Black Fire
The True Story of the Original Tom Sawyer - and of the Mysterious Fires That Baptized Gold Rush-Era San Francisco
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 $15.47
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Robert Graysmith
-
By:
-
Robert Graysmith
About this listen
When 28-year-old San Francisco Daily Morning Call reporter Mark Twain met Tom Sawyer at a local bathhouse in 1863, he was seeking a subject for his first novel. As Twain steamed, played cards, and drank beer with Sawyer (a volunteer firefighter, customs inspector, and local hero responsible for having saved 90 lives at sea), he had second thoughts about Shirley Tempest, his proposed book about a local girl firefighter, and began to envision a novel of wider scope.
Twain learned that a dozen years earlier the then-18-year-old New York-born Sawyer had been a "Torch Boy," one of the youths who raced ahead of the volunteer firemen's hand-drawn engines at night carrying torches to light the way, always aware that a single spark could reduce the all-wood city of San Francisco to ashes in an instant. At that time a mysterious serial arsonist known by some as "The Lightkeeper" was in the process of burning San Francisco to the ground six times in 18 months - the most disastrous and costly series of fires ever experienced by any American metropolis.
Black Fire is the most thorough and accurate account of Sawyer's relationship with Mark Twain and of the six devastating incendiary fires that baptized one of the modern world's favorite cities. Set amid a scorched landscape of burning roads, melting iron warehouses, exploding buildings, and deadly gangs who extorted and ruled by fear, it includes the never-before-told stories of Sawyer's heroism during the sinking of the steamship Independence and the crucial role Sawyer and the Torch Boys played in solving the mystery of the Lightkeeper.
Drawing on archival sources such as actual San Francisco newspaper interviews with Sawyer and the handwritten police depositions of the arrest of the Lightkeeper, best-selling author Robert Graysmith vividly portrays the gritty, corrupt, and violent world of Gold Rush-era San Francisco, overrun with gunfighters, hooligans, hordes of gold prospectors, crooked politicians, and vigilantes.
By chronicling how Sawyer took it upon himself to investigate, expose, and stop the arsonist, Black Fire details - for the first time - Sawyer's remarkable life and illustrates why Twain would later feel compelled to name his iconic character after his San Francisco buddy when he wrote The Adventures of Tom Sawyer.
©2012 Robert Graysmith (P)2012 TantorListeners also enjoyed...
-
The Dreamt Land
- Chasing Water and Dust Across California
- By: Mark Arax
- Narrated by: Mark Arax
- Length: 25 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Mark Arax is from a family of Central Valley farmers, a writer with deep ties to the land who has watched the battles over water intensify even as California lurches from drought to flood and back again. In The Dreamt Land, he travels the state to explore the one-of-a-kind distribution system, built in the 1940s, '50s and '60s, that is straining to keep up with California's relentless growth. The Dreamt Land weaves reportage, history and memoir to confront the "Golden State" myth in riveting fashion.
-
-
Damn Near Perfect!
- By Charlie Morton on 12-08-19
By: Mark Arax
-
Zodiac
- The Shocking True Story of the Nation's Most Bizarre Mass Murderer
- By: Robert Graysmith
- Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki
- Length: 10 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After Jack the Ripper and before Son of Sam there was only one name their equal in terror: the deadly, elusive, and mysterious Zodiac. Beginning in 1968 the hooded mass murderer terrified the city of San Francisco and the Bay Area with a string of brutal killings. A sexual sadist, his pleasure was torture and murder.
-
-
Interesting
- By Z on 05-19-06
By: Robert Graysmith
-
Season of the Witch
- Enchantment, Terror, and Deliverance in the City of Love
- By: David Talbot
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 16 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Season of the Witch is the first book to fully capture the dark magic of San Francisco in this breathtaking period, when the city radically changed itself - and then revolutionized the world. The cool gray city of love was the epicenter of the 1960s cultural revolution. But by the early 1970s, San Francisco’s ecstatic experiment came crashing down from its starry heights. The city was rocked by savage murder sprees, mysterious terror campaigns, political assassinations, street riots, and finally a terrifying sexual epidemic.
