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Blessed Are the Bank Robbers
- The True Adventures of an Evangelical Outlaw
- Narrated by: Chas Smith
- Length: 6 hrs and 38 mins
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Publisher's summary
A rollicking true story of Bibles and bank robberies in Southern California, from a talented and highly praised gonzo journalist.
Chas Smith grew up deeply enmeshed in the evangelical Christian world that grew out of Southern California in the late 1960s. His family included famous missionaries and megachurch pastors, but his cousin Daniel Courson was Grandma’s favorite. Smith looked up to Cousin Danny. He was handsome, adventurous, and smart, earned a degree from Bible college, and settled into a family and a stable career.
Needless to say, it was a big surprise when Cousin Danny started robbing banks. Known as the “Floppy Hat Bandit”, Courson robbed 19 of them in a torrid six-week spree before being caught and sentenced to seven years. When he tried to escape, they tacked on another year. And when he finally got out, despite seeming to be back on the straight and narrow, Cousin Danny disappeared. Banks started getting robbed again. It seemed Cousin Danny might be gunning for the record.
Smith’s Blessed Are the Bank Robbers is the wild, and wildly entertaining, story of an all-American antihero. It’s a tale of bank robberies, art and jewel heists, high-speed chases, fake identities, encrypted Swiss email accounts, jilted lovers, and the dark side of an evangelical family (and it wasn’t just Danny; an uncle was mixed up with the mujahideen). It’s a book about what it means to live inside the church and outside the law.
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Great read
- By Diane Dodge on 09-14-19
By: Shaun Assael
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Dancing For the Devil
- One Woman's Dramatic and Divine Rescue from the Sex Industry
- By: Anny Donewald, Carrie Gerlach Cecil
- Narrated by: Anny Donewald
- Length: 8 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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The daughter of an NCAA Championship-winning basketball coach and a stay-at-home mom, Anny Donewald had a seemingly blessed childhood. Then, at thirteen, one of her father’s players sexually abused her, and Donewald embarked on a path toward self-destruction. When Donewald was convinced to compete in an amateur night at a strip club, she found herself drawn into a world of drugs, money, and flesh peddlers in Michigan and Chicago - and eventually Las Vegas’ hottest XXX clubs.
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blunt
- By nicole on 05-23-15
By: Anny Donewald, and others
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After Perfect
- A Daughter's Memoir
- By: Christina McDowell
- Narrated by: Christina McDowell
- Length: 9 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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In the tradition of New York Times best sellers What Remains by Carole Radziwill and Oh the Glory of It All by Sean Wilsey, Christina McDowell's unflinching memoir is a brutally honest, cautionary tale about one family's destruction in the wake of the Wall Street implosion.
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Mixed reaction
- By Margaret on 07-09-15
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This Love Is Not for Cowards
- Salvation and Soccer in Ciudad Juárez
- By: Robert Andrew Powell
- Narrated by: Fred Sanders
- Length: 10 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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As Mexico has descended into a feudal narco-state - one where cartels, death squads, the army, and local police all fight over billions of dollars in profits from drug and human trafficking - the border city of Jurez has been hit hardest of all. And yet, more than a million people still live there. They even love their impoverished city, proudly repeating its mantra: "Amor por Jurez." Nothing exemplifies the spirit and hope of Juarenses more than the Indios, the city's beloved but hard-luck soccer team.
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Loved it
- By Nathan & Kira Huggins on 04-14-15
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Out of Orange
- A Memoir
- By: Cleary Wolters
- Narrated by: Barbara Rosenblat
- Length: 11 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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The real-life Alex Vause from the critically acclaimed, top-rated Netflix show Orange Is the New Black tells her story in her own words for the first time - a powerful, surprising memoir about crime and punishment, friendship and marriage, and a life caught in the ruinous drug trade and beyond.
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Must read for OITNB fans
- By D. T. Douglas on 06-21-15
By: Cleary Wolters
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Where Mercy Is Shown, Mercy Is Given
- By: Duane 'Dog' Chapman
- Narrated by: Alan Sklar
- Length: 9 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Considered by many to be the world's greatest bounty hunter, Duane "Dog" Chapman has become famous for capturing fugitives on Dog the Bounty Hunter, his number-one-rated show on A&E. But his job doesn't end when he cuffs his man - or woman. Having personally struggled against abuse, addiction, and a life of crime, Dog knows a thing or two about the path that these fugitives cuffed in the back of his car are on.
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Slow narration - I wish the author narrated more
- By HappyQuails on 02-22-11
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Pill City
- How Two Honor Roll Students Foiled the Feds and Built a Drug Empire
- By: Kevin Deutsch
- Narrated by: Mirron Willis
- Length: 7 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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April 28, 2015, West Baltimore, Maryland: ground zero in America's Opiate Wars. In this crime-plagued section of the city, the death of Freddie Gray has triggered the worst domestic rioting since the assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. and created a terrifying new breed of criminal entrepreneur.
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Race baiting bullshit.
