
The Book of Night Women
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Narrated by:
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Robin Miles
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By:
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Marlon James
About this listen
But when she begins to understand her own feelings and desires and identity, Lilith starts to push at the edges of what is imaginable for the life of a slave woman in Jamaica, and risks becoming the conspiracy's weak link. Lilith's story overflows with high drama and heartbreak, and life on the plantation is rife with dangerous secrets, unspoken jealousies, inhuman violence, and very human emotion - between slave and master, between slave and overseer, and among the slaves themselves. Lilith finds herself at the heart of it all. And all of it told in one of the boldest literary voices to grace the page recently - and the secret of that voice is one of the book's most intriguing mysteries.
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"Both beautifully written and devastating... Writing in the spirit of Toni Morrison and Alice Walker but in a style all his own, James has conducted an experiment in how to write the unspeakable - even the unthinkable. And the results of that experiment are an undeniable success.” (The New York Times Book Review)
“The narrative voice is so assured and the descriptions so detailed and believable that one can’t help being engaged. This is a book to love.... The Book of Night Women is hard to pick up, even harder to put down...and it deserves to be read." (Chicago Tribune)
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Story
It’s 1835 in Utica, New York, and newlywed Helen Galway discovers a secret: Two runaway slaves are hiding in the shack behind her husband’s house. Suddenly, she is at the center of not only the era’s greatest moral dilemma, but her own, as well. Should she be a “good wife” and report the fugitives to her husband? Or will she defy convention and come to their aid? Within her home, Helen is haunted by the previous Mrs. Galway, recently deceased but still an oppressive presence.
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Never thought I'd enjoy a novel so much.
- By HBvideo on 12-01-21
By: Deirdre Sinnott
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Sister of Mine
- A Novel
- By: Sabra Waldfogel
- Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
- Length: 17 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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When two Union soldiers stumble onto a plantation in northern Georgia on a warm May day in 1864, the last thing they expect is to see the Union flag flying high - or to be greeted by a group of freed slaves and their Jewish mistress. Little do they know that this place has an unusual history. Twelve years prior, Adelaide Mannheim - daughter of Mordecai, the only Jewish planter in the county - was given her own maid, a young slave named Rachel. The two became friends, and soon they discovered a secret.
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A Must Read
- By M. Ryder on 06-20-16
By: Sabra Waldfogel
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Sweetness in the Skin
- A Novel
- By: Ishi Robinson
- Narrated by: Deja Bowens
- Length: 8 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
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Pumkin Patterson is a thirteen-year-old girl living in a tiny two-room house in Kingston, Jamaica, with her grandmother (who wants to improve the family’s social standing), her Aunt Sophie (who dreams of a new life in Paris for her and Pumkin), and her mother Paulette (who’s rarely home). When Sophie is offered the chance to move to France for work, she seizes the opportunity, and promises to send for her niece in one year’s time....
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Perseverance in Paradise
- By Vaal807 on 04-17-25
By: Ishi Robinson
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The Attic Child
- A Novel
- By: Lola Jaye
- Narrated by: Lola Jaye, Lucian Msamati, Nneka Okoye
- Length: 14 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Early 1900s London: Taken from his homeland, twelve-year-old Celestine spends most of the time locked away in the attic of a large house by the sea. The only time Celestine isn’t bound by confines of the small space is when he is acting as an unpaid servant to English explorer Sir Richard Babbington, As the years pass, he desperately clings on to memories of his family in Africa, even as he struggles to remember his mother’s face, and sometimes his real name . . .
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Read/ listen to this book!
- By KH on 10-01-22
By: Lola Jaye
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Someone Knows My Name
- By: Lawrence Hill
- Narrated by: Adenrele Ojo
- Length: 18 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Aminata Diallo is the beguiling heroine of Lawrence Hill's Someone Knows My Name. In it, Hill exquisitely imagines the tale of an 18th-century woman's life, spanning six decades and three continents. The fascinating story that Hill tells is a work of the soul and the imagination. Aminata is a character who will stir listeners, from her kidnapping from Africa through her journeys back and forth across the ocean.
