
Battle Royale
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed

Get 2 free audiobooks during trial.
Buy for $26.24
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Mark Dacascos
About this listen
Battle Royale, a high-octane thriller about senseless youth violence in a dystopian world, it is one of Japan's best-selling - and most controversial - novels. As part of a ruthless program by the totalitarian government, ninth-grade students are taken to a small isolated island with a map, food, and various weapons. Forced to wear special collars that explode when they break a rule, they must fight each other for three days until only one "winner" remains. The elimination contest becomes the ultimate in must-see reality television.
A Japanese pulp classic available in English-language audio for the first time, Battle Royale is a potent allegory of what it means to be young and survive in today's dog-eat-dog world. The first novel by small-town journalist Koushun Takami, it went on to become an even more notorious film by 70-year-old director Kinji Fukusaku.
Download the accompanying reference guide.©1999 Koushun Takami; Translation copyright 2009, Yuji Oniki (P)2012 Simon & SchusterListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Long Walk
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the near future, when America has become a police state, 100 boys are selected to enter an annual contest where the winner will be awarded whatever he wants for the rest of his life. Among them is 16-year-old Ray Garraty, and he knows the rules - keep a steady walking pace of four miles per hour without stopping. Three warnings and you're out - permanently.
-
-
ONLY,---- WHAT A STUPID WORD!
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 04-29-16
By: Stephen King
-
The Ruins
- By: Scott Smith
- Narrated by: Patrick Wilson
- Length: 14 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Ruins follows two American couples enjoying a pleasant, lazy beach holiday together in Mexico. On an impulse, they go off with newfound friends in search of one of their group, the young German who, in pursuit of a girl, has headed for the remote Mayan ruins, site of a fabled archeological dig.
-
-
Singularly Harsh
- By Fredrick J. on 03-07-17
By: Scott Smith
-
Tales from the Gas Station: Volume One
- By: Jack Townsend
- Narrated by: Jon Grilz
- Length: 8 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Drunk customers. Shoplifting raccoons. Otherworldly visitors. As night-shift clerk at the 24-hour gas station at the edge of town, Jack has pretty much seen it all. That is, until his best friend reveals the body of a local politician hidden in the trunk of a car, setting off a chain of events with apocalyptic potential. Soon, Jack finds himself entangled in a supernatural conspiracy involving monster hunters, sociopaths, doomsday cultists, and...garden gnomes?
-
-
Mr. CreepyPasta Narration is better
- By Kelsey on 08-11-23
By: Jack Townsend
-
Slayers: A Buffyverse Story
- By: Christopher Golden, Amber Benson
- Narrated by: Amber Benson, Charisma Carpenter, James Charles Leary, and others
- Length: 8 hrs and 2 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Original cast members from the beloved TV series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, reunite for an all-new adventure about connections that never die—even if you bury them. A decade has passed since the epic final battle that concluded Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV). The game-changing spell that gave power to all potential Slayers persists. With new Slayers constantly emerging, things are looking grim for the bad guys.
-
-
A dream come true
- By Anonymous User on 10-12-23
By: Christopher Golden, and others
-
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes
- A Hunger Games Novel
- By: Suzanne Collins
- Narrated by: Santino Fontana
- Length: 16 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is the morning of the reaping that will kick off the 10th annual Hunger Games. In the Capitol, 18-year-old Coriolanus Snow is preparing for his one shot at glory as a mentor in the Games. The once-mighty house of Snow has fallen on hard times, its fate hanging on the slender chance that Coriolanus will be able to out charm, outwit, and outmaneuver his fellow students to mentor the winning tribute. The odds are against him. He’s been given the humiliating assignment of mentoring the female tribute from District 12, the lowest of the low.
-
-
Bad part
- By Edgars Dumins on 05-19-20
By: Suzanne Collins
-
Red Rising (Part 1 of 2) (Dramatized Adaptation)
- Red Rising, Book 1
- By: Pierce Brown
- Narrated by: full cast, Stewart Crank, John Kielty, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 31 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Darrow is a Red, a member of the lowest caste in the color-coded society of the future. Like his fellow Reds, he works all day, believing that he and his people are making the surface of Mars livable for future generations. Yet he toils willingly, trusting that his blood and sweat will one day result in a better world for his children. But Darrow and his kind have been betrayed. Soon he discovers that humanity reached the surface generations ago. Vast cities and lush wilds spread across the planet. Darrow—and Reds like him—are nothing more than slaves to a decadent ruling class.
