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The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 2 hrs and 4 mins
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Publisher's summary
From the number-one New York Times best-selling author of the Man Booker Prize-winning novel Lincoln in the Bardo and the story collection Tenth of December, a 2013 National Book Award Finalist for Fiction.
In a profoundly strange country called Inner Horner, large enough for only one resident at a time, citizens waiting to enter the country fall under the rule of the power-hungry and tyrannical Phil, setting off a chain of injustice and mass hysteria.
An Animal Farm for the 21st century, this is an incendiary political satire of unprecedented imagination, spiky humor, and cautionary appreciation for the hysteric in everyone. Over six years in the writing, this novella is Saunders' first stand-alone, book-length work - and his first book for adults in five years.
Includes an original song by the author.
“The Phil Stomp” was written and performed by George Saunders and recorded, mixed, and mastered by Peter Coleman at Indigital Studios in Santa Cruz, California.
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Story
The “best short story writer in English” (Time) is back with a masterful collection that explores ideas of power, ethics, and justice, and cuts to the very heart of what it means to live in community with our fellow humans. With his trademark prose—wickedly funny, unsentimental, and perfectly tuned—Saunders continues to challenge and surprise: here is a collection of prismatic, deeply resonant stories that encompass joy and despair, oppression and revolution, bizarre fantasy and brutal reality.
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Extraordinary
- By REBECCA on 10-18-22
By: George Saunders
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Fox 8
- A Story
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Fox 8 has always been known as the daydreamer in his pack, the one his fellow foxes regarded with a knowing snort and a roll of the eyes. That is, until Fox 8 develops a unique skill: He teaches himself to speak Yuman by hiding in the bushes outside a house and listening to children’s bedtime stories. The power of language fuels his abundant curiosity about people - even after danjer arrives in the form of a new shopping mall that cuts off his food supply, sending Fox 8 on a harrowing quest to help save his pack.
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Sly Foxes, Wise Owls, Mean Dudes
- By Mel on 05-28-13
By: George Saunders
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Congratulations, by the Way
- Some Thoughts on Kindness
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 12 mins
- Unabridged
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Three months after George Saunders gave a graduation address at Syracuse University, a transcript of that speech was posted on the website of The New York Times, where its simple, uplifting message struck a deep chord. Within days, it had been shared more than one million times. Why? Because Saunders’ words tap in to a desire in all of us to lead kinder, more fulfilling lives. Powerful, funny, and wise, Congratulations, by the Way is an inspiring message from one of today’s most influential and original writers.
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Great Speech
- By Lucas Samples on 09-23-20
By: George Saunders
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The Very Persistent Gappers of Frip
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Gappers will get your goat. Literally. If you don't brush them off and return them to the ocean, these bright orange, many-eyed creatures will cover your goats, and the goats will stop giving milk. In a village called Frip, goat's milk was the entire economy. Three families lived there - the Romos, the Ronsens, and a little girl named Capable and her widowed father, who wanted everything to remain the same. It didn't. One day, the Gappers decided for a good reason to concentrate on Capable's goats. Oh, how the Romos and Ronsens turned their backs on the gapper-ridden Capable!
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Imagination & simplicity
- By Cathy A. Briggs on 01-02-24
By: George Saunders
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The Braindead Megaphone
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 6 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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George Saunders's first foray into nonfiction is comprised of essays on literature, travel, and politics. At the core of this unique collection are Saunders's travel essays based on his trips to seek out the mysteries of the "Buddha Boy" of Nepal; to attempt to indulge in the extravagant pleasures of Dubai; and to join the exploits of the minutemen at the Mexican border. Saunders expertly navigates the works of Mark Twain, Kurt Vonnegut, and Esther Forbes, and leads the listener across the rocky political landscape of modern America.
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George Saunders is a genius!
- By caitlyngarofolo on 05-31-20
By: George Saunders
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CivilWarLand in Bad Decline
- Stories and a Novella
- By: George Saunders, Joshua Ferris - introduction
- Narrated by: George Saunders, Joshua Ferris
- Length: 5 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Since its publication in 1996, George Saunders’ debut collection has grown in esteem from a cherished cult classic to a masterpiece of the form, inspiring an entire generation of writers along the way. In six stories and a novella, Saunders hatches an unforgettable cast of characters, each struggling to survive in an increasingly haywire world.
