The Premonitions Bureau
A True Account of Death Foretold
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Narrated by:
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Julian Rhind-Tutt
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By:
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Sam Knight
About this listen
“This is rich, florid, funny history, with undertones of human grief . . . Knight is shrewd and perceptive . . . [he] pushes his material into neurobiology, into the nature of placebos and expectations and self-fulfilling prophecies . . . Knight’s book is crisp.” —Dwight Garner, New York Times
"[E]legant and eccentric . . . [Knight's] prose glides like mercury and he does not waste a word. With deft skill, he explores historical theories of perception, time, death, fear." —New York Times Book Review
"[A] thought-provoking and deeply researched book . . . Knight probes the space between coincidence and the ineffable mystery of supernatural possibilities." —NPR Books
"[Knight's] prose delights." —Wall Street Journal
“Stunning… An enveloping, unsettling book, gorgeously written and profound.” —Patrick Radden Keefe, New York Times bestselling author of Say Nothing and Empire of Pain
From a rising star New Yorker staff writer, the incredible and gripping true story of John Barker, a psychiatrist who investigated the power of premonitions—and came to believe he himself was destined for an early death
On the morning of October 21, 1966, Kathleen Middleton, a music teacher in suburban London, awoke choking and gasping, convinced disaster was about to strike. An hour later, a mountain of rubble containing waste from a coal mine collapsed above the village of Aberfan, swamping buildings and killing 144 people, many of them children. Among the doctors and emergency workers who arrived on the scene was John Barker, a psychiatrist from Shelton Hospital, in Shrewsbury. At Aberfan, Barker became convinced there had been supernatural warning signs of the disaster, and decided to establish a “premonitions bureau,” in conjunction with the Evening Standard newspaper, to collect dreams and forebodings from the public, in the hope of preventing future calamities.
Middleton was one of hundreds of seemingly normal people, who would contribute their visions to Barker’s research in the years to come, some of them unnervingly accurate. As Barker’s work plunged him deeper into the occult, his reputation suffered. But in the face of professional humiliation, Barker only became more determined, ultimately realizing with terrible certainty that catastrophe had been prophesied in his own life.
In Sam Knight’s crystalline telling, this astonishing true story comes to encompass the secrets of the world. We all know premonitions are impossible—and yet they come true all the time. Our lives are full of collisions and coincidence: the question is how we perceive these implausible events and therefore make meaning in our lives. The Premonitions Bureau is an enthralling account of madness and wonder, of science and the supernatural. With an unforgettable ending, it is a mysterious journey into the most unsettling reaches of the human mind.
©2022 Sam Knight (P)2022 Penguin AudioListeners also enjoyed...
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Critic reviews
One of The New Yorker’s Best Books of 2022
“Fascinating . . . A reasonable, readable excursion into realms of unreason—and good evidence to pay attention to dreams and hunches.” —Kirkus (starred review)
“The Premonitions Bureau is a remarkable book, telling the story of a remarkable man—John Barker—through a unique blend of history, biography, and the modern science of how the brain's predictions shape our worlds and control our bodies. Occasionally disconcerting, completely compelling and beautifully written—Sam Knight will take you an unforgettable journey into a history of predicting the future.” —Anil Seth, Science
“[A] mesmerizing debut . . . Knight interweaves intriguing episodes of precognition from history and literature. The result is a captivating study of the uncanny.” —Publishers Weekly
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- The True Story of a Serial Killer, the Great London Smog, and the Strangling of a City
- By: Kate Winkler Dawson
- Narrated by: Graeme Malcolm
- Length: 9 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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A real-life thriller in the vein of The Devil in the White City, Kate Winkler Dawson's debut, Death in the Air, is a gripping, historical narrative of a serial killer, an environmental disaster, and an iconic city struggling to regain its footing. In winter 1952, London automobiles and thousands of coal-burning hearths belched particulate matter into the air. But the smog that descended on December fifth of 1952 was different; it was a type that held the city hostage for five long days.
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Interesting
- By irene on 11-27-17
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Here Is Where
- Discovering America's Great Forgotten History
- By: Andrew Carroll
- Narrated by: Andrew Carroll
- Length: 14 hrs and 2 mins
- Unabridged
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The centerpiece of a major national campaign to indentify and preserve forgotten history, Here Is Where is acclaimed historian Andrew Carroll’s fascinating journey of discovery in which he travels to each of America’s 50 states and explores locations where remarkable individuals once lived or where the incredible or momentous occurred.
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A Man who Loves his Country
- By Daryl on 03-12-17
By: Andrew Carroll
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Light and Shadow
- Memoirs of a Spy's Son
- By: Mark Colvin
- Narrated by: Mark Colvin
- Length: 13 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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Mark Colvin is a broadcasting legend. He is the voice of ABC Radio’s leading current affairs program PM; he was a founding broadcaster for the groundbreaking youth station Double J; he initiated The World Today program; and he’s one of the most popular and influential journalists in the twittersphere. Mark has been covering local and global events for more than four decades. He has reported on wars, royal weddings and everything in between. In the midst of all this he discovered that his father was an MI6 spy.
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Probably of most interest to Australian readers
- By Robyn on 04-12-17
By: Mark Colvin
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Charlatan
- America's Most Dangerous Huckster, the Man Who Pursued Him and the Age of Flimflam
- By: Pope Brock
- Narrated by: Johnny Heller
- Length: 8 hrs and 41 mins
- Unabridged
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This is the enormously entertaining story of how a fraudulent surgeon made a fortune by inserting goats' testes into impotent American men. "Doctor" John Brinkley became a world renowned authority on sexual rejuvenation in the 1920s, with famous politicians and even royalty asking for his services.