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Rich in history and moral messages
- By Ariela on 10-14-09
By: Lawrence Hill
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The Sweetness of Water (Oprah’s Book Club)
- A Novel
- By: Nathan Harris
- Narrated by: William DeMeritt
- Length: 12 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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In the waning days of the Civil War, brothers Prentiss and Landry—freed by the Emancipation Proclamation—seek refuge on the homestead of George Walker and his wife, Isabelle. The Walkers, wracked by the loss of their only son to the war, hire the brothers to work their farm. Prentiss and Landry, meanwhile, plan to save money for the journey north and a chance to reunite with their mother, who was sold away when they were boys. Equal parts beauty and terror, The Sweetness of Water is an epic whose grandeur locates humanity and love amid the most harrowing circumstances.
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Masterful storytelling and an exceptional audio performance
- By Pamela on 06-18-21
By: Nathan Harris
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Wench
- A Novel
- By: Dolen Perkins-Valdez
- Narrated by: Quincy Tyler Bernstine
- Length: 8 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Tawawa House in many respects is like any other American resort before the Civil War. Situated in Ohio, this idyllic retreat is particularly nice in the summer when the Southern humidity is too much to bear. The main building, with its luxurious finishes, is loftier than the white cottages that flank it, but the smaller structures are better positioned to catch any breeze that may come off the pond. And they provide more privacy, which best suits the needs of the Southern white men who vacation there every summer.
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Fascinating and disturbing, an amazing debut...
- By Donna on 02-15-11
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A More Perfect Union
- By: Tammye Huf
- Narrated by: Gary Furlong, Chanté McCormick, Patryce Williams
- Length: 9 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Henry O’Toole sails to America in 1848 to escape the famine in Ireland, only to face anti-immigrant prejudice. Determined never to starve again, he changes his surname to Taylor and heads south to Virginia, seeking work as a traveling blacksmith on the prosperous plantations. Torn from her home and sold to Jubilee Plantation, Sarah must navigate its intricate hierarchy. And now an enigmatic blacksmith is promising her not just the world but also her freedom. How could she say no?
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A Perfect Union
- By Claudette Heston on 06-13-22
By: Tammye Huf
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'Til the Well Runs Dry
- By: Lauren Francis-Sharma
- Narrated by: Ron Butler, Bahni Turpin
- Length: 13 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Lauren Francis-Sharma's 'Til the Well Runs Dry opens in a seaside village in the north of Trinidad where young Marcia Garcia, a gifted and smart-mouthed 16-year-old seamstress, lives alone, raising two small boys and guarding a family secret. When she meets Farouk Karam, an ambitious young policeman, the risks and rewards in Marcia's life amplify forever.
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Most wells I knew as a boy…
- By Louie Crew Clay on 09-08-15
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Second House from the Corner
- By: Sadeqa Johnson
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 9 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Felicia Lyons, a stressed-out stay-at-home mom, struggles to sprint ahead of the demands of motherhood while her husband spends long days at the office. Felicia taps, utters mantras, and breathes her way through most situations, but on some days, like when the children won't stop screaming her name or arguing over toy trucks and pretzel sticks, she wonders what it would be like to get in her car and drive away.
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No ending to any of the situations that opened.
- By Tina on 03-12-16
By: Sadeqa Johnson
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Conjure Women
- A Novel
- By: Afia Atakora
- Narrated by: Adenrele Ojo
- Length: 13 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Conjure Women is a sweeping story that brings the world of the South before and after the Civil War vividly to life. Spanning eras and generations, it tells of the lives of three unforgettable women: Miss May Belle, a wise healing woman; her precocious and observant daughter, Rue, who is reluctant to follow in her mother’s footsteps as a midwife; and their master’s daughter, Varina. The secrets and bonds among these women and their community come to a head at the beginning of a war and at the birth of an accursed child.
