Audiobooks narrated by Joe Barrett

"Brought to you by Penguin. From her pygmy goat farm in Vermont, a cartoonist named Alison Bechdel wonders: Can she pull humanity out of its death spiral by writing a scathing memoir about her own greed and privilege? But how can she just sit around writing a book when the world is hanging on a thread? In this hilariously skewering comic novel, Alison is existentially pained by a climate-challenged world and a country on the brink of civil war. Her first graphic memoir about growing up with her taxidermist father has been adapted into a highly successful TV series, Death and Taxidermy. It’s a phenomenon that makes Alison, formerly on the cultural margins, the envy of her friend group. As the TV show racks up Emmy after Emmy, Alison’s own envy spirals. Surely writing her own wildly popular reality TV series wouldn’t be that hard? One that shows people how to free themselves from consumer capitalism and live a more ethical life?! In Spent, the celebrated, bestselling author of the modern classic Fun Home presents a laugh-out-loud and passionately political work of autofiction, and once again proves that “nobody does it better” (New York Times) than the real Alison Bechdel. 'The funniest, most satirical cartoon she has ever written – as well as, perhaps, the most prescient' OBSERVER © Alison Bechdel 2025 (P) Penguin Audio 2025"

Alison Bechdel (Author), Adenrele Ojo, Ali Liebegott, Alison Bechdel, Bill McKibben, Christina Delaine, Dan Bittner, Gilli Messer, Hayden Bishop, Holly Rae Taylor, Jenn Colella, Joe Barrett, Keylor Leight, Kimberly Farr, Maggie-Meg Reed, Naomi Liv Joseffy, Renata Friedman (Narrator)

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Crisis and Crossfire: The United States and the Middle East Since 1945: 2nd Edition

Peter L. Hahn (Author), Joe Barrett (Narrator)

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American Laughter, American Fury: Humor and the Making of a White Man's Democracy, 1750–1850

"In American Laughter, American Fury, Eran A. Zelnik offers a cultural history of early America that shows how humor among white men served to define and construct not only whiteness and masculinity but also American political culture and democracy more generally. Zelnik traces the emerging bonds of affinity that white male settlers in North America cultivated through their shared, transformative experience of mirth. This humor—a category that includes not only jokes but also play, riot, revelry, and mimicry—shaped the democratic and anti-elitist sensibilities of Americans. It also defined the borders of who could participate in politics, notably excluding those who were not white men. While this anti-authoritarian humor transformed the early United States into a country that abhorred elitism and class hierarchies, ultimately the story is one of democratization gone awry: this same humor allowed white men to draw the borders of the new nation exclusively around themselves. Zelnik analyzes several distinct forms of humor to make his case: tall tales, 'Indian play,' Black dialect, riot and revelry, revolutionary protests, and blackface minstrelsy. This provocative study seeks to understand the vexing, contradictory interplay among humor, democracy, and violence at the heart of American history and culture that continues today."

Eran A. Zelnik (Author), Joe Barrett (Narrator)

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Indochina Hand: Tales of a CIA Case Officer

"Barry Broman joined the CIA in 1971 straight out of the Marine Corps, choosing a career in intelligence largely because he wanted to spend his working life in Southeast Asia. Over the next thirty years, he had the privilege of working with brave men and women who were prepared to put their lives on the line in support of the free world during the Cold War, and he enjoyed the life of adventure he had been seeking since childhood. This book brings together tales from his career as a CIA case officer during the Cold War, giving fascinating insights into handling double agents, working in denied areas, assessing and recruiting Soviet targets, flying with Air America, acting to discredit Soviet agents with Moscow, and what happened when a case officer sets a 'scavenger hunt' around Bangkok for fellow spies—and at least one active target. A selection of stories told in engaging style proving that often the truth is more unbelievable than fiction."

Barry Michael Broman (Author), Joe Barrett (Narrator)

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What Is It Like to Be a Bat?