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>>BUCKLE. UP.<<
- By Mary K Foster on 05-23-21
By: George Saunders, and others
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Liberation Day
- Stories
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders, Tina Fey, Michael McKean, and others
- Length: 7 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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Story
The “best short story writer in English” (Time) is back with a masterful collection that explores ideas of power, ethics, and justice, and cuts to the very heart of what it means to live in community with our fellow humans. With his trademark prose—wickedly funny, unsentimental, and perfectly tuned—Saunders continues to challenge and surprise: here is a collection of prismatic, deeply resonant stories that encompass joy and despair, oppression and revolution, bizarre fantasy and brutal reality.
-
-
Extraordinary
- By REBECCA on 10-18-22
By: George Saunders
-
Fox 8
- A Story
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 37 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Fox 8 has always been known as the daydreamer in his pack, the one his fellow foxes regarded with a knowing snort and a roll of the eyes. That is, until Fox 8 develops a unique skill: He teaches himself to speak Yuman by hiding in the bushes outside a house and listening to children’s bedtime stories. The power of language fuels his abundant curiosity about people - even after danjer arrives in the form of a new shopping mall that cuts off his food supply, sending Fox 8 on a harrowing quest to help save his pack.
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Sly Foxes, Wise Owls, Mean Dudes
- By Mel on 05-28-13
By: George Saunders
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Congratulations, by the Way
- Some Thoughts on Kindness
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 12 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Three months after George Saunders gave a graduation address at Syracuse University, a transcript of that speech was posted on the website of The New York Times, where its simple, uplifting message struck a deep chord. Within days, it had been shared more than one million times. Why? Because Saunders’ words tap in to a desire in all of us to lead kinder, more fulfilling lives. Powerful, funny, and wise, Congratulations, by the Way is an inspiring message from one of today’s most influential and original writers.
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-
Great Speech
- By Lucas Samples on 09-23-20
By: George Saunders
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The Very Persistent Gappers of Frip
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
-
Story
Gappers will get your goat. Literally. If you don't brush them off and return them to the ocean, these bright orange, many-eyed creatures will cover your goats, and the goats will stop giving milk. In a village called Frip, goat's milk was the entire economy. Three families lived there - the Romos, the Ronsens, and a little girl named Capable and her widowed father, who wanted everything to remain the same. It didn't. One day, the Gappers decided for a good reason to concentrate on Capable's goats. Oh, how the Romos and Ronsens turned their backs on the gapper-ridden Capable!
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Imagination & simplicity
- By Cathy A. Briggs on 01-02-24
By: George Saunders
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The Braindead Megaphone
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 6 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
-
Story
George Saunders's first foray into nonfiction is comprised of essays on literature, travel, and politics. At the core of this unique collection are Saunders's travel essays based on his trips to seek out the mysteries of the "Buddha Boy" of Nepal; to attempt to indulge in the extravagant pleasures of Dubai; and to join the exploits of the minutemen at the Mexican border. Saunders expertly navigates the works of Mark Twain, Kurt Vonnegut, and Esther Forbes, and leads the listener across the rocky political landscape of modern America.
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George Saunders is a genius!
- By caitlyngarofolo on 05-31-20
By: George Saunders
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A Swim in a Pond in the Rain
- In Which Four Russians Give a Master Class on Writing, Reading, and Life
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders, Phylicia Rashad, Nick Offerman, and others
- Length: 14 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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For the last 20 years, George Saunders has been teaching a class on the Russian short story to his MFA students at Syracuse University. In A Swim in a Pond in the Rain, he shares a version of that class with us, offering some of what he and his students have discovered together over the years. Paired with iconic short stories by Chekhov, Turgenev, Tolstoy, and Gogol, the seven essays in this book are intended for anyone interested in how fiction works and why it’s more relevant than ever in these turbulent times.
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An innovative and fresh listening experience
- By Scott Garrioch on 01-14-21
By: George Saunders
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Pastoralia
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 4 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Hailed by Thomas Pynchon as "graceful, dark, authentic, and funny," George Saunders gives us, in his inventive and beloved voice, this best-selling collection of stories set against a warped, hilarious, and terrifyingly recognizable American landscape.
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Greatest living short story author reads own work.
- By Spam on 08-25-19
By: George Saunders
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Tenth of December
- Stories
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 5 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Writing brilliantly and profoundly about class, sex, love, loss, work, despair, and war, Saunders cuts to the core of the contemporary experience. These stories take on the big questions and explore the fault lines of our own morality, delving into the questions of what makes us good and what makes us human.
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Be prepared for something different...but good!