-
-
Fantastic
- By Tyler on 07-06-23
By: Pierce Brown
-
The Long Walk
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the near future, when America has become a police state, 100 boys are selected to enter an annual contest where the winner will be awarded whatever he wants for the rest of his life. Among them is 16-year-old Ray Garraty, and he knows the rules - keep a steady walking pace of four miles per hour without stopping. Three warnings and you're out - permanently.
-
-
ONLY,---- WHAT A STUPID WORD!
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 04-29-16
By: Stephen King
-
The Ruins
- By: Scott Smith
- Narrated by: Patrick Wilson
- Length: 14 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Ruins follows two American couples enjoying a pleasant, lazy beach holiday together in Mexico. On an impulse, they go off with newfound friends in search of one of their group, the young German who, in pursuit of a girl, has headed for the remote Mayan ruins, site of a fabled archeological dig.
-
-
Singularly Harsh
- By Fredrick J. on 03-07-17
By: Scott Smith
-
Tales from the Gas Station: Volume One
- By: Jack Townsend
- Narrated by: Jon Grilz
- Length: 8 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Drunk customers. Shoplifting raccoons. Otherworldly visitors. As night-shift clerk at the 24-hour gas station at the edge of town, Jack has pretty much seen it all. That is, until his best friend reveals the body of a local politician hidden in the trunk of a car, setting off a chain of events with apocalyptic potential. Soon, Jack finds himself entangled in a supernatural conspiracy involving monster hunters, sociopaths, doomsday cultists, and...garden gnomes?
-
-
Mr. CreepyPasta Narration is better
- By Kelsey on 08-11-23
By: Jack Townsend
-
Slayers: A Buffyverse Story
- By: Christopher Golden, Amber Benson
- Narrated by: Amber Benson, Charisma Carpenter, James Charles Leary, and others
- Length: 8 hrs and 2 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Original cast members from the beloved TV series, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, reunite for an all-new adventure about connections that never die—even if you bury them. A decade has passed since the epic final battle that concluded Buffy the Vampire Slayer (TV). The game-changing spell that gave power to all potential Slayers persists. With new Slayers constantly emerging, things are looking grim for the bad guys.
-
-
A dream come true
- By Anonymous User on 10-12-23
By: Christopher Golden, and others
-
The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes
- A Hunger Games Novel
- By: Suzanne Collins
- Narrated by: Santino Fontana
- Length: 16 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is the morning of the reaping that will kick off the 10th annual Hunger Games. In the Capitol, 18-year-old Coriolanus Snow is preparing for his one shot at glory as a mentor in the Games. The once-mighty house of Snow has fallen on hard times, its fate hanging on the slender chance that Coriolanus will be able to out charm, outwit, and outmaneuver his fellow students to mentor the winning tribute. The odds are against him. He’s been given the humiliating assignment of mentoring the female tribute from District 12, the lowest of the low.
-
-
Bad part
- By Edgars Dumins on 05-19-20
By: Suzanne Collins
-
Red Rising (Part 1 of 2) (Dramatized Adaptation)
- Red Rising, Book 1
- By: Pierce Brown
- Narrated by: full cast, Stewart Crank, John Kielty, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 31 mins
- Original Recording
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Darrow is a Red, a member of the lowest caste in the color-coded society of the future. Like his fellow Reds, he works all day, believing that he and his people are making the surface of Mars livable for future generations. Yet he toils willingly, trusting that his blood and sweat will one day result in a better world for his children. But Darrow and his kind have been betrayed. Soon he discovers that humanity reached the surface generations ago. Vast cities and lush wilds spread across the planet. Darrow—and Reds like him—are nothing more than slaves to a decadent ruling class.
-
-
Fantastic
- By Tyler on 07-06-23
By: Pierce Brown
-
Under the Dome
- A Novel
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Raul Esparza
- Length: 34 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On an entirely normal, beautiful fall day in Chester's Mill, Maine, the town is inexplicably and suddenly sealed off from the rest of the world by an invisible force field. Planes crash into it and fall from the sky in flaming wreckage, a gardener's hand is severed as "the dome" comes down on it, people running errands in the neighboring town are divided from their families, and cars explode on impact. No one can fathom what this barrier is, where it came from, and when - or if - it will go away.
