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The Inner Circle
- My Seventeen Years in the Cult of the American Sikhs, Book 1
- Narrated by: Peter MacDonald Blachly
- Length: 11 hrs and 17 mins
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Publisher's summary
Peter Macdonald Blachly takes us on an amazing adventure, documenting the 17 years he spent in a spiritual cult, while providing candid insights into the circumstances and conditions that made him vulnerable to manipulation by a charismatic sociopath. His understanding of psychology and human weaknesses, and the lessons he draws from his own experiences are universal, making his memoir highly relevant today.
The book provides a riveting account of Blachly’s introduction to yoga, his arranged marriage, and a thrilling and entertaining view of India during the 1970s and 1980s, when he undertook multiple extended tours, studying and performing the sacred music of the Sikhs, teaching yoga to young people in New Delhi, and learning to read, write, and speak Punjabi.
Back in the United States, Blachly takes us on another adventure, leading the Khalsa String Band, which he founded in 1974, on a multi-city performance tour throughout North America, shortly after opening the “Golden Temple Conscious Cookery”, the first full-service vegetarian restaurant in Washington, DC. The stories are told with self-deprecating humor, and with compassion for those who were traumatized by the abuse meted out by their spiritual teacher, Yogi Bhajan, a self-styled messiah of the Sikhs.
Blachly manages to weave together these world-traveling adventures with his own spiritual journey as one of the first people to don a turban in the early days of the Yogi Bhajan cult, which he joined in 1970. Although he pulls no punches about his gradual disillusionment with the moral failings of his teacher, the book does not come off as an exposé. Rather, it is his self-awareness and clear-eyed examination of his own vulnerable sense of identity—which made him susceptible to Yogi Bhajan’s manipulations—that sets the book apart from other memoirs.
In the words of cult expert Stephen Hassan, "Whether practicing one of the world’s religions, following a spiritual teacher, participating in an authoritarian cult, or in the thralls of a charismatic political leader, The Inner Circle provides valuable and entertaining lessons."
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Since bursting onto the scene in the mid '70s, the pop duo Captain and Tennille have long defined the sparkling, optimistic idea of everlasting love, both in their music and through their image as a happy and, seemingly, unbreakable couple. They were an irresistible pair to millions of fans all over the world, further underscored by the rousing "yes, we can!" gospel of their biggest hit, "Love Will Keep Us Together". But underneath the image was an entirely different story that the fans never saw.
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Loved it for several reasons
- By Jennifer on 05-28-16
By: Toni Tennille, and others
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Mozart in the Jungle
- Sex, Drugs, and Classical Music
- By: Blair Tindall
- Narrated by: Amanda Ronconi
- Length: 12 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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In a book that inspired the Amazon original series starring Gael Garcia Bernal and Malcolm McDowell, oboist Blair Tindall recounts her decades-long professional career as a classical musician, from the recitals and Broadway orchestra performances to the secret life of musicians who survive hand to mouth in the backbiting New York classical music scene, trading sexual favors for plum jobs and assignments in orchestras across the city.
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Entertaining, but with long pedantic sections
- By M. S. Cohen on 01-17-16
By: Blair Tindall
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Little Black Sheep
- A Memoir
- By: Ashley Cleveland
- Narrated by: Ashley Cleveland
- Length: 4 hrs and 32 mins
- Unabridged
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Ashley Cleveland grew up in a Southern family fractured by alcoholism, homosexuality, and the collapse of her parents' marriage. She knew from the start that she was the "good-for-nothing" black sheep of her divided home, and she quickly learned to play the part. Yet in her destructive days of drugs, alcohol, and sex, she encountered a forgiving God who was relentlessly faithful. Change did not come quickly. The brokenness did not disappear. But Ashley allowed God to heal her, to transform her desires, to bring courage to others through her journey.
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Strength, Love, and Hope!
- By Melanie White Designs on 05-05-19
By: Ashley Cleveland
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Factory Girls
- From Village to City in a Changing China
- By: Leslie T. Chang
- Narrated by: Susan Ericksen
- Length: 14 hrs and 36 mins
- Unabridged
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A book of global significance that provides new insight into China, Factory Girls demonstrates how the mass movement from rural villages to cities is remaking individual lives and transforming Chinese society, much as immigration to America's shores remade our own country a century ago.
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Living in Shenzhen - and What A Disappointment
- By Abstraction on 03-01-10
By: Leslie T. Chang
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And After the Fire
- A Novel
- By: Lauren Belfer
- Narrated by: Xe Sands, Simon Vance
- Length: 12 hrs and 33 mins
- Unabridged
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In the ruins of Germany in 1945, at the end of World War II, American soldier Henry Sachs takes a souvenir, an old music manuscript, from a seemingly deserted mansion and mistakenly kills the girl who tries to stop him. In America in 2010, Henry's niece, Susanna Kessler, struggles to rebuild her life after she experiences a devastating act of violence on the streets of New York City. When Henry dies soon after, she uncovers the long-hidden music manuscript.
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Very disappointing
- By Margalarg on 06-28-19
By: Lauren Belfer
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Good Day!
- The Paul Harvey Story
- By: Paul J. Batura
- Narrated by: Paul J. Batura
- Length: 6 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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In Good Day!: The Paul Harvey Story, author Paul J. Batura follows the remarkable life of one of the founding fathers of the news media. Paul Harvey started his career during the Great Depression and narrated America's story day by day, through wars and peace, the threat of communism and the crumbling of old colonial powers, consumer booms and eventual busts.
