Explore the psychology, science, and history of bad behavior with these provocative nonfiction narratives.


DECONSTRUCTING THE DARK SIDE

Explore the psychology, science, and history of bad behavior with these provocative nonfiction narratives.
Destination: True Crime > Dark Nonfiction
"If you've found your way here, you're probably a little like me: curious about the shadowy secrets of human nature and history. Have no fear (well, maybe just a little), because the riveting storytelling and compelling research behind these nonfiction listens make this a safe space to explore the dark depths of humanity—and maybe even lift them out of obscurity." —Kat, Audible Editor
Product List
  • Understanding the Dark Side of Human Nature Audiobook By Professor Daniel Breyer, The Great Courses cover art

    • Understanding the Dark Side of Human Nature

    • By: Professor Daniel Breyer, The Great Courses
    • Narrated by: Professor Daniel Breyer
    • Length: 12 hrs and 8 mins
    • Release date: 07-19-19
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 1,329 ratings
    • Superb course!
    • The course provides a fine-grained analysis of different concepts of evil from religious, moral, behavioral, and psychological perspectives. Attention is given to its impact on our lives with respect to our fears, our grief, our dreams, and our struggles with self-deception and weakness of will. Evil can destroy lives: Not only those who are victimized by it but also by those who are infected by it. Insightful lectures on revenge, anger, forgiveness, and redemption provide a helpful guide to mastering evil even as it threatens to destroy us. This course is a remarkable achievement that I highly recommend. —David, Audible Listener

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  • Talking to Strangers Audiobook By Malcolm Gladwell cover art

    • Talking to Strangers

    • What We Should Know About the People We Don't Know
    • By: Malcolm Gladwell
    • Narrated by: Malcolm Gladwell
    • Length: 8 hrs and 42 mins
    • Release date: 09-10-19
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 70,858 ratings
    • Things that go bump in the night
    • Gladwell deals with liars who get away with very bad things for years…Such betrayers of trust are surrounded by legions of educated and handsomely paid professionals, men and women, who actually defend them despite growing evidence of their crimes. What gets me deep down is Gladwell's optimistic tone throughout this exploration of how much we should trust strangers when the stakes are high. Gladwell communicates horrible things with stoic calm, and he tells the story as if around a campfire in a cave at night. In the end, he says we need to default to restraint and humility although we’re often afraid! —Lee, Audible Listener

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  • A Brief History of Vice Audiobook By Robert Evans cover art

    • A Brief History of Vice

    • How Bad Behavior Built Civilization
    • By: Robert Evans
    • Narrated by: Tristan Morris
    • Length: 7 hrs and 42 mins
    • Release date: 08-09-16
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 952 ratings
    • Wonderful intellectual surprise
    • Great book and narrator. Took chance on the book and loved it. I love nonfiction books that tell about how history was vs. how we like to sugarcoat it. Factual, honest, and surprisingly funny. Written in a bit of a Gonzo style that makes it fun and easy to listen to without glorifying the habits we guiltily love. —Carl, Audible Listener

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  • The Art of the English Murder Audiobook By Lucy Worsley cover art

    • The Art of the English Murder

    • From Jack the Ripper and Sherlock Holmes to Agatha Christie and Alfred Hitchcock
    • By: Lucy Worsley
    • Narrated by: Anne Flosnik
    • Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
    • Release date: 10-15-14
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 214 ratings
    • Perfect autumn listen
    • This is a fun book if you're a fan of British history or literature. I enjoyed it very much and it made for a nice companion while reading Sarah Waters's Fingersmith in print. It also brought back memories of reading Murder As a Fine Art by David Morrell. Narrator Anne Flosnik was the perfect choice to voice this book. I just wanted to keep listening to her read this book. Her reading made it clear that she was enjoying The Art of English Murder just as much as I was. —Literate Housewife, Audible Listener

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  • The Poisoner's Handbook Audiobook By Deborah Blum cover art

    • The Poisoner's Handbook

    • Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York
    • By: Deborah Blum
    • Narrated by: Coleen Marlo
    • Length: 9 hrs and 14 mins
    • Release date: 02-18-10
    • Language: English
    • 4 out of 5 stars 2,558 ratings
    • CSI, eat your heart out
    • For a person who has similar (morbid) tastes, The Poisoner's Handbook perfectly fits the bill. These crimes take place in New York City during the Jazz Age. The author carefully describes various poisons, such as wood alcohol, arsenic, and radium and the various effects it had on the victims. If your knowledge of poisons is based on tv shows or movies, you will be surprised to find out a lot you (probably) didn't know already. —Aaron, Audible Listener

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  • Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs? Audiobook By Caitlin Doughty cover art

    • Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs?

    • Big Questions from Tiny Mortals
    • By: Caitlin Doughty
    • Narrated by: Caitlin Doughty
    • Length: 4 hrs and 29 mins
    • Release date: 09-10-19
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 4,502 ratings
    • A kid-friendly 💀 explainer
    • As one of the world's most renowned funeral directors, Caitlin Doughty gets asked a lot of questions about death, and it’s always the kids who ask the weirdest and most wonderful ones. In Will My Cat Eat My Eyeballs?, she sets out to answer some of them—from ‘Can I keep my parents' skulls after they die?’ to 'What would happen if you swallowed a bag of popcorn before you died and were cremated?' Dressed up as an entertaining romp through an offbeat subculture—and yes, Doughty’s pitch perfect narration is hugely entertaining!—it’s secretly a guide for how to become more comfortable with something we’ll all inevitably face one day. —Rachel, Audible Editor