-
-
Glad I Listened to 11-22-63 First
- By Russell on 02-09-12
By: Stephen King
-
The Running Man
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Kevin Kenerly
- Length: 7 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It was the ultimate death game in a nightmare future America. The year is 2025 and reality TV has grown to the point where people are willing to wager their lives for a chance at a billion-dollar jackpot. Ben Richards is desperate - he needs money to treat his daughter's illness. His last chance is entering a game show called The Running Man where the goal is to avoid capture by Hunters who are employed to kill him.
-
-
Skip the intro
- By Jball359 on 04-29-16
By: Stephen King
-
World War Z: The Complete Edition
- An Oral History of the Zombie War
- By: Max Brooks
- Narrated by: Max Brooks, Alan Alda, John Turturro, and others
- Length: 12 hrs and 9 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
World War Z: The Complete Edition features 21 additional Hollywood A-list actors and sci-fi fan favorites performing stories not included in the original edition. New narrators include Academy Award-winning director Martin Scorsese, Spiderman star Alfred Molina, The Walking Dead creator Frank Darabont, rapper Common, Firefly star Nathan Fillion, Shaun of the Dead’s Simon Pegg, and members of the casts of Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, Heroes and more!
-
-
Will never pre-order again
- By Ignatz on 05-18-13
By: Max Brooks
-
Playground
- By: Aron Beauregard
- Narrated by: Lila Kerry
- Length: 9 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Three low-income families have been given a handsome retainer to join Geraldine Borden for a day at her cliffside estate. All the parents must do to collect the rest of their money is allow their children to test out the revolutionary playground equipment Geraldine has been working on for decades. But there’s a reason the structures in the bowels of her gothic castle have taken so long to develop—they were never meant to see the light of day.
-
-
Not for the weak-stomached.
- By Dan Bugbee on 01-26-23
By: Aron Beauregard
-
A Clockwork Orange
- By: Anthony Burgess
- Narrated by: Tom Hollander
- Length: 7 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A vicious 15-year-old droog is the central character of this 1963 classic, a frightening fable about good and evil, and the meaning of human freedom. In Anthony Burgess' nightmare vision of the future, where the criminals take over after dark, the story is told by the central character, Alex, who talks in a brutal invented slang that brilliantly renders his and his friends' social pathology.
-
-
Great book, great narration, but not for everyone
- By Steve on 06-28-09
By: Anthony Burgess
-
Tender Is the Flesh
- By: Agustina Bazterrica
- Narrated by: Joseph Balderrama
- Length: 6 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Working at the local processing plant, Marcos is in the business of slaughtering humans - though no one calls them that anymore. His wife has left him, his father is sinking into dementia, and Marcos tries not to think too hard about how he makes a living. After all, it happened so quickly. First, it was reported that an infectious virus has made all animal meat poisonous to humans. Then governments initiated the "Transition". Now, eating human meat - "special meat" - is legal. Marcos tries to stick to numbers, consignments, processing.
-
-
Uhhhhhhh....
- By Josh E. on 12-05-20
-
FantasticLand
- A Novel
- By: Mike Bockoven
- Narrated by: Angela Dawe, Luke Daniels
- Length: 10 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Since the 1970s, FantasticLand has been the theme park where "Fun is Guaranteed!" But when a hurricane ravages the Florida coast and isolates the park, the employees find it anything but fun. Five weeks later, the authorities who rescue the survivors encounter a scene of horror. Photos soon emerge online of heads on spikes outside of rides and viscera and human bones littering the gift shops, breaking records for hits, views, likes, clicks, and shares.
-
-
Absurd...But awesome
- By T.J. on 11-12-17
By: Mike Bockoven
-
The Gray Man
- By: Mark Greaney
- Narrated by: Jay Snyder
- Length: 11 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Court Gentry is known as The Gray Man—a legend in the covert realm, moving silently from job to job, accomplishing the impossible, and then fading away. And he always hits his target. But there are forces more lethal than Gentry in the world. And in their eyes, Gentry has just outlived his usefulness. Now, he is going to prove that for him, there's no gray area between killing for a living-and killing to stay alive.