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Conjure Women
- By Valerie D. Pegram on 04-22-20
By: Afia Atakora
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Things Past Telling
- A Novel
- By: Sheila Williams
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 11 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Born in West Africa in the mid-eighteenth century, Maryam Prescilla Grace—a.k.a “Momma Grace” will live a long, wondrous life marked by hardship, oppression, opportunity, and love. Though she will be “gifted” various names, her birth name is known to her alone. Over the course of 100-plus years, she survives capture, enslavement by several property owners, the Atlantic crossing when she is only eleven years of age, and a brief stint as a pirate’s ward, acting as both a spy and a translator.
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Fulfilled
- By Lovin Life on 08-18-22
By: Sheila Williams
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The Polished Hoe
- By: Austin Clarke
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 18 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Winner of both the Giller Prize and the Commonwealth Writers' Prize, The Polished Hoe is acclaimed author Austin Clarke's masterpiece. On a Caribbean island in the 1950s, elderly Mary Gertrude Mathilda commits murder. As she explains herself to police, her story exposes the ugly underbelly of life on Caribbean plantations, with its slavery and brutality.
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the murder mystery is not the point
- By connie on 08-24-10
By: Austin Clarke
What listeners say about The Book of Night Women
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- Philip
- 02-13-11
Sad
I enjoyed the book. Narrator great. The story line is about slavery. Don't expect it to end well.
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- Angela
- 06-25-09
Fantastic, Bravo
The characters seemed so real. The visually speaking I could see the slave plantion, Lilth being born, the story unfolding which made me to want to know more.
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1 person found this helpful
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- All_Light_813
- 07-25-15
Women's unbridled will, and resilience
A sensitive, and masterfully written narrative, weaving a symbolic, allegorical, and historic journey. Taking the reader into the lives of great women who had no voice, but their shear will to live, innate wisdom, deeply profound love, and the demons they fought daily. Broken and battered, stripped, and robbed of their dignity, and any and everything they loved or cared about. They resurrect, and transform themselves to reclaim their strength, dignity, their will to live, and their stolen and lost love. The evolution from slave to rebellious worriers, that drives them forward through pain, and hardship woven together creating, an intricate quilt of wonder and to personal triumphant.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Scylla Charybdis
- 05-23-21
Complicated Denouement
The writing is stellar and the pacing seems bewitched; the reader is never left bored or stranded. But the "resolution" left me frustrated and puzzled. I wasn't sure what the author really wanted his story to convey. As for the narration, honestly Robin Miles deserves all the awards. This book is not for the fainthearted.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Keashia
- 08-14-15
Not for the soft skinned...
If you want to hear a story that forces you to feel the depth of oppression of enslaved black women, this will do it. At the same time it causes you to consider the oppressor's plight as well. There is a beautiful and tragic example of humanity . This was my second time listening to it and I was just as memorized as the first time I heard it. A heart wrenching and heartfelt experience each time. Thank you Marlon James and Robin Miles.
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- Vanessa
- 08-06-18
Incredible
This book made me motivated to get out of bed and start my day so I could listen on my walk into work/school. It completely absorbed me- the story, the narrator. I'm excited to read more from Marlon James. This book is at the top of my list, excellent all around. His writing style is incredible and the story is heavy.
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- Karen
- 03-30-18
AWESOME Narrator, Heartbreaking Story
I cannot adequately convey my admiration of the talent of the narrator. The beyond difficult Jamaican inflections were flawless, and she switched to the different characters effortlessly. Even though it is a hard story to listen to, it is history. I feel these happenings should be known by everyone to put current events into perspective. Warning! A must read...
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- Danielle Wells
- 08-02-17
exciting and dramaticn yet sad
great read
couldn't stop listening once I started.
I recommend this book to anyone who is open minded and eager to know about Jamaican slavery...which is not widely talked about.
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- Victoria salazar
- 03-01-11
Brutal but awesome
At first the Jamaican dialect was a little offsetting but I forgot about it pretty quickly. The story is great. Although there are some pretty awful things that happen to the slaves in Jamaica the women's story of strength and endurance is incredible. Well done, couldn't stop listening! Highly recommended.
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- The bestest
- 02-24-16
love this book
this is my 3rd time reading this book and will reread it again
it needs to become a MOVIE
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