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The Good Hand
- A Memoir of Work, Brotherhood, and Transformation in an American Boomtown
- Narrated by: Michael Patrick F. Smith
- Length: 13 hrs and 38 mins
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Publisher's summary
"Remarkable...this is the book that Hillbilly Elegy should have been." (Kirkus Reviews)
A vivid window into the world of working-class men set during the Bakken fracking boom in North Dakota.
Like thousands of restless men left unmoored in the wake of the 2008 economic crash, Michael Patrick Smith arrived in the fracking boomtown of Williston, North Dakota, five years later homeless, unemployed, and desperate for a job. Renting a mattress on a dirty flophouse floor, he slept boot to beard with migrant men who came from all across America and as far away as Jamaica, Africa, and the Philippines. They ate together, drank together, argued like crows, and searched for jobs they couldn't get back home. Smith's goal was to find the hardest work he could do - to find out if he could do it. He hired on in the oil patch where he toiled 14-hour shifts from summer's 100-degree dog days to deep into winter's bracing whiteouts, all the while wrestling with the demons of a turbulent past, his broken relationships with women, and the haunted memories of a family riven by violence.
The Good Hand is a saga of fear, danger, exhaustion, suffering, loneliness, and grit that explores the struggles of America's marginalized boomtown workers - the rough-hewn, castoff, seemingly disposable men who do an indispensable job that few would exalt: oil field hands who, in the age of climate change, put the gas in our tanks and the food in our homes. Smith, who had pursued theater and played guitar in New York, observes this world with a critical eye; yet he comes to love his coworkers, forming close bonds with Huck, a goofy giant of a young man whose lead foot and quick fists get him into trouble with the law, and The Wildebeest, a foul-mouthed, dip-spitting truck driver who torments him but also trains him up and helps Smith "make a hand".
The Good Hand is ultimately a book about transformation - a classic American story of one man's attempt to burn himself clean through hard work, to reconcile himself to himself, to find community, and to become whole.
This audiobook edition includes an original score and seven songs performed by The Good Hand.
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Performance
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After the stunning historical novels The Clearing and The Missing, Tim Gautreaux now ranges freely through contemporary life with 12 new stories and eight from previous collections. Most are set in his beloved Louisiana, many hard by or on the Mississippi River, others in North Carolina, and even in midwinter Minnesota. But generally it's heat, humidity, and bugs that beset his people as they wrestle with affairs of the heart, matters of faith, and the pros and cons of tight-knit communities.
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Perfection! Amazing writer/amazing reader
- By Monique on 01-08-19
By: Tim Gautreaux
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The Boy Kings of Texas
- A Memoir
- By: Domingo Martinez
- Narrated by: Emilio Delgado
- Length: 13 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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A lyrical and authentic book that recounts the story of a border-town family in Brownsville, Texas in the 1980s, as each member of the family desperately tries to assimilate and escape life on the border to become "real" Americans, even at the expense of their shared family history. This is really un-mined territory in the memoir genre that gives in-depth insight into a previously unexplored corner of America.
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It was Okay
- By DebKoo on 05-17-13
By: Domingo Martinez
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Three-Fifths
- By: John Vercher
- Narrated by: J. D. Jackson
- Length: 7 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Pittsburgh, 1995. The son of a black father he’s never known and a white mother he sometimes wishes he didn’t, 22-year-old Bobby Saraceno is passing for white. Raised by his bigoted maternal grandfather, Bobby has hidden his truth from everyone, even his best friend and fellow comic-book geek, Aaron, who has just returned home from prison a hardened racist.
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Good BUT not as good as it sounded
- By jaymie thomas on 12-13-19
By: John Vercher
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We Begin at the End
- By: Chris Whitaker
- Narrated by: George Newbern
- Length: 10 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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Duchess Day Radley is a 13-year-old self-proclaimed outlaw. Rules are for other people. She is the fierce protector of her five-year-old brother, Robin, and the parent to her mother, Star, a single mom incapable of taking care of herself, let alone her two kids. Walk has never left the coastal California town where he and Star grew up. He may have become the chief of police, but he’s still trying to heal the old wound of having given the testimony that sent his best friend, Vincent King, to prison decades before. And he's in overdrive protecting Duchess and her brother.
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Horrible narrator in this audible book
- By M. patton on 03-03-21
By: Chris Whitaker
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No Angel
- My Harrowing Undercover Journey to the Inner Circle of the Hells Angels
- By: Jay Dobyns, Nils Johnson-Shelton
- Narrated by: Mel Foster
- Length: 12 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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Getting shot in the chest as a rookie ATF agent, bartering for machine guns, throttling down the highway at 100 miles per hour, and responding to a full-scale, bloody riot between the Hells Angels and their rivals, the Mongols - these are just a few of the high-adrenaline experiences Jay Dobyns recounts in this action-packed, hard to imagine, but true story of how he infiltrated the legendary Hells Angels.
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"I would avoid this one..."