-
-
Gripping, important history - well told
- By The Companion on 05-21-12
By: David Talbot
-
The Rise of the Dragon
- An Illustrated History of the Targaryen Dynasty, Volume One
- By: George R. R. Martin, Elio M. García Jr, Linda Antonsson
- Narrated by: Harry Lloyd
- Length: 8 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This lavish visual history—featuring over 180 all-new illustrations—is a stunning introduction to House Targaryen, the iconic family at the heart of HBO’s Game of Thrones prequel series, House of the Dragon.
-
-
This is a cash grab, and nothing more
- By Lisa Carrasquillo on 10-25-22
By: George R. R. Martin, and others
-
The Bonanza King
- By: Gregory Crouch
- Narrated by: John Keating
- Length: 23 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Born in 1831, John W. Mackay was a penniless Irish immigrant who came of age in New York City, went to California during the Gold Rush, and mined without much luck for eight years. When he heard of riches found on the other side of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in 1859, Mackay abandoned his claim and walked a hundred miles to the Comstock Lode in Nevada. Over the course of the next dozen years, Mackay worked his way up from nothing, thwarting the pernicious “Bank Ring” monopoly to seize control of the most concentrated cache of precious metals ever found on earth, the legendary “Big Bonanza”.
-
-
Stellar narration, biography exemplar!
- By LEE on 06-25-18
By: Gregory Crouch
-
The Devil in the White City
- Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America
- By: Erik Larson
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 14 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Two men, each handsome and unusually adept at his chosen work, embodied an element of the great dynamic that characterized America’s rush toward the twentieth century. The architect was Daniel Hudson Burnham, the fair’s brilliant director of works and the builder of many of the country’s most important structures, including the Flatiron Building in New York and Union Station in Washington, D.C. The murderer was Henry H. Holmes, a young doctor who, in a malign parody of the White City, built his “World’s Fair Hotel” just west of the fairgrounds.
-
-
A Rich Read!
- By D on 09-18-03
By: Erik Larson
-
The Dreamt Land
- Chasing Water and Dust Across California
- By: Mark Arax
- Narrated by: Mark Arax
- Length: 25 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Mark Arax is from a family of Central Valley farmers, a writer with deep ties to the land who has watched the battles over water intensify even as California lurches from drought to flood and back again. In The Dreamt Land, he travels the state to explore the one-of-a-kind distribution system, built in the 1940s, '50s and '60s, that is straining to keep up with California's relentless growth. The Dreamt Land weaves reportage, history and memoir to confront the "Golden State" myth in riveting fashion.
-
-
Damn Near Perfect!
- By Charlie Morton on 12-08-19
By: Mark Arax
-
Zodiac
- The Shocking True Story of the Nation's Most Bizarre Mass Murderer
- By: Robert Graysmith
- Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki
- Length: 10 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
After Jack the Ripper and before Son of Sam there was only one name their equal in terror: the deadly, elusive, and mysterious Zodiac. Beginning in 1968 the hooded mass murderer terrified the city of San Francisco and the Bay Area with a string of brutal killings. A sexual sadist, his pleasure was torture and murder.
-
-
Interesting
- By Z on 05-19-06
By: Robert Graysmith
-
Season of the Witch
- Enchantment, Terror, and Deliverance in the City of Love
- By: David Talbot
- Narrated by: Arthur Morey
- Length: 16 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Season of the Witch is the first book to fully capture the dark magic of San Francisco in this breathtaking period, when the city radically changed itself - and then revolutionized the world. The cool gray city of love was the epicenter of the 1960s cultural revolution. But by the early 1970s, San Francisco’s ecstatic experiment came crashing down from its starry heights. The city was rocked by savage murder sprees, mysterious terror campaigns, political assassinations, street riots, and finally a terrifying sexual epidemic.
-
-
Gripping, important history - well told
- By The Companion on 05-21-12
By: David Talbot
-
The Rise of the Dragon
- An Illustrated History of the Targaryen Dynasty, Volume One
- By: George R. R. Martin, Elio M. García Jr, Linda Antonsson
- Narrated by: Harry Lloyd
- Length: 8 hrs and 10 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This lavish visual history—featuring over 180 all-new illustrations—is a stunning introduction to House Targaryen, the iconic family at the heart of HBO’s Game of Thrones prequel series, House of the Dragon.
