The Great Pretenders
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 $20.25
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Alexandra Harris
-
By:
-
Laura Kalpakian
About this listen
The daughter of Hollywood royalty, Roxanne Granville is used to getting what she wants - even if she has to break the rules. But after a falling-out with her grandfather, a powerful movie mogul, she has to face life on her own for the first time....
Roxanne forges a career unique for women in the 1950s, becoming an agent for hungry young screenwriters. She struggles to be taken seriously by the men who rule Hollywood and who often assume that sexual favors are just a part of doing business. When she sells a script by a blacklisted writer under the name of a willing front man, more exiled writers seek her help. Roxanne wades into a world murky with duplicity and deception, and she can’t afford any more risks.
Then she meets Terrence Dexter, a compelling African-American journalist unlike anyone she’s ever known. Roxanne again breaks the rules and is quickly swept up in a passionate relationship with very real dangers that could destroy everything she’s carefully built.
Roxanne Granville is a woman who bravely defies convention. She won’t let men make all the rules and won’t let skin color determine whom she can love.
The Great Pretenders is a riveting, emotional novel that resonates in today’s world and reminds us that some things are worth fighting for.
©2019 Laura Kalpakian (P)2019 Penguin AudioListeners also enjoyed...
-
11-22-63
- A Novel
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Craig Wasson
- Length: 30 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On November 22, 1963, three shots rang out in Dallas, President Kennedy died, and the world changed. What if you could change it back? In this brilliantly conceived tour de force, Stephen King - who has absorbed the social, political, and popular culture of his generation more imaginatively and thoroughly than any other writer - takes listeners on an incredible journey into the past and the possibility of altering it.
-
-
I Owe Stephen King An Apology
- By Kelly - Write Well Academy on 04-16-12
By: Stephen King
-
Beautiful Ruins
- By: Jess Walter
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini
- Length: 12 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The story begins in 1962. On a rocky patch of the sun-drenched Italian coastline, a young innkeeper, chest-deep in daydreams, looks out over the incandescent waters of the Ligurian Sea and spies an apparition: a tall, thin woman, a vision in white, approaching him on a boat. She is an actress, he soon learns, an American starlet, and she is dying. And the story begins again today, half a world away, when an elderly Italian man shows up on a movie studio's back lot - searching for the mysterious woman he last saw at his hotel decades earlier.
-
-
My mind wandered
- By Ella on 11-25-12
By: Jess Walter
-
West of Sunset
- A Novel
- By: Stewart O'Nan
- Narrated by: Christopher Lane
- Length: 10 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1937 F. Scott Fitzgerald was a troubled, uncertain man whose literary success was long over. In poor health, with his wife consigned to a mental asylum and his finances in ruins, he struggled to make a new start as a screenwriter in Hollywood. By December of 1940, he would be dead of a heart attack. Those last three years of Fitzgerald's life, often obscured by the legend of his earlier Jazz Age glamour, are the focus of Stewart O'Nan's gorgeously and gracefully written novel.
-
-
An engrossing listen
- By Melvyn Kirtley on 02-05-15
By: Stewart O'Nan
-
South of Broad
- By: Pat Conroy
- Narrated by: Mark Deakins
- Length: 20 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Leopold Bloom King has been raised in a family shattered - and shadowed - by tragedy. Lonely and adrift, he searches for something to sustain him and finds it among a tightly knit group of outsiders. Surviving marriages happy and troubled, unrequited loves and unspoken longings, hard-won successes and devastating breakdowns, as well as Charleston, South Carolina’s dark legacy of racism and class divisions, these friends will endure until a final test forces them to face something none of them are prepared for.
-
-
Authors Need to Review Pronunciations
- By Pamela on 02-23-10
By: Pat Conroy
-
Bridge to Haven
- By: Francine Rivers
- Narrated by: Kate Forbes
- Length: 17 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
To those who matter in 1950s Hollywood, Lena Scott is the hottest rising star to hit the silver screen since Marilyn Monroe. Few know her real name is Abra. Even fewer know the price she' s paid to finally feel like she' s somebody. To Pastor Ezekiel Freeman, Abra will always be the little girl who stole his heart the night he found her, a wailing newborn abandoned under a bridge on the outskirts of Haven.