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  • The Royal Art of Poison Audiobook By Eleanor Herman cover art

    • The Royal Art of Poison

    • Filthy Palaces, Fatal Cosmetics, Deadly Medicine, and Murder Most Foul
    • By: Eleanor Herman
    • Narrated by: Susie Berneis
    • Length: 10 hrs and 31 mins
    • Release date: 08-06-18
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 2,544 ratings
    • More fun than poison should be!
    • I enjoyed this rollicking, pus-filled tale of poisoning, unintended self destruction and mysteries of famous deaths. The narrator is excellent, with just enough 'wink' in her voice to convey sly humor. The stories are sprinkled with interesting facts about both famous and obscure historical personalities, and there's something for everyone to learn. I highly recommend this book, whether you’re a fan of true crime, murder mysteries, medical oddities or just looking to learn something new. —Leslye, Audible Listener

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  • The Psychopath Inside Audiobook By James Fallon cover art

    • The Psychopath Inside

    • A Neuroscientist's Personal Journey into the Dark Side of the Brain
    • By: James Fallon
    • Narrated by: Walter Dixon
    • Length: 4 hrs and 58 mins
    • Release date: 10-31-13
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 592 ratings
    • Psychopathy as a spectrum. Who knew?
    • You learn something new every day. While it’s incorrect to say 'the science is in' on psychopathy, it is certainly more than fair to say Fallon has turned over more than enough rocks on the subject to warrant further study and exploration. His discoveries thus far, at the very least, open the door to 'partial' diagnoses, potentially upending the practice of traditional pass/fail scoring systems on the disorder that have undergirded the APA diagnostic system for decades. A practice that has allowed certain patients to fall through the cracks of treatment if not fly completely under the mental health radar altogether. This is of particular importance if, as James Fallon strongly suggests, early childhood experiences and/or interventions have profound implications on where exactly the fully formed adult will eventually land on the spectrum. This book is truly ground breaking. A must read. —average consumer, Audible Listener

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  • Savage Appetites Audiobook By Rachel Monroe cover art

    • Savage Appetites

    • Four True Stories of Women, Crime and Obsession
    • By: Rachel Monroe
    • Narrated by: Jayme Mattler
    • Length: 8 hrs and 27 mins
    • Release date: 08-20-19
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 185 ratings
    • So that's why I'm like this…
    • I've been fascinated by true tales of the dark and macabre variety for as long as I can remember, but I have to admit, there are times when I didn't feel particularly good about sharing that fact. Outwardly, I think I'm a pretty cheery person, so what draws me and so, so many other women into such dark stories? Enter Rachel Monroe, who had the very same question about herself. She presents four fascinating, sometimes deeply disturbing, tales of four women who also devoted their lives to crime in very different ways. Intertwining these tales with her own observations and experiences, she offers intriguing, if not perfectly comprehensive (because what’s life without a little mystery?) theories about what makes true crime just so irresistible. —Sam, Audible Editor

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  • Stephen Fry’s Victorian Secrets Audiobook By John Woolf, Nick Baker cover art

    • Stephen Fry’s Victorian Secrets

    • An Audible Original
    • By: John Woolf, Nick Baker
    • Narrated by: Stephen Fry
    • Length: 7 hrs and 33 mins
    • Release date: 11-01-18
    • Language: English
    • 4 out of 5 stars 18,641 ratings
    • Informative, scary, and funny. In that order.
    • This series is a real gem and I'm glad I found it. Each and every episode is fascinating and they each give quite an in-depth and compelling look into the secrets Victorians kept each and every day. The narration by Stephen Fry is perfect as ever. He keeps his trademark wit but he also seems genuine and sympathetic when discussing the more horrible parts of Victorian life. They couldn’t have found a more appropriate middle-man to introduce us to the skeletons of the Victorian closet. History geeks in particular will enjoy it but I would honestly recommend this to anyone. It’s equal parts informative, scandalous, enlightening and at times grotesque, but I enjoyed every minute of it and couldn’t give it enough stars. Do yourself a favor and give it a try. —Stefan, Audible Listener

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  • The Butchering Art Audiobook By Lindsey Fitzharris cover art

    • The Butchering Art

    • Joseph Lister's Quest to Transform the Grisly World of Victorian Medicine
    • By: Lindsey Fitzharris
    • Narrated by: Ralph Lister
    • Length: 7 hrs and 54 mins
    • Release date: 10-31-17
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 3,362 ratings
    • Not one boring moment!
    • If you were unlucky enough to have surgery in an English hospital in the mid 19th century, you often left as a corpse. This book shows the horrible conditions and follows the struggles of Dr. Joseph Lister who ushered in a new era in medicine and in the process saved countless lives. Both author and narrator do a great job of immersing the reader in the Victorian era. There is not one boring moment in this book. —WRWF, Audible Listener

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  • The New Evil Audiobook By Michael H. Stone MD, Gary Brucato PhD cover art

    • The New Evil

    • Understanding the Emergence of Modern Violent Crime
    • By: Michael H. Stone MD, Gary Brucato PhD
    • Narrated by: Charles Constant
    • Length: 18 hrs and 25 mins
    • Release date: 03-05-19
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 327 ratings
    • Truly a must listen!
    • This book is absolutely a must for all who have a curiosity about modern day serial killers and modern day crime. I was gripped by this book from start to finish. Well narrated and well thought out. 18 hr 45 minutes well listened. Another commuting book that took me two weeks, but well worth every minute. Highly recommended. —Karen, Audible Listener

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