-
-
This is a cash grab, and nothing more
- By Lisa Carrasquillo on 10-25-22
By: George R. R. Martin, and others
-
The Bonanza King
- By: Gregory Crouch
- Narrated by: John Keating
- Length: 23 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Born in 1831, John W. Mackay was a penniless Irish immigrant who came of age in New York City, went to California during the Gold Rush, and mined without much luck for eight years. When he heard of riches found on the other side of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in 1859, Mackay abandoned his claim and walked a hundred miles to the Comstock Lode in Nevada. Over the course of the next dozen years, Mackay worked his way up from nothing, thwarting the pernicious “Bank Ring” monopoly to seize control of the most concentrated cache of precious metals ever found on earth, the legendary “Big Bonanza”.
-
-
Stellar narration, biography exemplar!
- By LEE on 06-25-18
By: Gregory Crouch
-
The Devil in the White City
- Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America
- By: Erik Larson
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 14 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Two men, each handsome and unusually adept at his chosen work, embodied an element of the great dynamic that characterized America’s rush toward the twentieth century. The architect was Daniel Hudson Burnham, the fair’s brilliant director of works and the builder of many of the country’s most important structures, including the Flatiron Building in New York and Union Station in Washington, D.C. The murderer was Henry H. Holmes, a young doctor who, in a malign parody of the White City, built his “World’s Fair Hotel” just west of the fairgrounds.
-
-
A Rich Read!
- By D on 09-18-03
By: Erik Larson
-
The Johnstown Flood
- By: David McCullough
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann
- Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the end of the last century, Johnstown, Pennsylvania, was a booming coal-and-steel town filled with hardworking families striving for a piece of the nation's burgeoning industrial prosperity. In the mountains above Johnstown, an old earth dam had been hastily rebuilt to create a lake for an exclusive summer resort patronized by the tycoons of that same industrial prosperity, among them Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, and Andrew Mellon.
-
-
A page-turner! HIstory that reads like a novel
- By Susan K Donley on 06-17-05
By: David McCullough
-
Quicksilver
- Book One of The Baroque Cycle
- By: Neal Stephenson
- Narrated by: Neal Stephenson (introduction), Kevin Pariseau, Simon Prebble
- Length: 14 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In which Daniel Waterhouse, fearless thinker and courageous Puritan, pursues knowledge in the company of the greatest minds of Baroque-era Europe -- in a chaotic world where reason wars with the bloody ambitions of the mighty, and where catastrophe, natural or otherwise, can alter the political landscape overnight.
-
-
Be aware of what you're getting into
- By David on 12-16-11
By: Neal Stephenson
-
The War of the Worlds
- By: H. G. Wells
- Narrated by: Simon Vance
- Length: 5 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
First published by H. G. Wells in 1898, The War of the Worlds is the granddaddy of all alien invasion stories. The novel begins ominously, as the lone voice of a narrator intones, "No one would have believed in the last years of the 19th century that this world was being watched keenly and closely by intelligences greater than man's."
-
-
Ants
- By Janice on 03-30-14
By: H. G. Wells
-
Pompeii
- A Novel
- By: Robert Harris
- Narrated by: John Lee
- Length: 10 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
All along the Mediterranean coast, the Roman empire’s richest citizens are relaxing in their luxurious villas, enjoying the last days of summer. The world’s largest navy lies peacefully at anchor in Misenum. The tourists are spending their money in the seaside resorts of Baiae, Herculaneum, and Pompeii. But the carefree lifestyle and gorgeous weather belie an impending cataclysm, and only one man is worried.
-
-
We know the ending
- By Charles on 12-02-03
By: Robert Harris
-
The Chase
- By: Clive Cussler
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 12 hrs and 21 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A no-nonsense detective is on the trail of the sharpest and deadliest criminal mind he has ever encountered: a serial robber who murders any and all witnesses in cold-blood.
-
-
Not Cussler's best
- By Wayne on 12-07-15
By: Clive Cussler
-
Isaac's Storm
- A Man, a Time, and the Deadliest Hurricane in History
- By: Erik Larson
- Narrated by: Richard Davidson
- Length: 8 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the dawn of the 20th century, a great confidence suffused America. Isaac Cline was one of the era's new men, a scientist who believed he knew all there was to know about the motion of clouds and the behavior of storms. The idea that a hurricane could damage the city of Galveston, Texas, where he was based, was to him preposterous, "an absurd delusion." It was 1900, a year when America felt bigger and stronger than ever before. Nothing in nature could hobble the gleaming city of Galveston, then a magical place that seemed destined to become the New York of the Gulf.