"'Consciousness is what makes the mind-body problem really intractable.' So begins Thomas Nagel's classic 1974 essay 'What is it Like to be a Bat?' Nagel's essay initiated the now widespread attention to consciousness as a central problem for philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience; it also influenced the recognition of the consciousness of nonhuman creatures as an important subject of study. Nagel argued that the essential subjectivity of conscious experience—what it is like for the creature undergoing it—means that reductionist theories of mind, which attempt to analyze it in physical terms, can never succeed. It follows that the physical sciences cannot provide a complete description of reality, and that the physical conception of objective reality must be transcended if science is going to comprehend the mind. This edition reissues this classic and widely influential article on its fiftieth anniversary, along with a new preface discussing the origins and influence of the essay, as well as 'Further Thoughts: The Psychophysical Nexus,' a supplementary essay which describes Nagel's later thoughts about how to respond to the problem posed by 'What Is It Like to Be a Bat?'"

Thomas Nagel (Author), Joe Barrett (Narrator)

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A Second Chance: A Federal Judge Decides Who Deserves It

"Murderous mafia capos. The police officer who brutalized Abner Louima. A purveyor of child pornography. These are some of the defendants to have come before US District Court Judge Frederic Block to ask for reductions in their prison sentences. All of them have been found guilty and have already served decades in prison, but under the 2018 First Step Act they are entitled to petition for reconsideration and release. In a rare glimpse behind the bench, Judge Block recounts the cases of six incarcerated people who have done heinous things but have nevertheless petitioned him for their release. He then explains the criteria the First Step Act has spelled out for his consideration. And, in a novel twist, he asks the listener, 'What would you do?' Judge Block puts us out of our suspense in a third section of the book where he tells us what he did do in each case and why, as he weighs each compassionate release request, evaluating issues ranging from 'the trial tax,' to sentencing disparities, to judicial incompetence. Finally, Judge Block makes the compelling case that the First Step Act should be extended to state court judges, since state prisons house about ninety percent of those incarcerated. In a book that could be the basis for a new season of Law & Order, Judge Block challenges our ideas about punishment and justice."

Frederic Block (Author), Joe Barrett (Narrator)

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Hueys over Khe Sanh: Missions with VMO-6

"A vivid memoir of the Vietnam War by a crew chief who flew on hundreds of flights during his tour. During Vietnam, the basic role of the USMC gunship squadrons was to protect the transport helicopters during medevac missions, troop insertions and extractions, resupply missions, and supporting the Marines on the ground during operations and patrols. Basically, whenever the Marines or South Vietnam friendlies got in trouble the gunships were dispatched to assist them. As a gunner, and later crew chief, Pete Greene flew hundreds of missions on Huey gunships—flying practically every day with different pilots and gunners. In this vivid memoir he recalls many of those missions, including providing gunship support for MACV-SOG in and around I Corps area, working with Marine Recon, and undertaking frequent, perilous resupply and medevac and medevac support missions."

Peter Greene (Author), Joe Barrett (Narrator)

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No Haven: The Connecticut Mob and the Rise of America's Model City

"With Boston to the north and New York City to the south, Connecticut's history of organized crime is often overlooked. This is the untold story of New Haven's illegal past. One of America's most historic and enduring cities, New Haven has wrangled with a perpetual identity struggle, torn between worlds that occasionally converged in chaos and violence. In the 1930s, Connecticut became a region where Mafia families like the Genoveses, Gambinos, Colombos, and Patriarcas shared turf—working together with enough profits to go around or descending into open war to rival that experienced in any major city. Central to this conflict were three men who were, at different times, cautious allies or sworn nemeses. Representing the Genoveses, Midge Renault reigned supreme thanks to his reputation for wanton violence. Meanwhile, Colombo capo Ralph 'Whitey' Tropiano maintained a lower profile, which belied his reputation as a vicious killer. But it was his lieutenant, Billy 'The Wild Guy' Grasso, who ultimately rose to the top after joining the New England Patriarca Family, enjoying a short rule that ended with a murder plot that left him on the wrong end of a bullet."