-
-
The gray man talks about gentry in the 3rd person on the court
- By Safekeeper on 07-26-17
By: Mark Greaney
-
The Last Yakuza
- Life and Death in the Japanese Underworld
- By: Jake Adelstein
- Narrated by: Brian Nishii
- Length: 12 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Makoto Saigo is half-American and half-Japanese in small-town Japan with a set of talents limited to playing guitar and picking fights. With rock stardom off the table, he turns toward the only place where you can start from the bottom and move up through sheer merit, loyalty, and brute force―the yakuza. Saigo, nicknamed “The Tsunami”, quickly realizes that even within the organization, opinions are as varied as they come, and a clash of philosophies can quickly become deadly. One screw-up can cost you your life, or at least a finger.
-
-
absolutely astounding work. you will not put this down.
- By I_am_Guts on 01-31-24
By: Jake Adelstein
-
One Hundred Years of Solitude
- By: Gabriel García Márquez, Gregory Rabassa - translator
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 14 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One of the 20th century's enduring works, One Hundred Years of Solitude is a widely beloved and acclaimed novel known throughout the world and the ultimate achievement in a Nobel Prize-winning career. The novel tells the story of the rise and fall of the mythical town of Macondo through the history of the Buendía family. Rich and brilliant, it is a chronicle of life, death, and the tragicomedy of humankind. In the beautiful, ridiculous, and tawdry story of the Buendía family, one sees all of humanity, just as in the history, myths, growth, and decay of Macondo, one sees all of Latin America.
-
-
What in the heck happened?????
- By Melinda on 02-05-14
By: Gabriel García Márquez, and others
-
Ritualist
- Completionist Chronicles, Book 1
- By: Dakota Krout
- Narrated by: Vikas Adam
- Length: 12 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The decision to start a new life is never an easy one, but for Joe the transition was far from figurative. Becoming a permanent addition to a game world, it doesn't take long to learn that people with his abilities are actively hunted. In fact, if the wrong people gained knowledge of what he was capable of, assassins would appear in droves.
-
-
Ritual is necessary for us to know anything
- By LITRPG Audiobook Reviews on 05-18-18
By: Dakota Krout
-
Steelheart
- The Reckoners, Book 1
- By: Brandon Sanderson
- Narrated by: MacLeod Andrews
- Length: 12 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Ten years ago, Calamity came. It was a burst in the sky that gave ordinary men and women extraordinary powers. The awed public started calling them Epics. But Epics are no friend of man. With incredible gifts came the desire to rule. And to rule man you must crush his will. Nobody fights the Epics...nobody but the Reckoners. A shadowy group of ordinary humans, they spend their lives studying Epics, finding their weaknesses, and then assassinating them. And David wants in. He wants Steelheart - the Epic who is said to be invincible. The Epic who killed David's father.
-
-
He got the idea from a near traffic accident
- By Don Gilbert on 09-26-13
People who viewed this also viewed...
-
Audition
- By: Ryu Murakami, Ralph McCarthy - translator
- Narrated by: David Shih
- Length: 4 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this gloriously over-the-top tale, Aoyama, a widower who has lived alone with his son ever since his wife died seven years before, finally decides it is time to remarry. Since Aoyama is a bit rusty when it comes to dating, a filmmaker friend proposes that, in order to attract the perfect wife, they do a casting call for a movie they don't intend to produce. As the resumes pile up, only one of the applicants catches Aoyama's attention - Yamasaki Asami - a striking young former ballerina with a mysterious past. But she is a far cry from the innocent young woman he imagines her to be.
-
-
Adequate?
- By Evan Runyon on 01-04-22
By: Ryu Murakami, and others
-
We
- A Novel
- By: Yevgeny Zamyatin
- Narrated by: Louise Brealey, Margaret Atwood, Toby Jones
- Length: 9 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a glass-enclosed city of perfectly straight lines, ruled over by an all-powerful “Benefactor”, the citizens of the totalitarian society of OneState are regulated by spies and secret police; wear identical clothing; and are distinguished only by a number assigned to them at birth. That is, until D-503, a mathematician who dreams in numbers, makes a discovery: he has an individual soul. He can feel things. He can fall in love. And, in doing so, he begins to dangerously veer from the norms of his society, becoming embroiled in a plot to destroy OneState and liberate the city.
-
-
Truly perfection
- By Blake Burkholder on 08-30-22
By: Yevgeny Zamyatin
-
We
- By: Yevgeny Zamyatin
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 6 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in the 26th century A.D., Yevgeny Zamyatin's masterpiece describes life under the regimented totalitarian society of OneState, ruled over by the all-powerful "Benefactor." Recognized as the inspiration for George Orwell's 1984, We is the archetype of the modern dystopia, or anti-Utopia: a great prose poem detailing the fate that might befall us all if we surrender our individual selves to some collective dream of technology and fail in the vigilance that is the price of freedom.