-
-
Two versions on Audible
- By stephiemav42 on 03-10-21
By: Erik Larson
-
All Things Must Fight to Live
- Stories of War and Deliverance in Congo
- By: Bryan Mealer
- Narrated by: Karl Miller
- Length: 10 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In All Things Must Fight to Live, Bryan Mealer takes listeners on a harrowing 2000 mile journey through Congo, where gun-toting militia still rape and kill with impunity. Amidst burnt-out battlefields where armies still wrestle for control, into the dark corners of the forests, and along the high savanna, where thousands have been slaughtered and quickly forgotten, Mealer searches for signs that Africa's most troubled state will soon rise from ruin.
-
-
Outstanding story and narration
- By Cthulhu's slobber on 09-19-19
By: Bryan Mealer
-
Ragtime
- By: E. L. Doctorow
- Narrated by: E. L. Doctorow
- Length: 7 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The story opens in 1906 in New Rochelle, New York, at the home of an affluent American family. One lazy Sunday afternoon, the famous escape artist Harry Houdini swerves his car into a telephone pole outside their house. And almost magically, the line between fantasy and historical fact, between real and imaginary characters, disappears.
-
-
too good for words
- By connie on 10-05-08
By: E. L. Doctorow
-
Roughing It
- By: Mark Twain
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 15 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1861, young Mark Twain found himself adrift as a tenderfoot in the Wild West. Roughing It is a hilarious record of his travels over a six-year period that comes to life with his inimitable mixture of reporting, social satire, and rollicking tall tales. Twain reflects on his scuffling years mining silver in Nevada, working at a Virginia City newspaper, being downandout in San Francisco, reporting for a newspaper from Hawaii, and more.
-
-
The wild humorist of the West
- By Tad Davis on 01-02-12
By: Mark Twain
-
The Great Fire
- By: Jim Murphy
- Narrated by: Taylor Mali
- Length: 2 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Great Fire of 1871 was one of the most colossal disasters in American history - with damage so profound that few people believed the city could ever rise again. By weaving personal accounts of actual survivors together with careful research, Jim Murphy constructs a riveting and dramatic narrative, ultimately revealing how the human spirit triumphed even in a time of deepest despair and the people of Chicago found the courage and strength to build their city once again.
-
-
Wow. I didn't know that!
- By DonnaMarie113 on 02-17-22
By: Jim Murphy
-
1906: A Novel
- By: James Dalessandro
- Narrated by: Gigi Shane
- Length: 11 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Set during the great San Francisco earthquake and fire, this pause-resisting historical novel reveals recently uncovered facts that forever change our understanding of what really happened. Narrated by a feisty young reporter, Annalisa Passarelli, the novel paints a vivid picture of the Post-Victorian city, from the mansions of Nob Hill to the underbelly of the Barbary Coast, to the arrival of tenor Enrico Caruso and the Metropolitan Opera.
-
-
Corruption, Violence, Death. And That is Before
- By Julia Oberhardt on 10-16-15
-
The Road
- By: Jack London
- Narrated by: T. Anthony Quinn
- Length: 4 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Road, Jack London embraces the concepts of unconfined individualism and Darwinism through his autobiographical account of his time riding the rails of Canada and the United States. The author of White Fang, The Call of the Wild, and Sea Wolf, relays the time leading up to turning point in his life - a perfunctory trial and a 30-day imprisonment in the Erie County Penitentiary for the crime of vagrancy - an experience so degrading that he turned to a career in writing.
-
-
Charming, insightful, mind blowing.
- By Grover M Smith II on 05-27-20
By: Jack London
Related to this topic
-
The Great Fire
- By: Jim Murphy
- Narrated by: Taylor Mali
- Length: 2 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Great Fire of 1871 was one of the most colossal disasters in American history - with damage so profound that few people believed the city could ever rise again. By weaving personal accounts of actual survivors together with careful research, Jim Murphy constructs a riveting and dramatic narrative, ultimately revealing how the human spirit triumphed even in a time of deepest despair and the people of Chicago found the courage and strength to build their city once again.
-
-
Wow. I didn't know that!