- By Chris on 12-27-12
By: Jay Dobyns, and others
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Of Mice and Minestrone
- Hap and Leonard: The Early Years (Hap and Leonard)
- By: Kathleen Kent - introduction, Kasey Lansdale - contributor, Joe R. Lansdale
- Narrated by: JD Jackson
- Length: 5 hrs and 48 mins
- Unabridged
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Hap Collins looks like a good ol’ boy. But even in his misspent youth, his best pal is Leonard Pine, who is Black, gay, and the ultimate outsider. Inseparable friends, Hap and Leonard climb into the boxing ring, visit their families, get in bar fights, and just go fishing - all the while confronting racists, righting wrongs, and eating a whole lot of delicious food.
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Wringing every last drop
- By 🔥 Phx17 🔥 on 04-08-23
By: Kathleen Kent - introduction, and others
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The Death of Cool
- From Teenage Rebellion to the Hangover of Adulthood
- By: Gavin McInnes
- Narrated by: Gavin McInnes
- Length: 7 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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This is his story, or, rather, stories - lots of them, and all gut-punchingly hilarious, from that first far reach into a girl's tight jeans to turning forty with a cataclysmic party. In between you’ll hear about acid trips, threesomes, Nazi skinheads, his band Anal Chinook (Inuit for “warm wind”), Martians in northern Canada, throwing pedophiles in jail, dinner with the Clash, what happens when you crash Bill Maher's show wasted, and the true story of Vice magazine.
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if you don't buy this book, the terrorists win
- By Kelsey Gholi on 04-03-17
By: Gavin McInnes
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Junkie Love
- By: Joe Clifford
- Narrated by: Timothy McKean
- Length: 6 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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From the cow fields of Connecticut to the streets of San Francisco, Joe Clifford's Junkie Love traverses the lost highways of America, down the rocky roads of mental illness to the dead ends of addiction. Based on Clifford's own harrowing experience with drugs as a rock 'n' roll wannabe in the 1990s, the audiobook draws on the best of Kerouac and the Beats, injecting a heavy dose of pulp fiction as it threads a rollicking narrative through a doomed love triangle, lit up by the many strange characters he meets along the way.
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WOW! an inside look into an junkies mind
- By TinkerMel on 05-16-17
By: Joe Clifford
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The Drop
- By: Dennis Lehane
- Narrated by: Jim Frangione
- Length: 5 hrs and 26 mins
- Unabridged
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Three days after Christmas, a lonely bartender looking for a reason to live rescues an abused puppy from a trash can and meets a damaged woman looking for something to believe in. As their relationship grows, they cross paths with the Chechen mafia; a man grown dangerous with age and thwarted hopes; two hapless stick-up artists; a very curious cop; and the original owner of the puppy, who wants his dog bac.k…
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THAT IS LIFE,
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 12-06-14
By: Dennis Lehane
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Fourth of July Creek
- A Novel
- By: Smith Henderson
- Narrated by: MacLeod Andrews, Jenna Lamia
- Length: 15 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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After trying to help Benjamin Pearl, an undernourished, nearly feral 11-year-old boy living in the Montana wilderness, social worker Pete Snow comes face-to-face with the boy's profoundly disturbed father, Jeremiah. With courage and caution, Pete slowly earns a measure of trust from this paranoid survivalist itching for a final conflict that will signal the coming End Times. But as Pete's own family spins out of control, Pearl's activities spark the full-blown interest of the FBI, putting Pete at the center of a massive manhunt from which no one will emerge unscathed.
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The Ghost of Tom Joad & the Wrath of Grapes
- By Mel on 06-30-14
By: Smith Henderson
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Saguaro
- By: Carson Mell
- Narrated by: Carson Mell
- Length: 3 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Saguaro chronicles the life of rock legend Bobby Bird as he finds himself rolled up in barbiturates, at sea with satanic cults, finding true love, selling out, and coming back. Bird may be many things - a legend in pink cotton, a living history in tattoos, the very embodiment of rock and roll - but he isn’t a bad man. At least not all the time. He made his name as a crooner, revered as a singer with soul, a soul he quickly sold without ever considering the implications.
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Animal Cruelty Warning
- By AJLecter on 02-06-23
By: Carson Mell
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The Ninth Metal
- The Comet Cycle, Book 1
- By: Benjamin Percy
- Narrated by: Julia Whelan
- Length: 10 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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The town of Northfall, Minnesota, will never be the same. Meteors cratered hardwood forests and annihilated homes, and among the wreckage a new metal was discovered. This “omnimetal” has properties that make it world-changing as an energy source…and a weapon. John Frontier returns for his sister’s wedding to find his family embroiled in a cutthroat war to control mineral rights and mining operations. His father rightly suspects foreign leaders and competing corporations of sabotage, but the greatest threat to his legacy might be the US government.
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Everyone Will Enjoy This Except My Mother
- By Liv Rosin on 06-04-21
By: Benjamin Percy
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Art in America
- By: Ron McLarty
- Narrated by: Ron McLarty
- Length: 14 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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Art in America tells the story of unknown writer Steven Kearney, an aging man whose lifelong commitment to his art finally brings him to homelessness in NYC. Then miraculously he receives an invitation to become playwright in residence of a troubled Rocky Mountain town.