-
-
Francine Rivers is the best for a reason.
- By Candace on 05-06-14
By: Francine Rivers
-
Summer Island
- By: Kristin Hannah
- Narrated by: Joyce Bean
- Length: 10 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Thirty-four-year-old Ruby Bridge is a not-too-successful comedienne who uses her mother, a nationally-syndicated "moral and spiritual counselor" as the main fodder for her cynical, rather bitter humor. Her mother Nora, long divorced from Ruby's father, is a woman whose past is just about to catch up with her - in the form of blackmail by a former lover.
-
-
Disappointed
- By Lisa on 04-10-20
By: Kristin Hannah
-
11-22-63
- A Novel
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Craig Wasson
- Length: 30 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
On November 22, 1963, three shots rang out in Dallas, President Kennedy died, and the world changed. What if you could change it back? In this brilliantly conceived tour de force, Stephen King - who has absorbed the social, political, and popular culture of his generation more imaginatively and thoroughly than any other writer - takes listeners on an incredible journey into the past and the possibility of altering it.
-
-
I Owe Stephen King An Apology
- By Kelly - Write Well Academy on 04-16-12
By: Stephen King
-
Beautiful Ruins
- By: Jess Walter
- Narrated by: Edoardo Ballerini
- Length: 12 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The story begins in 1962. On a rocky patch of the sun-drenched Italian coastline, a young innkeeper, chest-deep in daydreams, looks out over the incandescent waters of the Ligurian Sea and spies an apparition: a tall, thin woman, a vision in white, approaching him on a boat. She is an actress, he soon learns, an American starlet, and she is dying. And the story begins again today, half a world away, when an elderly Italian man shows up on a movie studio's back lot - searching for the mysterious woman he last saw at his hotel decades earlier.
-
-
My mind wandered
- By Ella on 11-25-12
By: Jess Walter
-
West of Sunset
- A Novel
- By: Stewart O'Nan
- Narrated by: Christopher Lane
- Length: 10 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1937 F. Scott Fitzgerald was a troubled, uncertain man whose literary success was long over. In poor health, with his wife consigned to a mental asylum and his finances in ruins, he struggled to make a new start as a screenwriter in Hollywood. By December of 1940, he would be dead of a heart attack. Those last three years of Fitzgerald's life, often obscured by the legend of his earlier Jazz Age glamour, are the focus of Stewart O'Nan's gorgeously and gracefully written novel.
-
-
An engrossing listen
- By Melvyn Kirtley on 02-05-15
By: Stewart O'Nan
-
South of Broad
- By: Pat Conroy
- Narrated by: Mark Deakins
- Length: 20 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Leopold Bloom King has been raised in a family shattered - and shadowed - by tragedy. Lonely and adrift, he searches for something to sustain him and finds it among a tightly knit group of outsiders. Surviving marriages happy and troubled, unrequited loves and unspoken longings, hard-won successes and devastating breakdowns, as well as Charleston, South Carolina’s dark legacy of racism and class divisions, these friends will endure until a final test forces them to face something none of them are prepared for.
-
-
Authors Need to Review Pronunciations
- By Pamela on 02-23-10
By: Pat Conroy
-
Bridge to Haven
- By: Francine Rivers
- Narrated by: Kate Forbes
- Length: 17 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
To those who matter in 1950s Hollywood, Lena Scott is the hottest rising star to hit the silver screen since Marilyn Monroe. Few know her real name is Abra. Even fewer know the price she' s paid to finally feel like she' s somebody. To Pastor Ezekiel Freeman, Abra will always be the little girl who stole his heart the night he found her, a wailing newborn abandoned under a bridge on the outskirts of Haven.
-
-
Francine Rivers is the best for a reason.