Paul Bleakley (Author), Joe Barrett (Narrator)

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Reducing Your Taxes For Dummies

"Get year-round insight on reducing tax burdens This book walks you through the best strategies for reducing your personal tax burden and keeping more dollars in your pocket. If you plan and manage your finances all year round, tax season can be a cakewalk. Reducing Your Taxes For Dummies offers tips on maximizing your deductions, minimizing your income tax, and hunting for breaks on investment, real estate, and business income tax. Written by Dummies financial guru Eric Tyson (Personal Finance For Dummies, Taxes For Dummies), this guide explains tax basics, savings plans, retirement accounts, and myriad ideas for reducing your personal tax burden. ● Understand filing status, child tax credits, alternative minimum tax, IRS audits, and beyond ● Avoid common tax mistakes and identify all your possible deductions ● Plan and invest in a tax-wise way throughout the year ● Make the most of your retirement accounts and savings plans Keep your hard-earned cash with Reducing Your Taxes For Dummies. It's full of year-round opportunities for reducing your tax burden and paying less in taxes each year."

Eric Tyson (Author), Joe Barrett (Narrator)

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Schoolboy: The Untold Journey of a Yankees Hero

"Waite 'Schoolboy' Hoyt's improbable baseball journey began when the 1915 New York Giants signed him as a high school junior, for no pay and a five-dollar bonus. Based on a trove of Hoyt's writings and interview transcripts, Tim Manners has reanimated the baseball legend's untold story, entirely in Hoyt's own words. Over his twenty-three-year professional baseball career, Hoyt won 237 big league games across 3,845 2/3 innings—and one locker room brawl with Babe Ruth. He writes at length about the art of pitching and how the game and its players changed—and didn't—over his lifetime. After retiring from baseball at thirty-eight and coming to terms with his alcoholism, Hoyt found some happiness as a family man and a beloved, pioneering Cincinnati Reds radio sportscaster with a Websterian vocabulary spiked with a Brooklyn accent. When Hoyt died in 1984 his foremost legacy may have been as a raconteur who punctuated his life story with awe-inspiring and jaw-dropping anecdotes. In Schoolboy he never flinches from an unsparing account of his remarkable and paradoxical eighty-four-year odyssey."

Waite Hoyt (Author), Joe Barrett (Narrator)

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Where The Ley Lines Meet: Final Chapter to the Claire Saga

"The Claire Trilogy taught us the meaning of family and loyalty in every sense of those words through the bonding of Claire the Mule and her family of mystical misfits under the most trying of circumstances. Its prequel, Finding Jimmy Moran, introduced the world to the magical young boy who grows into the man that leads Claire's family across the galaxy. Where The Ley Lines Meet is what happens when the mystical misfits and their alien brethren are recalled to earth to reunite and save the world. The storylines and characters the fans have come to love in the prior four books reappear in this continuation and conclusion of The Claire Saga. Or is it?"

Tom Mccaffrey (Author), Joe Barrett (Narrator)

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Madness, Betrayal and the Lash: The Epic Voyage of Captain George Vancouver

"From 1792 to 1795, George Vancouver sailed the Pacific as the captain of his own expedition and as an agent of imperial ambition. To map a place is to control it, and Britain had its eyes on America's Pacific coast. And map it Vancouver did. His voyage was one of history's greatest feats of maritime daring, discovery, and diplomacy, and his marine survey of Hawaii and the Pacific coast was at its time the most comprehensive ever undertaken. But just two years after returning to Britain, the forty-year-old Vancouver, hounded by critics, shamed by public humiliation at the fists of an aristocratic sailor he had flogged, and blacklisted because of a perceived failure to follow the Admiralty's directives, died in poverty, nearly forgotten. In this riveting and perceptive biography, historian Stephen Bown delves into the events that destroyed Vancouver's reputation and restores his position as one of the greatest explorers of the Age of Discovery."

Stephen R. Bown (Author), Joe Barrett (Narrator)

Audiobook

Audiobooks Narrated by Joe Barrett

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