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Another great tale from Ron McLarty
- By TypicalConsumer on 08-18-09
By: Ron McLarty
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The Rabbit Factory
- By: Marshall Karp
- Narrated by: Tom Stechschulte, James Jenner
- Length: 14 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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Marshall Karp is an acclaimed playwright known for his witty sense of humor and crackling dialogue. His debut novel The Rabbit Factory stars the irreverent LAPD detective duo of Mike Lomax and Terry Biggs. Dean Lamaar is the architect of an entertainment empire and the creator of iconic characters like Rambunctious Rabbit and McGreedy the Moose.
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Bizarre but engaging mystery.1st-rate performance.
- By MidwestGeek on 12-19-12
By: Marshall Karp
What listeners say about The Good Hand
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- troy
- 02-09-22
much better than I thought
great story, well read and told, with interesting characters and insights from the author. highly recommended
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- Joseph Thompson
- 03-07-23
Good story
After 1 year you’re only starting to figure that part of the oilfield out. Great book overall but feel like his main reason for going was to write a book about it but honestly appreciated that a liberal went out and experienced the life rather than writing a book about the horrors of the oilfield without actually experiencing it first hand. Thank you for that.
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- Barb
- 06-09-23
Good story but weak ending
It was a fascinating story. The intertwining of the author’s life and background with that of so many oil field workers was interesting given the varied backgrounds everyone came from. However after the build up of so many months of working in the oil fields it just became a “time to go home. The end” sort of ending. I was looking for a little more insight and introspection than I received.
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- Jan
- 03-06-21
Wonderful engaging story. A true artist.
I loved the insight this author developed about childhood trauma, the search for his own manhood the revelations along the way of feeling so different and out of place and eventual acceptance into a brotherhood of men. I would and have encouraged others to enjoy this audio. Loved having the author read his own work. Felt like he was personally sharing his experiences with me. Will watch for more by this author.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Monrovial
- 08-15-21
Good, but...
It's been a couple weeks since I finished listening to this book, and I have mixed emotions:
The story on a whole was good. He captured the people, the lifestyle, the transformation from his start to finish in the fields very well. He was the only one who could do justice to reading this story, and I'm glad he did. I appreciated the commentary on how important oil has become in this world. I was invested in the people in this book and thankful he gave us an epilogue of sorts on where they wound up.
If I stopped there, you might think I loved the book, but...
The singing between chapters was brutal. He speaks in the book of attending a concert where a singer was off-key throughout but how the singer was great because of the words and meaning of the songs...the beauty of the perfomance. Perhaps you have to love someone's music enough to tolerate the off-key singing. With the author, I could not. It was brutal...and as I heard him singing, it took me back to parts where he talked of a famous singer telling him he did a good job after a set or his relationships with other famous artists and left me feeling that I couldn't trust the story because it seems he thinks he is a good artist. I could not get past the voice to even understand his lyrics...and then the name dropping and talking up about his music got irritating. It would have been better had I never heard him sing.
Also, the ending seemed ranging, lost, and while I understand perhaps that captured the author at the time, his editor failed him here.
So I guess, even though I think I liked the book overall, I would not recommend it to my friends unless they outright showed an interest in the oil fields or blue-collar struggles in general—and only then would I recommend the book vs. the audiobook.
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- Stephen
- 03-02-21
Woody Allen drills for oil
I saw the rating for this book and thought, great – a Hillbilly Elegy for the Bakken Oil Fields. In a word, no. Unlike Mr. Vance, Mr. Smith is not introducing you to people that he knows and for whom he empathizes. Mr. Smith takes great pains to repeatedly tell the reader that he is an artist who is there for a suffering tour. He spends most of the book describing how horrible and dysfunctional these people are, how sensitive and artistic he is, and how mean to him they are to him. The reader gets jarring cuts of his bluegrass music that seem as out of place with the prose as he is to the people. Mr. Smith rails against every left-wing boogeyman, but never actually does much of anything about them. But he is quick to inform you again and again and again, that he has talked to people who have. The book deals with damaged people doing difficult and dangerous work. These people are far from perfect, but I had a lot more empathy for them then I did the author who came across like the stereotypical neurotic whiney New Yorker who is between visits to his therapist. If however, your view of the middle of the country is that it is filled with semi-literate, knuckle-draggers who drool at the mouth, this book will reinforce all of your prejudices. You will love it.
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- Terry Kaufman
- 03-26-21
way to go magic!
thanks for your honesty
can't wait to see what you do next!
this is a story that needs to be shared
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4 people found this helpful
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- Bruce Betzer
- 07-13-21
Musical interludes
The author’s original songs added greatly to the sense of authenticity and his narration feels honest and sincere.
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- Kevin Hill
- 07-22-21
A Great Listen!
Interesting memoir about something I knew nothing about, working in an oil field. Hard to believe he’s not a professional writer, very descriptive audio book and I enjoyed how they incorporated his music into the story. Spoken by the author himself, he does a good job narrating his own story. Highly recommend!
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- Reader
- 06-07-21
Well done.
I enjoyed this book. I have family members who have worked on rigs, albeit not in winter in North Dakota. Hats off to these guys.
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1 person found this helpful