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Should have been better
- By Royce Brown on 12-21-09
By: Paul J. Batura
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Mao's Last Dancer
- Young Readers' Edition
- By: Li Cunxin
- Narrated by: Paul English
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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One day, not so very many years ago, a small peasant boy was chosen to study ballet at the Beijing Dance Academy. His mother urged him to take this chance of a lifetime. But Li was only eleven years old and he was scared and lonely, pushed away from all that he had ever known and loved. He hated the strict training routines and the strange place he had been brought to. All he wanted to do was go home - to his mother, father, and six brothers, to his own small village. But soon Li realised that his mother was right. He had the chance to do something special with his life - and he never turned back.
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Happiness rising from the injustise
- By Natasha on 10-29-13
By: Li Cunxin
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Dreams from My Father
- A Story of Race and Inheritance
- By: Barack Obama
- Narrated by: Barack Obama
- Length: 14 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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In this lyrical, unsentimental, and compelling memoir, the son of a Black African father and a White American mother searches for a workable meaning to his life as a Black American. It begins in New York, where Barack Obama learns that his father - a figure he knows more as a myth than as a man - has been killed in a car accident. This sudden death inspires an emotional odyssey - first to a small town in Kansas, from which he retraces the migration of his mother’s family to Hawaii, and then to Kenya, where he meets the African side of his family.
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Powerful
- By Gene R. on 10-26-21
By: Barack Obama
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The Pursuit of Happyness (Abridged)
- By: Chris Gardner
- Narrated by: Andre Blake
- Length: 5 hrs and 42 mins
- Abridged
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At the age of 20, Chris Gardner arrived in San Francisco to pursue a promising career in medicine. However, he surprised everyone and himself by setting his sights on the competitive world of high finance. Yet no sooner had he landed an entry-level position at a prestigious firm, Gardner found himself caught in a web of incredibly challenging circumstances that left him part of the city's working homeless with his toddler son.
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Very Good Story!
- By Lito Da Critic on 06-02-06
By: Chris Gardner
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The Goddess Pose
- The Audacious Life of Indra Devi, the Woman Who Helped Bring Yoga to the West
- By: Michelle Goldberg
- Narrated by: Tanya Eby
- Length: 10 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Born into the minor aristocracy (as Eugenia Peterson), Devi grew up in the midst of one of the most turbulent times in human history. Forced to flee the Russian Revolution as a teenager, she joined a famous Berlin cabaret troupe, dove into the vibrant prewar spiritualist movement, and, at a time when it was nearly unthinkable for a young European woman to travel alone, followed the charismatic theosophical leader Jiddu Krishnamurti to India.
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The Auntie Mame of yoga!
- By Victoria Moran on 10-09-17
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Life in Motion
- An Unlikely Ballerina
- By: Misty Copeland
- Narrated by: Lisa Reneé Pitts
- Length: 9 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
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As the only African-American soloist dancing with the prestigious American Ballet Theatre, Misty Copeland has made history. But when she first placed her hands on the barre at an after-school community center, no one expected the undersized, anxious 13-year-old to become a groundbreaking ballerina. Life in Motion is a story of passion and grace for anyone who has dared to dream of a different life.
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Has Copeland heard this narration? Has Audible?
- By Debbie on 08-02-15
By: Misty Copeland
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Peace from Broken Pieces
- How to Get Through What You're Going Through
- By: Iyanla Vanzant
- Narrated by: Iyanla Vanzant
- Length: 11 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
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New York Times best-selling author Iyanla Vanzant recounts the last decade of her life and the spiritual lessons learned—from the price of success during her meteoric rise as a TV celebrity on Oprah, the Iyanla TV show (produced by Barbara Walters), to the dissolution of her marriage and her daughter's 15 months of illness and death on Christmas day.
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Iyanla is Inspirational! A GREAT LISTEN!!!
- By Theresa on 12-04-11
By: Iyanla Vanzant
What listeners say about The Inner Circle
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Johannah
- 02-07-23
Engaging story...couldn't put it down...
I loved the author's voice! This book was very well written, and the author is so vulnerable, honest, and intriguing that I immediately bought the paperback version. I enjoyed the photos documenting this man's liminal experience in the early days of the burgeoning American Sikh community. The author was barely twenty when he was compelled toward the promise of community and spiritual meaning initiated by a powerful new “Saturn” teacher from India. At first, the author is swept up into luminous and exotic experiences, and at times it almost seems like he had found salvation.
But, this doesn't last long. While listening to the non-blaming way the author describes the "master's" behaviors I, as a reader, wanted to reach back in time to warn the young man to take heed of his teacher's dark side. It is palpable how naive and, therefore, how incredibly vulnerable he was to the gut wrenching psychological trauma that his teacher, “Yogi Bhajan,” exacted upon those who, like lambs to the slaughter, sought refuge in a "father figure."
And yet, the author's resilience shines through. I was wonderfully surprised by the recordings of the author's music inserted in various parts of the narrative, and wished I could find more of it. His main entree into Bhajan’s “inner circle” was through his savant musical abilities that were showcased in the Khalsa String Band, which the author created and with whom he recorded and performed in venues across the country and widely in India. It was fun to see the author seated on a high platform, wearing robes and a turban while playing music for dignitaries and crowds at the Golden Temple!
While this was a deeply personal narrative it also reveals the unfolding of near universal narcissistic abuse that defines the playbook of every cult leader, whether religious or political. That being said, this book is a “first,” specifically because it is told through the lens of a man with high functioning autism, who can write with fluent grace, and who developed his most beautiful voice and expression through music. How confusing it must have been to shine so brightly in the darkness that was Yogi Bhajan's perverse exploitation of Sikhism. I am impatient for the publication of Book II!
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