- By DonnaMarie113 on 02-17-22
By: Jim Murphy
-
The Road
- By: Jack London
- Narrated by: T. Anthony Quinn
- Length: 4 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Road, Jack London embraces the concepts of unconfined individualism and Darwinism through his autobiographical account of his time riding the rails of Canada and the United States. The author of White Fang, The Call of the Wild, and Sea Wolf, relays the time leading up to turning point in his life - a perfunctory trial and a 30-day imprisonment in the Erie County Penitentiary for the crime of vagrancy - an experience so degrading that he turned to a career in writing.
-
-
Charming, insightful, mind blowing.
- By Grover M Smith II on 05-27-20
By: Jack London
-
The Johnstown Flood
- By: David McCullough
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann
- Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the end of the last century, Johnstown, Pennsylvania, was a booming coal-and-steel town filled with hardworking families striving for a piece of the nation's burgeoning industrial prosperity. In the mountains above Johnstown, an old earth dam had been hastily rebuilt to create a lake for an exclusive summer resort patronized by the tycoons of that same industrial prosperity, among them Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, and Andrew Mellon.
-
-
A page-turner! HIstory that reads like a novel
- By Susan K Donley on 06-17-05
By: David McCullough
-
Roughing It
- By: Mark Twain
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 15 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1861, young Mark Twain found himself adrift as a tenderfoot in the Wild West. Roughing It is a hilarious record of his travels over a six-year period that comes to life with his inimitable mixture of reporting, social satire, and rollicking tall tales. Twain reflects on his scuffling years mining silver in Nevada, working at a Virginia City newspaper, being downandout in San Francisco, reporting for a newspaper from Hawaii, and more.
-
-
The wild humorist of the West
- By Tad Davis on 01-02-12
By: Mark Twain
-
Under a Flaming Sky
- The Great Hinckley Firestorm of 1894
- By: Daniel James Brown
- Narrated by: Mark Bramhall, Daniel James Brown
- Length: 8 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On September 1, 1894, two forest fires converged on the town of Hinckley, Minnesota, trapping over 2,000 people. Daniel J. Brown recounts the events surrounding the fire in the first and only book to chronicle the dramatic story that unfolded. Whereas Oregon's famous "Biscuit" fire in 2002 burned 350,000 acres in one week, the Hinckley fire did the same damage in five hours. The fire created its own weather, including hurricane-strength winds, bubbles of plasmalike glowing gas, and 200-foot-tall flames.
-
-
History lovers dream book.
- By Lynn Fraser on 10-18-18
-
Wicked River
- The Mississippi When It Last Ran Wild
- By: Lee Sandlin Jeff
- Narrated by: Jeff McCarthy
- Length: 10 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Acclaimed journalist and author Lee Sandlin delivers a riveting glimpse of a dangerous and colorful place in America’s historical landscape - the Mississippi River of the 19th century. Long before it was dredged into a shipping channel or romanticized into myth, the untamed Mississippi - the lifeblood of communities that rose and fell along its banks - spawned a motley array of pirates and dignitaries, visionaries, and thieves.
-
-
Worth a listen
- By Robert B. Golson on 12-09-10
By: Lee Sandlin Jeff
-
The Great Fire
- By: Jim Murphy
- Narrated by: Taylor Mali
- Length: 2 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The Great Fire of 1871 was one of the most colossal disasters in American history - with damage so profound that few people believed the city could ever rise again. By weaving personal accounts of actual survivors together with careful research, Jim Murphy constructs a riveting and dramatic narrative, ultimately revealing how the human spirit triumphed even in a time of deepest despair and the people of Chicago found the courage and strength to build their city once again.
-
-
Wow. I didn't know that!
- By DonnaMarie113 on 02-17-22
By: Jim Murphy
-
The Road
- By: Jack London
- Narrated by: T. Anthony Quinn
- Length: 4 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Road, Jack London embraces the concepts of unconfined individualism and Darwinism through his autobiographical account of his time riding the rails of Canada and the United States. The author of White Fang, The Call of the Wild, and Sea Wolf, relays the time leading up to turning point in his life - a perfunctory trial and a 30-day imprisonment in the Erie County Penitentiary for the crime of vagrancy - an experience so degrading that he turned to a career in writing.
-
-
Charming, insightful, mind blowing.