- By Candace on 05-06-14
By: Francine Rivers
-
Summer Island
- By: Kristin Hannah
- Narrated by: Joyce Bean
- Length: 10 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Thirty-four-year-old Ruby Bridge is a not-too-successful comedienne who uses her mother, a nationally-syndicated "moral and spiritual counselor" as the main fodder for her cynical, rather bitter humor. Her mother Nora, long divorced from Ruby's father, is a woman whose past is just about to catch up with her - in the form of blackmail by a former lover.
-
-
Disappointed
- By Lisa on 04-10-20
By: Kristin Hannah
-
The High Tide Club
- A Novel
- By: Mary Kay Andrews
- Narrated by: Kathleen McInerney
- Length: 16 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When 99-year-old heiress Josephine Bettendorf Warrick summons Brooke Trappnell to Talisa Island, her 20,000-acre remote barrier island home, Brooke is puzzled. Everybody in the South has heard about the eccentric millionaire mistress of Talisa, but Brooke has never met her. Over the course of a few meetings, Josephine spins a tale of old friendships, dark secrets, betrayal, and a long-unsolved murder. She wants Brooke to help her make amends with the heirs of the women who were her closest friends....
-
-
Too politically correct
- By Caroline on 06-06-18
By: Mary Kay Andrews
-
The One-in-a-Million Boy
- By: Monica Wood
- Narrated by: Chris Ciulla
- Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For years, guitarist Quinn Porter has been on the road, chasing gig after gig, largely absent to his twice-ex-wife Belle and their odd, Guinness records-obsessed son. When the boy dies suddenly, Quinn seeks forgiveness for his paternal shortcomings by completing the requirements for one of his son's unfinished Boy Scout badges. For seven Saturdays Quinn does yard work for Ona Vitkus, the spry 104-year-old Lithuanian immigrant the boy had visited weekly.
-
-
Loved it
- By Justin on 10-20-16
By: Monica Wood
-
The Bette Davis Club
- By: Jane Lotter
- Narrated by: Sue Pitkin, Tessa Marts
- Length: 11 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
The morning of her niece's wedding, Margo Just drinks a double martini and contemplates the many mistakes she's made in her fifty-odd years of life. Spending three decades in love with a wonderful but unattainable man is pretty high up on her list of missteps, as is a long line of unsuccessful love affairs accompanied by a seemingly endless supply of delicious cocktails.
-
-
Sharp, Clever and Elegant... and funny as hell!
- By Chip Atkinson on 01-17-17
By: Jane Lotter
-
The Tender Bar
- A Memoir
- By: J. R. Moehringer
- Narrated by: Adam Grupper, Daniel Thomas May
- Length: 16 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
J.R. Moehringer grew up captivated by a voice. It was the voice of his father, a New York City disc jockey who vanished before J.R. spoke his first word. Sitting on the stoop, pressing an ear to the radio, J.R. would strain to hear in that plummy baritone the secrets of masculinity and identity. Though J.R.'s mother was his world, his rock, he craved something more, something faintly and hauntingly audible only in The Voice.
-
-
I Love this Book
- By Corey on 07-30-21
By: J. R. Moehringer
-
The Godfather Returns
- A Novel
- By: Mark Winegardner
- Narrated by: Scott Brick
- Length: 20 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Thirty-five years ago, Mario Puzo's great American tale, The Godfather, was published, and popular culture was indelibly changed. Now, in The Godfather Returns, acclaimed novelist Mark Winegardner continues the story, the years not covered in Puzo's best-selling book or in Francis Ford Coppola's classic films.
-
-
Puzo lives
- By Janet C. Walker on 11-21-04
By: Mark Winegardner
-
The Tin Horse
- A Novel
- By: Janice Steinberg
- Narrated by: Kate McGregor-Stewart
- Length: 15 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
has been more than 60 years since Elaine Greenstein’s twin sister, Barbara, ran away, cutting off contact with her family forever. Elaine has made peace with that loss. But while sifting through old papers as she prepares to move to Rancho Mañana - or the 'Ranch of No Tomorrow' as she refers to the retirement community - she is stunned to find a possible hint to Barbara’s whereabouts all these years later. And it pushes her to confront the fierce love and bitter rivalry of their youth.
