Audiobooks by Louis Begley

The man who brutally murdered Uncle Harry is dead. In an effort to recover from the confrontation and collect himself, Jack takes refuge on Torcello, a small island in the Venetian lagoon, to return to his writing career. Even more urgently, he wants to win back Kerry, the beautiful lawyer who rejected him after the bloody episode with Harry's assassin. But events beyond Jack's control intervene: Kerry loses her life in circumstances that contradict everything Jack thinks he knew about her. Soon death begins to stalk Jack himself. It is impossible not to recognize in its drumbeat the machinations of Abner Brown, the man who orchestrated Harry's demise. Jack fights back, driven by cold rage and determination to complete his revenge. At his side is Kerry's best friend, the glamorous and enigmatic Heidi Krohn. Their quest will force Jack to plumb the abyss of depravity into which Kerry had sunk and face one of his fellow Marines who has embarked on a violent feud of his own. Reprising memorable characters from Killer, Come Hither and introducing dangerous new ones, Begley concludes Jack's harrowing vendetta with one last shocking twist.

Louis Begley (Author), Stephen R. Thorne (Narrator)

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Killer, Come Hither

Jack Dana is a former Marine Infantry officer and Force Recon platoon leader. He is also the author of three successful books. It may seem odd that someone like Jack— honor graduate of the Corps’ toughest combat schools, a guy who knows how to punch a blade between a person’s ribs and went door-to-door killing people during the second battle for Fallujah—should become a novelist. But there’s the other side of Jack. The Yale graduate. The only child of a Harvard philosophy professor father and a flutist mother who played with a Boston-based chamber orchestra. Raised in a comfortable clapboard house in Cambridge, and then later, after his parents’ deaths, by his enigmatic uncle in Long Island. As Jack would say, “The truth is that to everything there is a season.”

Louis Begley (Author), R. C. Bray (Narrator)

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Schmidt Steps Back

The third book in the darkly comic series following the travails of American anti-hero, Warren Schmidt, SCHMIDT STEPS BACK takes a more somber tone, covering 'the most difficult things ' the loss of a child, and the terrible things that have happened to our country in the last 14 years', according to author Louis Begley. In the new novel, Schmidt will watch the Twin Towers collapse from his office in New York. 'Unless one looks at the dark side, one shouldn't be bothering to write,' said Begley. His protagonist was played by Jack Nicholson in a lauded 2002 film adaptation of the first novel in the series, ABOUT SCHMIDT.

Louis Begley (Author), George Guidall (Narrator)

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Wartime Lies

As the world slips into the throes of war in 1939, nine-year-old Maciek’s once closeted existence outside Warsaw is no more. When Warsaw falls, the orphaned Maciek escapes with his sharp-tongued aunt Tania. Posing as Catholic Poles to hide their Jewish identity, they endure the war together—running, hiding, changing their names, forging documents to secure their temporary lives—as the insistent drum of the Nazi march moves ever closer to them and to their secret wartime lies. This exquisite, acclaimed novel of the Holocaust as seen through the eyes of a young Polish boy was chosen by the New York Times as one of the Ten Best Books of the Year, nominated for the National Book Award, and won the 1991 Irish Times–Aer Lingus International Fiction Prize. “[A] searing story of the quest for an authentic self in an insane world.”--Publishers Weekly

Louis Begley (Author), Stefan Rudnicki (Narrator)

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About Schmidt

Louis Begley's perceptive novel hums with emotional energy and shimmers with haunting images. A National Book Critics' Circle Award finalist, About Schmidt is a powerful meditation on loneliness, desire, and transformation. Old-school lawyer Albert Schmidt has spent years carefully climbing the ladder of success. But now, at what should be the pinnacle of his career, his life is in chaos. Within months, he is widowed and forcibly retired from his firm. He harbors painfully mixed feelings about his ambitious daughter's impending marriage. Suddenly, in the midst of this turmoil, a seductive young woman asks Smitty what he wants. Far from being a time of satisfaction and complacency, the middle age encountered by Begley's hero is the beginning of a new journey tantalizing, yet unnerving. From the first step, Begley draws the reader deeply into a man's quest for new ways to understand an unstable world.

Louis Begley (Author), George Guidall (Narrator)

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Venice for Lovers

Every year for the thirty they have been married, Louis Begley and Anka Muhlstein have escaped to Venice to write. In Venice for Lovers, Begley and Muhlstein fashion their own personal homages to Venice, one with a novella, the other with a personal essay. In her contribution to the book, Muhlstein charmingly describes how she and her husband dine at the same restaurant every night for years on end, and how becoming friends with restaurateurs has been an unsurpassed means of getting to know the city and its inhabitants, far from the tourists in San Marco Square. They meet Venetians like Ernesto, who tells them of the great flood that nearly destroyed the beautiful city; and Nerone, an authoritarian chef who serves the freshest seafood and throws yesterday's catch to the cats. And they spend blissful hours at Da Fiore, named by the International Herald Tribune as one of the ten best restaurants in the world but which, unfazed, retains its rustic simplicity. In his short novella, Begley writes a story of falling in love with-and in-Venice. His twenty-year-old protagonist, enamored with an older, far worldlier woman, is lured by her to the City of Water, only to be unceremoniously dumped after a brief rendezvous. But he discovers a lasting love for Venice itself-not an uncommon romance, as Begley's brilliant essay on the city's place within world literature demonstrates. By turns humorous, nostalgic, and spellbinding, Venice for Lovers is a memorable collaboration by two fine stylists-a very private view of a place that will forever inspire dreams of love and passion.

Anka Muhlstein, Louis Begley (Author), Malcolm Hillgartner (Narrator)

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Schmidt Delivered

Best-selling author Louis Begley created a beguiling icon of middle age in About Schmidt. Recently widowed, pushed into retirement by his law firm, at odds with his family, Albert Schmidt captivated readers with his cautious courage. Now he is facing ever mounting challenges of life, love, and age. Schmidt is happy living with his affectionate young girlfriend, Carrie. His grumpy daughter, on the other hand, seems to want only money from him. What really disturbs Schmidt, however, is the growing attention of his neighbor, the exotic Michael Mansour. Wealthy and persistent, Mansour seems determined to draw Schmidt into his lavish personal and financial affairs. Louis Begley's aim is perfect as he targets the joys and pitfalls facing our graying hero. Audie Award-winning narrator George Guidall brings out all the wry humor of a man who is fully aware of his flaws and weaknesses, yet remains strong.

Louis Begley (Author), George Guidall (Narrator)

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Mistler's Exit

A PEN/Hemingway Award winner, Louis Begley creates multi-faceted characters that come to life under the spell of his crystalline prose. Returning his readers to the wealthy and privileged world of About Schmidt , he introduces them, this time, to an especially poignant protagonist. "A happy man, as the world goes," Thomas Mistler feels an odd sense of liberation now that he has been diagnosed with terminal cancer. This hard-driving Madison Avenue mogul suddenly has an excuse to live for the moment. But spending time alone in Venice is not the free-wheeling, self-indulgent experience he had hoped for. As growing evidence of his physical decline intrudes, Mistler's sense of control diminishes. With one final impulsive purchase, though, he boldly plans his exit on his own terms. Bitingly candid and sometimes funny, this small gem of a novel addresses the complexities of responsibility, pleasure, and suffering. Narrator Paul Hecht renders the subtle, understated, and intimate prose with amazing ease. The last tape contains an interview with the author.

Louis Begley (Author), Paul Hecht (Narrator)

Audiobook