- By Grover M Smith II on 05-27-20
By: Jack London
-
The Johnstown Flood
- By: David McCullough
- Narrated by: Edward Herrmann
- Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
At the end of the last century, Johnstown, Pennsylvania, was a booming coal-and-steel town filled with hardworking families striving for a piece of the nation's burgeoning industrial prosperity. In the mountains above Johnstown, an old earth dam had been hastily rebuilt to create a lake for an exclusive summer resort patronized by the tycoons of that same industrial prosperity, among them Andrew Carnegie, Henry Clay Frick, and Andrew Mellon.
-
-
A page-turner! HIstory that reads like a novel
- By Susan K Donley on 06-17-05
By: David McCullough
-
Roughing It
- By: Mark Twain
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 15 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1861, young Mark Twain found himself adrift as a tenderfoot in the Wild West. Roughing It is a hilarious record of his travels over a six-year period that comes to life with his inimitable mixture of reporting, social satire, and rollicking tall tales. Twain reflects on his scuffling years mining silver in Nevada, working at a Virginia City newspaper, being downandout in San Francisco, reporting for a newspaper from Hawaii, and more.
-
-
The wild humorist of the West
- By Tad Davis on 01-02-12
By: Mark Twain
-
Under a Flaming Sky
- The Great Hinckley Firestorm of 1894
- By: Daniel James Brown
- Narrated by: Mark Bramhall, Daniel James Brown
- Length: 8 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On September 1, 1894, two forest fires converged on the town of Hinckley, Minnesota, trapping over 2,000 people. Daniel J. Brown recounts the events surrounding the fire in the first and only book to chronicle the dramatic story that unfolded. Whereas Oregon's famous "Biscuit" fire in 2002 burned 350,000 acres in one week, the Hinckley fire did the same damage in five hours. The fire created its own weather, including hurricane-strength winds, bubbles of plasmalike glowing gas, and 200-foot-tall flames.
-
-
History lovers dream book.
- By Lynn Fraser on 10-18-18
-
Wicked River
- The Mississippi When It Last Ran Wild
- By: Lee Sandlin Jeff
- Narrated by: Jeff McCarthy
- Length: 10 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Acclaimed journalist and author Lee Sandlin delivers a riveting glimpse of a dangerous and colorful place in America’s historical landscape - the Mississippi River of the 19th century. Long before it was dredged into a shipping channel or romanticized into myth, the untamed Mississippi - the lifeblood of communities that rose and fell along its banks - spawned a motley array of pirates and dignitaries, visionaries, and thieves.
-
-
Worth a listen
- By Robert B. Golson on 12-09-10
By: Lee Sandlin Jeff
-
The Big Burn
- Teddy Roosevelt and the Fire That Saved America
- By: Timothy Egan
- Narrated by: Robertson Dean
- Length: 9 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In The Worst Hard Time, Timothy Egan put the environmental disaster of the Dust Bowl at the center of a rich history, told through characters he brought to indelible life. Now he performs the same alchemy with the Big Burn, the largest-ever forest fire in America and the tragedy that cemented Teddy Roosevelt's legacy in the land.
-
-
Mediocre
- By Mona on 11-04-20
By: Timothy Egan
-
Triangle
- The Fire That Changed America
- By: David Von Drehle
- Narrated by: Barrett Whitener
- Length: 10 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On March 25, 1911, as workers were getting ready to leave for the day, a fire broke out in the Triangle Shirtwaist factory in New York's Greenwich Village. Within minutes it spread to consume the building's upper three stories. Firemen who arrived at the scene were unable to rescue those trapped inside: their ladders simply weren't tall enough. People on the street watched in horror as desperate workers jumped to their deaths. It was the worst disaster in New York City history.
-
-
Interesting but Loong
- By JAS on 04-21-18
By: David Von Drehle
-
The Floor of Heaven
- A True Tale of the Last Frontier and the Yukon Gold Rush
- By: Howard Blum
- Narrated by: John H. Mayer
- Length: 16 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It is the last decade of the 19th century. The Wild West has been tamed and its fierce, independent and often violent larger-than-life figures – gun-toting wanderers, trappers, prospectors, Indian fighters, cowboys, and lawmen –are now victims of their own success. They are heroes who’ve outlived their usefulness.