-
-
The Tin Horse redefines black sheep of the family
- By Victoria on 10-12-13
By: Janice Steinberg
-
Native Speaker
- By: Chang-rae Lee
- Narrated by: David Colacci
- Length: 11 hrs and 1 min
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Henry Park has spent his entire life trying to become a true American—a native speaker. But even as the essence of his adopted country continues to elude him, his Korean heritage seems to drift further and further away. Park's harsh Korean upbringing has taught him to hide his emotions, to remember everything he learns, and most of all to feel an overwhelming sense of alienation. In other words, it has shaped him as a natural spy.
-
-
Great novel. Strange narrator choice.
- By Andy P on 08-10-22
By: Chang-rae Lee
-
Stars over Sunset Boulevard
- By: Susan Meissner
- Narrated by: Ann Marie Lee
- Length: 10 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Los Angeles, present day. When an iconic hat worn by Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind ends up in Christine McAllister's vintage clothing boutique by mistake, her efforts to return it to its owner take her on a journey more enchanting than any classic movie.... Los Angeles, 1938. Violet Mayfield sets out to reinvent herself in Hollywood after her dream of becoming a wife and mother falls apart, and she lands a job on the film set of Gone with the Wind.
-
-
Pass on this
- By Lulew on 03-24-17
By: Susan Meissner
-
Another Side of Paradise
- A Novel
- By: Sally Koslow
- Narrated by: Ana Clements
- Length: 10 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In 1937 Hollywood, gossip columnist Sheilah Graham’s star is on the rise while literary wonder boy F. Scott Fitzgerald’s career is slowly drowning in booze. But the once-famous author, desperate to make money penning scripts for the silver screen, is charismatic enough to attract the gorgeous Miss Graham, a woman who exposes the secrets of others while carefully guarding her own.
-
-
Narrator interfered with my enjoyment of the book
- By Suzanne Stokes on 10-11-18
By: Sally Koslow
-
All She Ever Wanted
- By: Lynn Austin
- Narrated by: Linda Stephens
- Length: 14 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A three-time Christy Award winner, Lynn Austin crafts rousing tales of hope and redemption. All She Ever Wanted stars Kathleen Seymour, a woman who seems to have it all, though she hides a dark family secret. To her horror, everything comes crashing down when she loses her job and her daughter is caught shoplifting. Desperate to regain control over her life, Kathleen returns to her estranged family to mend her severely broken relationships before it is too late.
-
-
Pure Enjoyment
- By Carla on 03-26-13
By: Lynn Austin
-
Mother Daughter Traitor Spy
- A Novel
- By: Susan Elia MacNeal
- Narrated by: Caroline Hewitt
- Length: 11 hrs and 57 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
June 1940. France has fallen to the Nazis, and Britain may be next—but to many Americans, the war is something happening “over there.” Veronica Grace has just graduated from college; she and her mother, Violet, are looking for a fresh start in sunny Los Angeles. After a blunder cost her a prestigious career opportunity in New York, Veronica is relieved to take a typing job in L.A.—only to realize that she’s working for one of the area’s most vicious propagandists. Overnight, Veronica is exposed to the dark underbelly of her new home, where Nazis are recruiting Americans.
-
-
Exquisite narration
- By HoneyBadger on 01-18-23
-
City of Flickering Light
- By: Juliette Fay
- Narrated by: Lisa Flanagan
- Length: 11 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It's July 1921, "flickers" are all the rage, and Irene Van Beck has just declared her own independence by jumping off a moving train to escape her fate in a traveling burlesque show. When her friends, fellow dancer Millie Martin and comedian Henry Weiss, leap after her, the trio finds their way to the bright lights of Hollywood with hopes of making it big in the burgeoning silent film industry. But despite the glamour and seduction of Tinseltown, success doesn't come easy, and nothing can prepare Irene, Millie, and Henry for the poverty, temptation, and heartbreak that lie ahead.