-
-
Interesting history, prose a little outdated
- By Joel D Offenberg on 11-30-11
By: Yevgeny Zamyatin
-
Off Season
- By: Jack Ketchum
- Narrated by: Richard Davidson
- Length: 7 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
September. A beautiful New York editor retreats to a lonely cabin on a hill in the quiet Maine beach town of Dead River - off season - awaiting her sister and friends. Nearby, a savage human family with a taste for flesh lurks in the darkening woods, watching, waiting for the moon to rise and night to fall.
-
-
Wow!
- By Barry S. Sharpnack on 11-22-09
By: Jack Ketchum
-
Orleans
- By: Sherri L. Smith
- Narrated by: Iesha Nyree, Landon Woodson
- Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
First came the storms. Then came the Fever. And the Wall. After a string of devastating hurricanes and a severe outbreak of Delta Fever, the Gulf Coast has been quarantined. Years later, residents of the Outer States are under the assumption that life in the Delta is all but extinct...but in reality, a new primitive society has been born. Fen de la Guerre is living with the O-positive blood tribe in the Delta when they are ambushed. Left with her tribe leader's newborn, Fen is determined to get the baby to a better life over the wall before her blood becomes tainted.
-
-
I'm left devastated
- By Cy Hy on 01-22-22
By: Sherri L. Smith
-
Kokoro
- By: Natsume Soseki
- Narrated by: Matt Shea
- Length: 7 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The subject of Kokoro, which can be translated as 'the heart of things' or as 'feeling,' is the delicate matter of the contrast between the meanings the various parties of a relationship attach to it. In the course of this exploration, Soseki brilliantly describes different levels of friendship, family relationships, and the devices by which men attempt to escape from their fundamental loneliness. The novel sustains throughout its length something approaching poetry, and it is rich in understanding and insight.
-
-
The Heart Of Things, Relationships & Feelings
- By Sara on 04-27-15
By: Natsume Soseki
-
Audition
- By: Ryu Murakami, Ralph McCarthy - translator
- Narrated by: David Shih
- Length: 4 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this gloriously over-the-top tale, Aoyama, a widower who has lived alone with his son ever since his wife died seven years before, finally decides it is time to remarry. Since Aoyama is a bit rusty when it comes to dating, a filmmaker friend proposes that, in order to attract the perfect wife, they do a casting call for a movie they don't intend to produce. As the resumes pile up, only one of the applicants catches Aoyama's attention - Yamasaki Asami - a striking young former ballerina with a mysterious past. But she is a far cry from the innocent young woman he imagines her to be.
-
-
Adequate?
- By Evan Runyon on 01-04-22
By: Ryu Murakami, and others
-
We
- A Novel
- By: Yevgeny Zamyatin
- Narrated by: Louise Brealey, Margaret Atwood, Toby Jones
- Length: 9 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a glass-enclosed city of perfectly straight lines, ruled over by an all-powerful “Benefactor”, the citizens of the totalitarian society of OneState are regulated by spies and secret police; wear identical clothing; and are distinguished only by a number assigned to them at birth. That is, until D-503, a mathematician who dreams in numbers, makes a discovery: he has an individual soul. He can feel things. He can fall in love. And, in doing so, he begins to dangerously veer from the norms of his society, becoming embroiled in a plot to destroy OneState and liberate the city.
-
-
Truly perfection
- By Blake Burkholder on 08-30-22
By: Yevgeny Zamyatin
-
We
- By: Yevgeny Zamyatin
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 6 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set in the 26th century A.D., Yevgeny Zamyatin's masterpiece describes life under the regimented totalitarian society of OneState, ruled over by the all-powerful "Benefactor." Recognized as the inspiration for George Orwell's 1984, We is the archetype of the modern dystopia, or anti-Utopia: a great prose poem detailing the fate that might befall us all if we surrender our individual selves to some collective dream of technology and fail in the vigilance that is the price of freedom.
-
-
Interesting history, prose a little outdated
- By Joel D Offenberg on 11-30-11
By: Yevgeny Zamyatin
-
Off Season
- By: Jack Ketchum
- Narrated by: Richard Davidson
- Length: 7 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
September. A beautiful New York editor retreats to a lonely cabin on a hill in the quiet Maine beach town of Dead River - off season - awaiting her sister and friends. Nearby, a savage human family with a taste for flesh lurks in the darkening woods, watching, waiting for the moon to rise and night to fall.