-
-
A major disappointment
- By Joshua on 05-03-14
By: Howard Blum
-
The Devil in the White City
- Murder, Magic, and Madness at the Fair That Changed America
- By: Erik Larson
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 14 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Two men, each handsome and unusually adept at his chosen work, embodied an element of the great dynamic that characterized America’s rush toward the twentieth century. The architect was Daniel Hudson Burnham, the fair’s brilliant director of works and the builder of many of the country’s most important structures, including the Flatiron Building in New York and Union Station in Washington, D.C. The murderer was Henry H. Holmes, a young doctor who, in a malign parody of the White City, built his “World’s Fair Hotel” just west of the fairgrounds.
-
-
A Rich Read!
- By D on 09-18-03
By: Erik Larson
-
Gold Diggers
- Striking It Rich in the Klondike
- By: Charlotte Gray
- Narrated by: Steven Cooper
- Length: 12 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Between 1896 and 1899, thousands of people lured by gold braved a grueling journey into the remote wilderness of North America. Within two years, Dawson City, in the Canadian Yukon, grew from a mining camp of four hundred to a raucous town of more than thirty thousand. The stampede to the Klondike was the last great gold rush in history. Scurvy, dysentery, frostbite, and starvation stalked all who dared to be in Dawson. And yet the possibilities attracted people from all walks of life.
-
-
Disappointed...
- By Michael McGrath on 01-29-14
By: Charlotte Gray
-
Dark Tide
- The Great Boston Molasses Flood of 1919
- By: Stephen Puleo
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 9 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Around noon on January 15, 1919, a group of firefighters were playing cards in Boston's North End when they heard a tremendous crash. It was like, "a roaring surf," one of them said later. Like, "a runaway two-horse team smashing through a fence," said another. A third firefighter jumped up from his chair to look out a window - "Oh my God!" he shouted to the other men, "Run!" A 50-foot-tall steel tank filled with 2.3 million gallons of molasses had just collapsed on Boston's waterfront, disgorging its contents as a 15-foot-high wave of molasses that at its outset traveled at 35 miles an hour.
-
-
INTERESTING STORY - ABOUT 2x TOO LONG
- By The Louligan on 09-07-14
By: Stephen Puleo
-
All Things Must Fight to Live
- Stories of War and Deliverance in Congo
- By: Bryan Mealer
- Narrated by: Karl Miller
- Length: 10 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In All Things Must Fight to Live, Bryan Mealer takes listeners on a harrowing 2000 mile journey through Congo, where gun-toting militia still rape and kill with impunity. Amidst burnt-out battlefields where armies still wrestle for control, into the dark corners of the forests, and along the high savanna, where thousands have been slaughtered and quickly forgotten, Mealer searches for signs that Africa's most troubled state will soon rise from ruin.
-
-
Outstanding story and narration
- By Cthulhu's slobber on 09-19-19
By: Bryan Mealer
-
Ruthless Tide
- The Heroes and Villains of the Johnstown Flood, America’s Astonishing Gilded Age Disaster
- By: Al Roker
- Narrated by: Mirron Willis
- Length: 8 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A gripping narrative history of the 1889 Johnstown Flood - the deadliest flood in US history - from New York Times best-selling author, NBC host, and legendary weather authority Al Roker. May 1889: After a deluge of rainfall swelled the Little Conemaugh River, panicked engineers watched helplessly as swiftly rising waters threatened to breach the South Fork Dam in central Pennsylvania. Though they telegraphed neighboring towns, warning of the impending danger, residents, used to false alarms, remained in their homes. At 3:10 p.m., the dam gave way....
-
-
Mispronunciation bothers me
- By Tracy on 09-08-18
By: Al Roker
-
The Race Underground
- Boston, New York, and the Incredible Rivalry That Built America's First Subway
- By: Doug Most
- Narrated by: John H. Mayer
- Length: 15 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the late nineteenth century, as cities like Boston and New York grew larger, the streets became increasingly clogged with horse-drawn carts. When the great blizzard of 1888 brought New York City to a halt, a solution had to be found. Two brothers - Henry Melville Whitney of Boston and William Collins Whitney of New York City - pursued the dream of his city being the first American metropolis to have a subway and the great race was on.