-
-
Good listen!
- By Amazon Customer on 11-28-21
By: Juliette Fay
Critic reviews
"What a good book! Engagingly readable, full of Golden Age of Hollywood glitz - and a wonderful story of idealism, courage and the price of love. Enjoyed every page!" (Diana Gabaldon, number-one New York Times best-selling author of Outlander)
"In her riveting new novel, Laura Kalpakian has given us a heroine to cheer for in this juicy tale of Hollywood. Roxanne Granville’s journey from diffident daughter of privilege to boundary-shattering career woman who takes on both the Hollywood blacklist and the racial prejudices of the early Civil Rights era is breathtaking and moving, even epic.” (Melanie Benjamin, New York Times best-selling author of The Girls in the Picture)
“[An] empowering, beautifully written story transports readers to 1950s-era Hollywood.” (Woman’s World)
Related to this topic
-
Stars over Sunset Boulevard
- By: Susan Meissner
- Narrated by: Ann Marie Lee
- Length: 10 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Los Angeles, present day. When an iconic hat worn by Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind ends up in Christine McAllister's vintage clothing boutique by mistake, her efforts to return it to its owner take her on a journey more enchanting than any classic movie.... Los Angeles, 1938. Violet Mayfield sets out to reinvent herself in Hollywood after her dream of becoming a wife and mother falls apart, and she lands a job on the film set of Gone with the Wind.
-
-
Pass on this
- By Lulew on 03-24-17
By: Susan Meissner
-
A Rather Lovely Inheritance
- By: CA Belmond
- Narrated by: Katherine Kellgren
- Length: 9 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This is your life Penny Nichols...Penny Nichols is a historical researcher working on a big-budget film in the south of France when she gets an urgent call. Her Aunt Penelope has just died, and Penny's presence is required in London for the reading of the will. With only a slim recollection of her eccentric aunt, Penny is astonished to learn that not only is she the bona fide heiress - but she's also been invited to put her research skills to work.
-
-
Delightful Story with Excellent Narratation
- By AnJoMom16 on 01-13-15
By: CA Belmond
-
Marjorie Morningstar
- By: Herman Wouk
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 28 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Marjorie Morningstar is a love story. It presents one of the greatest characters in modern fiction: Marjorie, the pretty 17-year-old who left the respectability of New York's Central Park West to join the theater, live in the teeming streets of Greenwich Village, and seek love in the arms of a brilliant, enigmatic writer.
-
-
Great story with really cheesy narration
- By James on 05-05-12
By: Herman Wouk
-
Vegas Rich
- Vegas, Book 1
- By: Fern Michaels
- Narrated by: Laural Merlington
- Length: 21 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With a heart full of dreams, Sallie Coleman leaves Texas and heads west determined to get as far from the squalor of her dirt poor beginnings. With its shifting sands, smoky saloons, and bingo palaces, Las Vegas seems like a paradise. A paradise where an extraordinary twist of fate makes Sallie the most powerful businesswoman in Nevada.
-
-
Get this booK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- By Amazon Customer on 09-26-10
By: Fern Michaels
-
The One-in-a-Million Boy
- By: Monica Wood
- Narrated by: Chris Ciulla
- Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For years, guitarist Quinn Porter has been on the road, chasing gig after gig, largely absent to his twice-ex-wife Belle and their odd, Guinness records-obsessed son. When the boy dies suddenly, Quinn seeks forgiveness for his paternal shortcomings by completing the requirements for one of his son's unfinished Boy Scout badges. For seven Saturdays Quinn does yard work for Ona Vitkus, the spry 104-year-old Lithuanian immigrant the boy had visited weekly.
