An American institution, Sun Records has a history with many chapters -- its Memphis origins with visionary Sam Phillips, the breakthrough recordings of Elvis Presley, and the studio's immense influence on the sound of popular music. But behind the company's chart toppers and legendary musicians there exists another story, told by Barbara Barnes Sims. In the male-dominated workforce of the 1950s, 24-year-old Sims found herself thriving in the demanding roles of publicist and sales promotio...

This audiobook brings together original pieces on Thoreau by twenty-seven of today's leading writersWith narration by William Hope, Barbara Barnes, Kaliswa Brewster, Kate Harper, Peter Marinker, and Ako MitchellFeatures essays by Jennifer Finney Boylan • Kristen Case • George Howe Colt • Gerald Early • Paul Elie • Will Eno • Adam Gopnik • Lauren Groff • Celeste Headlee • Pico Iyer • Alan Lightman • James Marcus • Megan Marshall • Michelle Nijhuis • Zo...

Thirty-eight-year-old Jeremy Pauling has never left home. He lives on the top floor of a Baltimore row house where he creates collages of little people snipped from wrapping paper. His only company is his elderly mother, who lives beneath him.But after the death of his mother and at a loss, Jeremy agrees to accept the mysterious yet compassionate Mary Tell and her child as new tenants. Like one of his paper creations, Jeremy is fragile and easily torn, and Mary is unaware of how mu...

Prudence Rutledge is terrified. She sits in her isolated New England farmhouse, fearing that her husband is stepping out on her. Seems like Saul has been seen down at the pond, meeting up with a young woman named Ora Brand. Trouble is, Ora Brand has been dead for over a year.In her short story Bewitched, Edith Wharton lures you into the ghostly heart of New England, circa 1926. It’s a time when ghosts roam the barren hills, and horror stalks the lonely inhabitants with dev...

Bloomsbury presents A Saint from Texas by Edmund White, read by Barbara Barnes.From Edmund White, a bold and sweeping new novel that traces the extraordinary fates of twin sisters, one destined for Parisian nobility and the other for Catholic sainthood.Yvette and Yvonne Crawford are twin sisters, born on a humble patch of East Texas prairie but bound for far more dramatic and tragic fates. Just as an untold fortune of oil lies beneath their daddy’s land, both girls harbor t...

"A strong cast of five narrators rewinds time and transports listeners to sparkling seascapes and the English countryside." - AudioFile MagazineCelebrate life's journeys with the beloved author whose stories of life and love touched the world.A Place Like Home is a spellbinding collection of short stories by internationally bestselling author Rosamunde Pilcher, never before published in book form. The collection contains f...

Bob Dylan is a singular figure defined by a lifetime of creative invention that has helped transform music, literature, pop culture, and even politics. This book provides a lively, accessible look at his art and music as seen by leading rock and pop critics and music scholars. The chapters are carefully integrated so that readers can take quick dives into specific topics ranging from the Blues to religious faith, civil rights, and American literature. Incorporating a rich array of new arch...

A BBC Radio 3 dramatisation of Vikram Seth's verse novel about the lives and loves of a group of twentysomethings in 1980s San FranciscoAward-winning novelist Vikram Seth is renowned worldwide for his magnum opus A Suitable Boy. But his dazzling debut, though less well-known, is equally innovative, masterly and ambitious. First published in 1986. and inspired by Pushkin's Eugene Onegin, it is written entirely in verse, comprising almost 600 stanza...

Fast-talking, trouble-seeking private eye Philip Marlowe is a different kind of detective: a moral man in an amoral world. California in the ’40s and ’50s is as beautiful as a ripe fruit and rotten to the core, and Marlowe must struggle to retain his integrity amidst the corruption he encounters daily. The Big Sleep finds the world-weary, wisecracking investigator consulted by a wealthy family man with two big problems: his children. Carmen Sternwood has got herself mixed up with ...

A full-cast dramatisation of Edith Wharton’s 1913 satire of marriage and money in early-20th century American societySOON TO BE A STUDIOCANAL MOVIE STARRING SYDNEY SWEENEY, LEO WOODALL, AND MOREWhen the beautiful and ambitious Undine Spragg convinces her nouveau riche parents to move to New York, she quickly injects herself into high society. But even a well-to-do husband isn’t enough for Undine, whose overwhelming lust for wealth proves to be her undoing. ...

From one of our most critically acclaimed and beloved storytellers comes a sweeping novel set on board the Morning Light, a Nova Scotian merchant ship sailing through the south pacific in 1912.Kay and Thea are half-sisters, separated in age by almost twenty years, but deeply attached. When their stern father dies, Thea returns to Nova Scotia for her long-promised marriage to the captain of the Morning Light. But she cannot abandon her orphaned you...

Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert have sent to the orphanage for a boy. So when a skinny, red-haired girl turns up, she is not quite what they had in mind. Anne Shirley soon sets the quiet island community of Avonlea talking of little else. With her incessant chatter and intense imagination, things are never dull with Anne - in fact, they are frequently fiery. But slowly the islanders realise that beneath the quicksilver tongue and the red-headed temper is a little girl with a heart of gold, wh...