-
-
Informative Cobbled Telling of an Important Story
- By Lynn on 05-21-14
By: Doug Most
-
City of Devils
- The Two Men Who Ruled the Underworld of Old Shanghai
- By: Paul French
- Narrated by: Paul Chan
- Length: 9 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Shanghai, 1930s; it was a haven for outlaws from all over the world: a place where pasts could be forgotten, fascism and communism outrun, names invented, and fortunes made - and lost. “Lucky” Jack Riley was the most notorious of those outlaws. An ex-US Navy boxing champion, he escaped from prison and rose to become the Slots King of Shanghai. “Dapper” Joe Farren - a Jewish boy who fled Vienna’s ghetto - ruled the nightclubs. This is the story of their rise to power, their downfall, and the trail of destruction left in their wake.
-
-
Very hard to listen to
- By Terrance D. Harps on 07-26-18
By: Paul French
-
Insurgent Mexico
- By: John Reed
- Narrated by: Frank Muller
- Length: 7 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
"We could see them now, hundreds of little black figures riding through the chaparral. A spent bullet droned overhead, then one unspent, and then a whole flock. 'Come on, Meester! Let's go!' We began to run...." The material for this remarkable history came from journalist and poet John Reed's experience as a war correspondent during the Mexican Revolution.
-
-
Bad recording
- By Tapioca on 08-22-07
By: John Reed
-
Train
- Riding the Rails That Created the Modern World - from the Trans-Siberian to the Southwest Chief
- By: Tom Zoellner
- Narrated by: Grover Gardner
- Length: 12 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Tom Zoellner loves trains with a ferocious passion. In his new audiobook he chronicles the innovation and sociological impact of the railway technology that changed the world, and could very well change it again. From the frigid Trans-Siberian Railroad to the antiquated Indian Railways to the futuristic maglev trains, Zoellner offers a stirring story of man's relationship with trains. Zoellner examines both the mechanics of the rails and their engines and how they helped societies evolve. Not only do trains transport people and goods in an efficient manner, but they also reduce pollution and dependency upon oil.
-
-
The world history of trains up to the present
- By matthew on 03-06-14
By: Tom Zoellner
What listeners say about Black Fire
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Douglas
- 07-01-13
Fascinating Narrative
Graysmith proved himself as a riveting writer in his terrifying historical account of the Zodiac serial killer, and one of the main reasons is that he was able to place the reader directly in time and place and experience as very few can, even writers of fiction, let alone history. Black Fire does not disappoint on this account either, placing one in 1800's San Fransisco, to live for the duration of the book and driving this narrative with a central real-life character: the real Tom Sawyer (Seinfeld fans: is Clemens' great novel a kind of "reality tour?"). Some Amazon reviewers complained of length and "thickness" of the narrative, but I suspect that it is merely because texting and Facebook and other such concentration killers have made us thicker in the head and thinner on attention. Someone who can stay awake for an hour at a time will enjoy this book immensely. Perhaps Graysmith flatters himself a bit as an audio book reader here, and perhaps he might be better to continue spending his time writing pages rather than reading them aloud, but you hardly notice, the book itself is so good.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
5 people found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Adrienne
- 06-19-17
Disappointed
One of Mark Twain's gifts was an excellent narrative flow. Robert Greysmith does not share this gift. The historical material is undoubtedly fascinating, but both the author's reading style and prose are jerky and disjointed. Jumping from incident to incident and back, pausing in the middle for an overblown description of one aspect or individual. Twain is famous for his colorful descriptions, but he has a knack for them. Robert Greysmith does not share this knack either.
I wonder if the subject matter would be better served by another reader. I doubt however that even the best reader could have made this hash of information flow smoothly.
I listened to it all the way through mind you. Now I have to listen to it a second or third time so that I can arrange all the parts in my own head in some way that makes sense.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Twang
- 03-10-23
What a lovely treat of a book!
Absolutely delightful and certainly worth a listen! My one very very small critique is that every now and then a word will drop out - could have used better sound mixing
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Jeffrey Williams
- 10-10-22
Know your limits
A good story but the narration by the author is so bad I gave up. I think this could have been a wonderful book with the right narrator. Good author, great material but bad performance.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Mimi Routh
- 02-15-23
Terrible Narration, Way Too Yang
Author is a jerk who thinks he can read his own stuff. I lived 30 years in "the City" and loved it, but this listen is torture. Except for Lily, he hardly mentions women. It's all about "boys" having fun. Fire losses expressed in dollars. I'm out of here no thanks!
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!