-
-
Loved it
- By Justin on 10-20-16
By: Monica Wood
-
Texas Rich
- By: Fern Michaels
- Narrated by: Erin Yuen
- Length: 25 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Young Billie Ames naively fell for the exciting pilot Moss Coleman at the Philadelphia Navy Yard during World War II. Within a few months, she was pregnant, married, and traveling across the country to Austin...to the 250,000-acre spread known as Sunbridge and into the tantalizing world of the Texas rich. In a vast land dominated by the industrious Colemans, Billie fights to maintain control of her life and her marriage.
-
-
Awful Southern Accent
- By Tina Peters on 03-24-16
By: Fern Michaels
-
Stars over Sunset Boulevard
- By: Susan Meissner
- Narrated by: Ann Marie Lee
- Length: 10 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Los Angeles, present day. When an iconic hat worn by Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind ends up in Christine McAllister's vintage clothing boutique by mistake, her efforts to return it to its owner take her on a journey more enchanting than any classic movie.... Los Angeles, 1938. Violet Mayfield sets out to reinvent herself in Hollywood after her dream of becoming a wife and mother falls apart, and she lands a job on the film set of Gone with the Wind.
-
-
Pass on this
- By Lulew on 03-24-17
By: Susan Meissner
-
A Rather Lovely Inheritance
- By: CA Belmond
- Narrated by: Katherine Kellgren
- Length: 9 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
This is your life Penny Nichols...Penny Nichols is a historical researcher working on a big-budget film in the south of France when she gets an urgent call. Her Aunt Penelope has just died, and Penny's presence is required in London for the reading of the will. With only a slim recollection of her eccentric aunt, Penny is astonished to learn that not only is she the bona fide heiress - but she's also been invited to put her research skills to work.
-
-
Delightful Story with Excellent Narratation
- By AnJoMom16 on 01-13-15
By: CA Belmond
-
Marjorie Morningstar
- By: Herman Wouk
- Narrated by: Gabra Zackman
- Length: 28 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Marjorie Morningstar is a love story. It presents one of the greatest characters in modern fiction: Marjorie, the pretty 17-year-old who left the respectability of New York's Central Park West to join the theater, live in the teeming streets of Greenwich Village, and seek love in the arms of a brilliant, enigmatic writer.
-
-
Great story with really cheesy narration
- By James on 05-05-12
By: Herman Wouk
-
Vegas Rich
- Vegas, Book 1
- By: Fern Michaels
- Narrated by: Laural Merlington
- Length: 21 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
With a heart full of dreams, Sallie Coleman leaves Texas and heads west determined to get as far from the squalor of her dirt poor beginnings. With its shifting sands, smoky saloons, and bingo palaces, Las Vegas seems like a paradise. A paradise where an extraordinary twist of fate makes Sallie the most powerful businesswoman in Nevada.
-
-
Get this booK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
- By Amazon Customer on 09-26-10
By: Fern Michaels
-
The One-in-a-Million Boy
- By: Monica Wood
- Narrated by: Chris Ciulla
- Length: 10 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For years, guitarist Quinn Porter has been on the road, chasing gig after gig, largely absent to his twice-ex-wife Belle and their odd, Guinness records-obsessed son. When the boy dies suddenly, Quinn seeks forgiveness for his paternal shortcomings by completing the requirements for one of his son's unfinished Boy Scout badges. For seven Saturdays Quinn does yard work for Ona Vitkus, the spry 104-year-old Lithuanian immigrant the boy had visited weekly.
-
-
Loved it
- By Justin on 10-20-16
By: Monica Wood
-
Texas Rich
- By: Fern Michaels
- Narrated by: Erin Yuen
- Length: 25 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Young Billie Ames naively fell for the exciting pilot Moss Coleman at the Philadelphia Navy Yard during World War II. Within a few months, she was pregnant, married, and traveling across the country to Austin...to the 250,000-acre spread known as Sunbridge and into the tantalizing world of the Texas rich. In a vast land dominated by the industrious Colemans, Billie fights to maintain control of her life and her marriage.