- By Mr. D on 02-21-14
By: George Saunders
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In Persuasion Nation
- By: George Saunders
- Narrated by: George Saunders
- Length: 5 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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From the number one New York Times best-selling author of the Man Booker Prize-winning novel Lincoln in the Bardo and the story collection Tenth of December, a 2013 National Book Award Finalist for Fiction. Talking candy bars, baby geniuses, disappointed mothers, castrated dogs, interned teenagers, and moral fables - all in this hilarious and heartbreaking collection from an author hailed as the heir to Kurt Vonnegut and Thomas Pynchon.
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Disappointing
- By Cynthia on 06-14-21
By: George Saunders
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How Much of These Hills Is Gold
- A Novel
- By: C Pam Zhang
- Narrated by: Catherine Ho, Joel de la Fuente
- Length: 9 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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Ba dies in the night; Ma is already gone. Newly orphaned children of immigrants, Lucy and Sam are suddenly alone in a land that refutes their existence. Fleeing the threats of their Western mining town, they set off to bury their father in the only way that will set them free from their past. Along the way, they encounter giant buffalo bones, tiger paw prints, and the specters of a ravaged landscape as well as family secrets, sibling rivalry, and glimpses of a different kind of future.
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Artistically written
- By Sherry Novak on 08-15-20
By: C Pam Zhang
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The Penguin Book of the Modern American Short Story
- By: John Freeman - editor
- Narrated by: Erin Bennett, Scott Brick, Cassandra Campbell, and others
- Length: 17 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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In the past 50 years, the American short story has changed dramatically. New voices, forms, and mixtures of genres have brought this unique US genre a thrilling burst of energy. This rich anthology celebrates this avalanche of talent. Beginning in 1970, it culls together a half century of powerful American short stories from all genres, including - for the first time in a literary anthology - science fiction, horror, and fantasy.
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Too dark for my taste
- By Lazy Chicken on 10-03-22
What listeners say about The Brief and Frightening Reign of Phil
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Emily Jones
- 12-03-21
Excellent story
it's a story about real life even though it seems so strange at first. amazing how barbaric humans can be. read for a class, required. really enjoyed. gets people to think, I hope. love the author narrating
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- Jaclyn Brown
- 05-10-23
Odd and interesting
This is my second read by George Saunders and I loved it. His imagination is wild and he plays with time in an interesting way. I love his minimalist word choice. I have just enough information to picture these bizarre worlds he creates.
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- Paul Frandano
- 12-08-21
Gogol and Lewis Carroll and Saunders Hold Hands...
...and pass through the Looking Glass...into a strange, strangely invented world. We know this at the very outset, from an absurd first paragraph that tells us what we most need to know about this world. "It’s one thing to be a small country, but the country of Inner Horner was so small only one Inner Hornerite at a time could fit inside, and the other six Inner Hornerites had to wait their turns to live in their own country while standing very timidly in the surrounding country of Outer Horner."
Saunders' Inner and Outer Horner is cluttered with absurdities, absurdities that, as we go along, with its absurd citizenry and its absurd President and its absurdly ambitious Phil of the title, take shape as a parable for our times, a parable of political power gone absolute and thus mad, written by Saunders 11 years earlier than the reality that descended on the world's greatest Democracy...a quick, satisfying novella that should stimulate some readerly thought along one or more of several paths.
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- ibillinsly@gmail
- 06-04-19
4.0 stars
This is a funny and entertaining novella. It’s probably fine for kids too. Saunders also narrates this audiobook, and he’s a really good narrator. It’s hard to believe he wrote this in back 2005. This novel is probably more relevant today than when he first released it. It's a quirky tale, but it's also brief and frightening at the same time.
Overall rating: 4.0 stars
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6 people found this helpful
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- B Johnson
- 08-15-22
loved it!
Loved it! Saunders' inimitable voice puts me in mind of Mark Twain and
James Thurber.
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- Darwin8u
- 12-24-19
“Our country is big, let us be big.”
This novella is one part Animal Farm, one part Gulliver's Travels. Part parable, part satire, it is (not to give to much of too little away) a short novella about border disputes, leadership, the media, and standing up to oppression. It was published in 2005 under the GWB administration, but feels (because of global border disputes) more relevant today in 2019 than even it was in 2005.
It is cute, at times funny, quick, and narratively interesting. It just isn't Saunders great. It is a minor moon and not even a planet in his solar system. But still, it is a "lush, full moon" at that.
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2 people found this helpful