- By Nick on 02-16-17
By: Kevin Deutsch
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Running with Raven
- The Amazing Story of One Man, His Passion, and the Community He Inspired
- By: Laura Lee Huttenbach
- Narrated by: Allyson Ryan
- Length: 6 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Raven Kraft has changed the lives of thousands who have run with him - many of them hundreds of times. From all 50 states and dozens of countries, across all age groups and backgrounds, they come to run with Raven, and in the process find friendship, inspiration - and a nickname. Among them is author Laura Lee "White Lightning" Huttenbach, who has logged over 1,000 miles of Raven Runs. Here she explores the stories of dozens of others about why they started running with Raven - and why they keep coming back.
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Wonderful
- By ChargingDC on 02-14-24
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The Gift of Our Wounds
- A Sikh and a Former White Supremacist Find Forgiveness After Hate
- By: Pardeep Singh Kaleka, Arno Michaelis, Robin Gaby Fisher
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne, John McLain
- Length: 6 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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When white supremacist Wade Michael Page murdered six people and wounded four in a Sikh Temple in Wisconsin in 2012, Pardeep Kaleka was devastated. The temple leader, now dead, was his father. His family, who had immigrated to the US from India when Pardeep was young, had done everything right. Why was this happening to him? Arno Michaelis, a former skinhead and founder of one of the largest racist skinhead organizations in the world, knew he had to take action and fight against the very crimes he used to commit.
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The Gift
- By M. Forsberg on 07-29-22
By: Pardeep Singh Kaleka, and others
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Baltimore Blues
- Tess Monaghan, Book 1
- By: Laura Lippman
- Narrated by: Deborah Hazlett
- Length: 9 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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Unemployed at 29, Tess Monaghan is willing to take any freelance job to pay the rent—including a bit of unorthodox snooping for her rowing buddy, Darryl "Rock" Paxton. In a city where someone is murdered almost every day, attorney Michael Abramowitz's death should be just another statistic. But the slain lawyer's notoriety—and his noontime trysts with Rock's fiancée—make the case front page news...and point to Rock as the likely murderer. But trying to prove her friend's innocence could prove costly to Tess.
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I'm on #8 - This series is almost unique
- By connie on 02-19-12
By: Laura Lippman
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Fallen
- Out of the Sex Industry and into the Arms of the Savior
- By: Annie Lobert
- Narrated by: Annie Lobert
- Length: 6 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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When Annie grabbed at what looked like an opportunity to escape her tumultuous, abuse-filled home, she had never heard the term sex trafficking. Needing money, wanting to be loved, and desperately seeking control of her life, she stumbled into the ever-darkening world of the sex industry as a glamorous, high-class escort in Las Vegas. All that glittered was not gold. She embarked on a dangerous path toward self-destruction.
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Life Changing
- By Yigosh on 07-03-15
By: Annie Lobert
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All Souls
- A Family Story from Southie
- By: Michael Patrick MacDonald
- Narrated by: Michael Patrick MacDonald
- Length: 8 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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The anti-busing riots of 1974 forever changed Southie, Boston's working-class Irish community, branding it as a violent, racist enclave. Michael Patrick MacDonald grew up in Southie's Old Colony housing project. He describes the way this world within a world felt to the troubled yet keenly gifted observer he was even as a child. But the threats - poverty, drugs, a shadowy gangster world - were real. All Souls is heartbreaking testimony to lives lost too early, and the story of how a place so filled with pain could still be "the best place in the world".
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this book broke me in the best way
- By anon on 02-14-23
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Bluegrass
- A True Story of Murder in Kentucky
- By: William Van Meter
- Narrated by: Ed Sala
- Length: 7 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Widely published journalist William Van Meter returned to his hometown of Bowling Green, Kentucky to research this harrowing account of a horrifying crime that occurred at Western Kentucky University. In 2003, attractive college student Katie Autry was found dead in her dorm room after being raped, stabbed, and set on fire. As Van Meter delves into the facts of the case, further disturbing information surfaces.
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Excellent!
- By brooke whitehead on 01-09-23
What listeners say about Blessed Are the Bank Robbers
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- joe jessal
- 03-21-22
Chaz Delivers Again!
I had the pleasure of listening to Blessed Are The Bank Robbers on my surf trip from my home in Newport Oregon to North San Diego County. Oh the irony. Gotta say the book made the drive through the night much more enjoyable.
I’ve enjoyed all of Chaz Smiths books so far and I loved that this not only told a great tale but also allowed us to peek a little further behind the curtains.
Fantastic book Chaz! I hope your already hard at work on the next 🤙
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- Jennifer Jepsen
- 08-08-22
Mischaracterization
Personally know the subject. Visited and wrote him at multiple prison locations. Only person at his federal sentencing. Nothing in this book addresses the deep and lasting pain he caused himself, his sweet family and those across the bank counter. The glorification of bank robbing while skipping over mental illness made it tough to finish. Chas, I hoped to meet under different circumstances.
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