand. "I knew you wouldn't mind my appearing so suddenly. Ever so many things have happened in Fairyland since the last books were written, and we all think it's a dreadful...

In 1910, Baum hoped to end the Oz series and follow with a new series about a little girl named Trot and her sailor companion, Cap’n Bill. The Sea Fairies (1911) was the first book in the projected series and took Trot and Cap’n Bill under the sea where they had adventures with mermaids and other fantastic creatures. It was followed by Sky Island (1912) and then Baum returned to the Oz titles. He brought Trot and Cap’n Bill to Oz in the Scarecrow of Oz (1915).

In The Adventures of Ulysses, Charles Lamb re-tells the story of Ulysses’s journey from Troy to his own kingdom of Ithaca. The book uses Homer’s The Odyssey as the basis for the story, but it isn’t a direct translation of the Greek classic. The book is considered a modern version of the epic tale when it was published in 1808. In the preface of the book, Lamb said that he made the narration of the story faster so that more readers would be attracted to it.

To begin with, Homer’s Odyssey is already a classic and in re-telling this story, Charles Lamb aimed to make this epic poem more comprehensible to the average person. And he was successful in doing what he aime...