-
-
Wow!
- By Barry S. Sharpnack on 11-22-09
By: Jack Ketchum
-
Orleans
- By: Sherri L. Smith
- Narrated by: Iesha Nyree, Landon Woodson
- Length: 8 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
First came the storms. Then came the Fever. And the Wall. After a string of devastating hurricanes and a severe outbreak of Delta Fever, the Gulf Coast has been quarantined. Years later, residents of the Outer States are under the assumption that life in the Delta is all but extinct...but in reality, a new primitive society has been born. Fen de la Guerre is living with the O-positive blood tribe in the Delta when they are ambushed. Left with her tribe leader's newborn, Fen is determined to get the baby to a better life over the wall before her blood becomes tainted.
-
-
I'm left devastated
- By Cy Hy on 01-22-22
By: Sherri L. Smith
-
Kokoro
- By: Natsume Soseki
- Narrated by: Matt Shea
- Length: 7 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The subject of Kokoro, which can be translated as 'the heart of things' or as 'feeling,' is the delicate matter of the contrast between the meanings the various parties of a relationship attach to it. In the course of this exploration, Soseki brilliantly describes different levels of friendship, family relationships, and the devices by which men attempt to escape from their fundamental loneliness. The novel sustains throughout its length something approaching poetry, and it is rich in understanding and insight.
-
-
The Heart Of Things, Relationships & Feelings
- By Sara on 04-27-15
By: Natsume Soseki
-
Out
- A Novel
- By: Natsuo Kirino
- Narrated by: Emily Woo Zeller
- Length: 18 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This mesmerizing novel tells the story of a brutal murder in the staid Tokyo suburbs, as a young mother who works the night shift making boxed lunches strangles her abusive husband and then seeks the help of her coworkers to dispose of the body and cover up her crime. The coolly intelligent Masako emerges as the plot's ringleader but quickly discovers that this killing is merely the beginning, as it leads to a terrifying foray into the violent underbelly of Japanese society.
-
-
Out...
- By Christopher on 06-24-16
By: Natsuo Kirino
-
The Running Man
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Kevin Kenerly
- Length: 7 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It was the ultimate death game in a nightmare future America. The year is 2025 and reality TV has grown to the point where people are willing to wager their lives for a chance at a billion-dollar jackpot. Ben Richards is desperate - he needs money to treat his daughter's illness. His last chance is entering a game show called The Running Man where the goal is to avoid capture by Hunters who are employed to kill him.
-
-
Skip the intro
- By Jball359 on 04-29-16
By: Stephen King
-
1Q84
- By: Haruki Murakami, Jay Rubin - translator, Philip Gabriel - translator
- Narrated by: Allison Hiroto, Marc Vietor, Mark Boyett
- Length: 46 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The year is 1984 and the city is Tokyo.
A young woman named Aomame follows a taxi driver's enigmatic suggestion and begins to notice puzzling discrepancies in the world around her. She has entered, she realizes, a parallel existence, which she calls 1Q84 - "Q" is for "question mark". A world that bears a question....
-
-
WOW, WOW, WOW.
- By Amanda on 11-06-11
By: Haruki Murakami, and others
-
Perfume
- The Story of a Murderer
- By: Patrick Süskind, John E. Woods - translator
- Narrated by: Nigel Patterson
- Length: 9 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the slums of 18th-century France, Jean-Baptiste Grenouille is born with one sublime gift - an absolute sense of smell. As a boy, he lives to decipher the odors of Paris and apprentices himself to a prominent perfumer who teaches him the ancient art of mixing precious oils and herbs. But Grenouille's genius is such that he is not satisfied to stop there, and he becomes obsessed with capturing the smells of objects. Then one day, he catches a hint of a scent that will drive him on an ever-more-terrifying quest to create the "ultimate perfume" - the scent of a beautiful young virgin.
-
-
This is an unusual, highly entertaining story.
- By Kay Tracy on 02-13-19
By: Patrick Süskind, and others
-
Necroscope
- By: Brian Lumley
- Narrated by: James Langton
- Length: 17 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Harry Keogh is the man who can talk to the dead, the man for whom every grave willingly gives up its secrets, the one man who knows how to travel effortlessly through time and space to destroy the vampires that threaten all of humanity.