-
-
Awful Southern Accent
- By Tina Peters on 03-24-16
By: Fern Michaels
-
Strong Motion
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: Scott Aiello
- Length: 20 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Louis Holland arrives in Boston in a spring of ecological upheaval (a rash of earthquakes on the North Shore) and odd luck: the first one kills his grandmother. Louis tries to maintain his independence, but falls in love with a Harvard seismologist whose discoveries about the earthquakes' cause complicate everything.
-
-
Compelling Story, Ridiculous Narrator
- By DianeReads on 02-28-16
By: Jonathan Franzen
-
Georgia Bottoms
- A Novel
- By: Mark Childress
- Narrated by: Debra Monk
- Length: 7 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A best-selling author of books for adults and children, Mark Childress pens his most outrageous work yet with Georgia Bottoms. The titular heroine is the epitome of the church-going Southern belle, except for one teeny-tiny aspect of her life. Georgia’s family inheritance has long since evaporated, and to maintain her genteel lifestyle, Miss Bottoms has taken six affluent lovers—the fly in the ointment being that one is a married preacher who’s about to reveal their infidelity to the whole congregation.
-
-
Fun Listen
- By Sue on 04-08-11
By: Mark Childress
-
Chanel Bonfire
- By: Wendy Lawless
- Narrated by: Wendy Lawless
- Length: 6 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
By the time Wendy Lawless turned 17, she'd known for quite some time that she didn't have a normal mother. But that didn't stop her from wanting one.... Georgann Rea didn't bake cookies or go to PTA meetings; she wore a mink coat and always had a lit Dunhill plugged into her cigarette holder. She went through men like Kleenex, and didn't like dogs or children. Georgann had the ice queen beauty of a Hitchcock heroine and the cold heart to match.
-
-
Not an Engaging Listen
- By Sobriquet on 03-13-13
By: Wendy Lawless
-
Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules (Unabridged Selections)
- By: Edited by David Sedaris
- Narrated by: David Sedaris, Mary-Louise Parker, Cherry Jones
- Length: 2 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Children Playing Before a Statue of Hercules is a collection of short stories, some classic, others impending, selected and introduced by David Sedaris.
-
-
Great stories but only 5 of 17 are included
- By Terri Kirk on 07-13-12
-
Fame
- By: Tilly Bagshawe
- Narrated by: Alison Larkin
- Length: 14 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When legendary film director Dorian Rasmirez gambles his fortune on an opulent remake of Wuthering Heights, he knows it’s his last chance to salvage his career. Thanks to a bitter public feud with producer Harry Greene, Dorian desperately needs a hit - a big one - and he’ll do anything to get it. Even cast Hollywood bad girl Sabrina Leon in the lead role. Plucked from obscurity, Sabrina catapulted to fame at an early age. Now the young starlet is as famous for her battles with drugs and alcohol as she is for her intoxicating beauty.
-
-
Started out with good intentions
- By BookLuvr on 06-28-14
By: Tilly Bagshawe
-
The Secret of the Villa Mimosa
- By: Elizabeth Adler
- Narrated by: Monica Buckley
- Length: 11 hrs and 25 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A beautiful Jane Doe with no memory of who she is or how she got to the bottom of a treacherous ravine; and a psychiatrist who joins her on her search for her identity. Dr. Phyl Forster was intrigued by the lovely woman who had been recovered from a San Francisco hillside and taken to the hospital where Forster was a resident psychiatrist. When Jane Doe regained consciousness, Dr. Phyl was at her side. It was then she realized that the patient had lost all memory.
-
-
Into the dark side!
- By anya on 10-11-21
By: Elizabeth Adler
-
The Wednesday Sisters
- By: Meg Waite Clayton
- Narrated by: Julie Dretzin
- Length: 10 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
For 35 years, Frankie, Linda, Kath, Brett, and Ally have met every Wednesday at the park near their homes in Palo Alto, California. Defined when they first meet by what their husbands do, the young homemakers and mothers are far removed from the Summer of Love that has enveloped most of the Bay Area in 1967.
-
-
Loved it!