-
-
ONE MUST NOT CURSE THE DEAD
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 01-08-16
By: Brian Lumley
-
Earthlings
- A Novel
- By: Sayaka Murata
- Narrated by: Nancy Wu
- Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
As a child, Natsuki doesn’t fit into her family. Her parents favor her sister, and her best friend is a plush toy hedgehog named Piyyut who has explained to her that he has come from the planet Popinpobopia on a special quest to help her save the Earth.
-
-
Intriguing but disturbing
- By C. Parham on 01-01-21
By: Sayaka Murata
-
Gone
- Gone Series, Book 1
- By: Michael Grant
- Narrated by: Kyle McCarley
- Length: 17 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the blink of an eye, everyone disappears. Gone. Except for the young. There are teens, but not one single adult. Just as suddenly, there are no phones, no Internet, no television. No way to get help. And no way to figure out what's happened. Hunger threatens. Bullies rule. A sinister creature lurks. Animals are mutating. And the teens themselves are changing, developing new talents - unimaginable, dangerous, deadly powers - that grow stronger by the day. It's a terrifying new world.
-
-
Please rerelease this book w new narration
- By Kim on 02-12-17
By: Michael Grant
-
Memoirs of a Geisha
- By: Arthur Golden
- Narrated by: Bernadette Dunne
- Length: 17 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In a voice both haunting and startlingly immediate, Nitta Sayuri describes her life as a geisha. Taken from her home at the age of nine, she is sold into slavery to a renowned geisha house. Witness her transformation as you enter a world where appearances are paramount, virginity is auctioned to the highest bidder, women beguile powerful men, and love is scorned as illusion.
-
-
Perfect ---- in every way
- By Amanda on 02-08-06
By: Arthur Golden
-
American Psycho
- By: Bret Easton Ellis
- Narrated by: Pablo Schreiber
- Length: 16 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Patrick Bateman moves among the young and trendy in 1980s Manhattan. Young, handsome, and well educated, Bateman earns his fortune on Wall Street by day while spending his nights in ways we cannot begin to fathom. Expressing his true self through torture and murder, Bateman prefigures an apocalyptic horror that no society could bear to confront.
-
-
Fanntastic book but maybe not for everyone....
- By So Fain on 03-27-11
-
Warm Up
- A Tor.Com Original Prequel to Vicious
- By: V.E. Schwab
- Narrated by: Jeremy Arthur
- Length: 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's been 297 days since David died - and came back. He may have survived the avalanche, but the aftermath has been far worse. His wife moved out, taking his son with her, and a devastated David hasn't left his house since, terrified of the mysterious new power that followed him home from the ill-fated expedition. After months in seclusion, David's ready for a fresh start, and ventures out, determined to keep his power in check. But David's power isn't the one he needs to worry about.
-
-
Too short but great short story
- By Carlos P. on 07-06-24
By: V.E. Schwab
-
Speaks the Nightbird
- By: Robert R. McCammon
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini
- Length: 30 hrs and 42 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Carolinas, 1699: The citizens of Fount Royal believe a witch has cursed their town with inexplicable tragedies -- and they demand that beautiful widow Rachel Howarth be tried and executed for witchcraft. Presiding over the trial is traveling magistrate Issac Woodward, aided by his astute young clerk, Matthew Corbett. Believing in Rachel's innocence, Matthew will soon confront the true evil at work in Fount Royal....
-
-
Dark, Twisted Period Piece with GREAT Characters!
- By aaron on 06-05-12
-
World War Z: The Complete Edition
- An Oral History of the Zombie War
- By: Max Brooks
- Narrated by: Max Brooks, Alan Alda, John Turturro, and others
- Length: 12 hrs and 9 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
World War Z: The Complete Edition features 21 additional Hollywood A-list actors and sci-fi fan favorites performing stories not included in the original edition. New narrators include Academy Award-winning director Martin Scorsese, Spiderman star Alfred Molina, The Walking Dead creator Frank Darabont, rapper Common, Firefly star Nathan Fillion, Shaun of the Dead’s Simon Pegg, and members of the casts of Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, Heroes and more!
-
-
Will never pre-order again
- By Ignatz on 05-18-13
By: Max Brooks
great book, bad narration
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
What made the experience of listening to Battle Royale the most enjoyable?
I've read this book twice, hard copy and always wanted an audible version so I could listen at work. The fact that Mark Dacascos was able to pronounce the Japanese names extremely well, his voice was slightly monotone. However, for me, it was fine because I'd read the book before and hearing the action sequences rather than reading them made what was happening more clear.What was one of the most memorable moments of Battle Royale?
Kiriyama's ruthlessness as he took out two girls at close range. Yikes! That scene in the book and the movie always makes me cringe.What about Mark Dacascos’s performance did you like?
His pronunciation of Japanese names.If you could take any character from Battle Royale out to dinner, who would it be and why?
Shinji Mimura ;)Slightly Monotone Narrative
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
_Battle Royale_ is mostly preoccupied with descriptions of teenage angst and mistrust. The 'program' is an excellent setting for such a project, as it reduces every encounter to a catalyst for the students' motives and insecurities to play out in dramatic action. The political commentary that frames the whole story--'fascism and corrupted conservatism create an irresistable state of efficient oppression we can't break away from'--is also nicely described in the actions of the students.
Some of the writing (perhaps only the translation?) is a bit clunky and formulaic, and the performance of the reader here only accentuates that. A revised edition/translation and some careful direction for the voice talent would go a long way to making this a much better audiobook.
Dacascos reads with a good sense for pace and he gets the emotion of the main (male) characters just right, but it's a subtle and monotone reading and might come off as boring if you're hoping, for example, to hear the panic or fear or anguish in some of the students' words. He also steamrolls through some of the detail in complex dialog or description, which is where a little direction would have helped. The accent seems close enough to Japanese to be believable to my untrained ear, not sure if that's how Dacascos reads his other parts.
I enjoyed this book, but the graphic descriptions of murderous violence (not to mention a seduction-turned-murder) aren't easy to listen to. Caveat auditor.
Hyper-graphic teenage murder drama
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
I picked it up because a friend heard me raving about The Hunger Games trilogy and vehemently expressed his disdain for it, stating the author had "bitten" this story. I loved all three of The Hunger Games books so I decided to check it out. I had to get the audiobook to accompany it because a book as long as this one will take me forever to get through if I am not able to listen to it while I drive.
Surely this isn't the first ever book that has been written about a fight to the death but it seems to me pretty unique in that junior high students are put into the mix as the contestants.
There are definitely a lot of parallels and similarities and while no one can say for sure if The Hunger Games blatantly "bit" Battle Royale, it is clear that the author read this book prior to writing hers and definitely tailored it to be extremely similar.
But hey, whatever... Nothing is new under the sun.
Normally, I have to question the editing of a book that is more than 400 pages. Maybe it's my journalistic training but I just don't understand what you have to say in 600+ pages that you couldn't say in 400. If your book is that long, it better be brimming with absolutely necessary prose or I'm going to be pissed. Every page of Battle Royale was absolutely necessary.
Although there were clear main characters, I love how nearly all of the 42 student perspectives were shown. It made it that much more heart-wrenching when one of the students I liked died. My dialogue with the book while reading surely made my husband think I was nuts. I was constantly yelling "Noooo," "Are you serious!" and "Don't trust him/her! Kill him/her!" It was an emotional roller coaster and I very much enjoyed the ride.
Short chapters are essential to me. I need frequent breaks in a story. This book did not disappoint in that regard. I also enjoyed the official count of how many students were still alive at the end of each chapter. It added to the anticipation. I found myself skipping ahead and looking at the count thinking "Oh no! 3 students are going to die! Please don't let it be ______!" The descriptions of the violence, blood, and gore were so thorough that I found myself turning my face away from the book in horror as the images came to life in my mind. Yikes!
Not sure why people said the names were confusing. I had no problem distinguishing the 42 Japanese names. I also thought the narrator did a great job distinguishing voices. Some people didn't like the narrator but I really did.
19hours and I finished it in 4 days because I could not turn it off.
While I loved the Hunger Games, I will say this; if I had read this first, I would not have liked The Hunger Games nearly as much...
Who knows what the future will bring, but as of this very moment, Battle Royale is my favorite read of the year...
Not for the faint of heart...
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
also while the narration is adequate, there are so many different characters that you wish the reader used some different voices for characters to help distinguish them.
great, original story
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Good Story, Annoying Narrator
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Love the story.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Excellent novel
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Hunger Games Meets Squid Game Meets Japanese Teens
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
Genuine good book
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.