- By Denise Wallace on 06-26-09
-
Gold Dust
- By: Kimberley Freeman
- Narrated by: Jennifer Vuletic
- Length: 18 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Three women linked by their blood, their dreams...and their sins. From Leningrad in the '70s to America and London in the present day, Kimberley Freeman's new novel follows the lives of two sisters, Lena and Natalia, and their cousin, Sofi, as they move away from Russia and all they have known. Despite promising to always take care of each other, a pact to meet every winter is shattered as their lives change and long-held resentments begin to surface. Can that resentment turn to hatred? To murder?
-
-
It's just not the same without Caroline Lee
- By Maria on 12-04-17
-
Tryin' To Sleep In the Bed You Made
- By: Virginia DeBerry, Donna Grant
- Narrated by: Fran L. Washington
- Length: 16 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Gayle was the beauty who believed that a man could make her life complete. Patricia was the intellectual who thought that rising to the top of her career would make her happy. And then there is Marcus Carter, who has been linked to both Gayle and Pat since the tragedy that occurred when they were all children. Can either one save him from himself? Can friends survive a love that comes between them? Each of them gets what she wants, but no one counts on the price they have to pay.
-
-
Better with each chapter!
- By Cyn B. on 02-09-16
By: Virginia DeBerry, and others
-
Josephine Baker's Last Dance
- By: Sherry Jones
- Narrated by: Adenrele Ojo
- Length: 13 hrs
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In this illuminating biographical novel, Sherry Jones spans Josephine Baker's early years in servitude and poverty in America to her rise to fame as a showgirl in her famous banana skirt to her activism against discrimination, and her many loves and losses. From 1920s Paris to 1960s Washington to her final, triumphant performance, one of the most extraordinary lives of the 20th century comes to stunning life on the page. With intimate prose and comprehensive research, Sherry Jones brings Josephine Baker into focus for the first time in a joyous celebration of a life lived in technicolor.
-
-
Josephine Bakers Last Dance
- By Robin on 09-02-20
By: Sherry Jones
-
Babylon Sisters
- By: Pearl Cleage
- Narrated by: Pearl Cleage
- Length: 8 hrs and 7 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Catherine, busy working with refugee and immigrant women through her small firm, Babylon Sisters, has taken on a powerful new client. She doesn't have much time for Phoebe's complicated questions of paternity - that is, until Phoebe's real father, B. J., a renowned investigative reporter, shows up in town to work on a story connected to Catherine.
-
-
Sister Love
- By Florence Graydon on 03-26-21
By: Pearl Cleage
-
Summer at Willow Lake
- The Lakeshore Chronicles, Book 1
- By: Susan Wiggs
- Narrated by: Joyce Bean
- Length: 12 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Real estate expert Olivia Bellamy reluctantly trades a trendy Manhattan summer for her family's old resort camp in the Catskills, where her primary task will be renovating the bungalow colony for her grandparents, who want one last summer together filled with fun, friends and family. A posh resort in its heyday, the camp is now in disarray and Olivia is forced to hire contractor Connor Davis - a still-smoldering flame from her own summers at camp.
-
-
Finding Love at Summer Camp
- By Pamela Dale Foster on 02-13-15
By: Susan Wiggs
What listeners say about The Great Pretenders
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Ash
- 10-05-19
Good book and easy to stop and start
The reading performance was fantastic! So many characters represented well vocally.
Some of the writing is a little repetitive without meaning.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Evonne
- 05-14-20
OUTSTANDING
I was drawn in from the start.. considering the state of the world at the moment, prejudices & racism ; 1956 wasnt that long ago and we still have a long way to go.. but this book reminded what really matters. The setting of the story in Hollywood's golden age was as vivid as if I lived in that time myself. Kudos
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
1 person found this helpful
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Peter
- 11-20-20
Disappointing
The topic--racial tensions during the 1950s--is an important part of the history of this country's institutional racism. The setting--the Hollywood film industry during the Red-baiting of that period--is an important part of the history of this country's polarized politics. Alas, the writing does not do justice to the topic, although it does a more reasonable job of portraying the setting. As limited as the book is, the narration is even more mediocre.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!