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nix the narrator
- By susan nenadic on 02-08-09
By: Pope Brock
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And So It Goes
- Kurt Vonnegut: A Life
- By: Charles J. Shields
- Narrated by: Fred Berman
- Length: 17 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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New York Times best-selling author and biographer Charles J. Shields crafts this fascinating portrait of literary icon Kurt Vonnegut. The first authorized biography of the influential American writer, And So It Goes examines Vonnegut’s life, from his childhood to his death in 2007, and explores how the author changed the conversation of American literature.
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Probably only for die hard Vonnegut fans
- By Watery M on 12-22-12
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The Girls of Atomic City
- The Untold Story of the Women Who Helped Win World War II
- By: Denise Kiernan
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 12 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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At the height of World War II, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, was home to 75,000 residents, consuming more electricity than New York City. But to most of the world, the town did not exist. Thousands of civilians - many of them young women from small towns across the South - were recruited to this secret city, enticed by solid wages and the promise of war-ending work. Kept very much in the dark, few would ever guess the true nature of the tasks they performed each day in the hulking factories in the middle of the Appalachian Mountains.
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Important story of this secret city
- By CBlox on 11-14-13
By: Denise Kiernan
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Truth Doesn't Have a Side
- My Alarming Discovery About the Danger of Contact Sports
- By: Dr. Bennet Omalu, Mark Tabb, Will Smith - foreword
- Narrated by: Ron Butler
- Length: 10 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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One day in 2002 the 50-year old body of former Pittsburgh Steeler and hall of famer Mike Webster was laid on a cold table in front of pathologist Dr. Bennet Omalu. Webster's body looked to Omalu like the body of a much older man, and the circumstances of his behavior prior to his death were clouded in mystery. But when Omalu cut into Webster's brain, it appeared to be normal. Something didn't add up.
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Truly Enlightening
- By Marie on 01-31-20
By: Dr. Bennet Omalu, and others
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The Last Love Song
- A Biography of Joan Didion
- By: Tracy Daugherty
- Narrated by: Bernadette Dunne
- Length: 26 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Joan Didion lived a life in the public and private eye with her late husband, writer John Gregory Dunne, whom she met while the two were working in New York City, when Didion was at Vogue and Dunne was writing for Time. They became wildly successful writing partners when they moved to Los Angeles and cowrote screenplays and adaptations together. Didion is well known for her literary journalistic style in both fiction and nonfiction.
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Riveted for 1591 miles
- By Kaysi12 on 04-11-16
By: Tracy Daugherty
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109 East Palace
- Robert Oppenheimer and the Secret City of Los Alamos
- By: Jennet Conant
- Narrated by: Anne Twomey
- Length: 5 hrs and 57 mins
- Abridged
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They were told as little as possible. Their orders were to go to Santa Fe, New Mexico, and report for work at a classified Manhattan Project site, a location so covert it was known to them only by the mysterious address: 109 East Palace.
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Great Listen
- By John H. Davis III on 10-22-05
By: Jennet Conant
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Sybil Exposed
- The Extraordinary Story Behind the Famous Multiple Personality Case
- By: Debbie Nathan
- Narrated by: Marguerite Gavin
- Length: 9 hrs and 39 mins
- Unabridged
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Journalist Debbie Nathan reveals the true story behind the famous case of Sybil, the woman with sixteen different personalities.
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No definitive answer, just speculations all around
- By Amy A on 12-30-18
By: Debbie Nathan
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Paradise Falls
- The True Story of an Environmental Catastrophe
- By: Keith O'Brien
- Narrated by: Eileen Stevens
- Length: 13 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Lois Gibbs, Luella Kenny, and other mothers loved their neighborhood on the east side of Niagara Falls. It had an elementary school, a playground, and rows of affordable homes. In the spring of 1977, pungent odors began to seep into these little houses, and it didn’t take long for worried mothers to identify the curious scent. It was the sickly-sweet smell of chemicals.
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Incredible work of everyday people
- By J. C. Edens on 11-20-24
By: Keith O'Brien
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The Trip to Echo Spring
- On Writers and Drinking
- By: Olivia Laing
- Narrated by: Kate Reading
- Length: 10 hrs and 34 mins
- Unabridged
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In The Trip to Echo Spring, Olivia Laing examines the link between creativity and alcohol through the work and lives of six of America's finest writers: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, Tennessee Williams, John Berryman, John Cheever, and Raymond Carver. All six of these men were alcoholics, and the subject of drinking surfaces in some of their finest work, from Cat on a Hot Tin Roof to A Moveable Feast.
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Great Narration!!!!!! Great story about 20 Century make writer who suffer with alcoholism. If you like this topic and want more
- By Pamela Abbey on 04-25-21
By: Olivia Laing
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The Harvard Psychedelic Club
- How Timothy Leary, Ram Dass, Huston Smith, and Andrew Weil Killed the Fifties and Ushered in a New Age for America
- By: Don Lattin
- Narrated by: John Pruden
- Length: 7 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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It is impossible to overstate the cultural significance of the four men described in Don Lattin's The Harvard Psychedelic Club. Huston Smith, tirelessly working to promote cross-cultural religious and spiritual tolerance. Richard Alpert, aka Ram Dass, inspiring generations with his mantra "be here now". Andrew Weil, undisputed leader of the holistic medicine revolution. And, of course, Timothy Leary, the charismatic, rebellious counterculture icon and LSD guru.
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A Fascinating, Engaging Story, Expertly Told
- By Gillian Culff on 12-12-19
By: Don Lattin
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Nagasaki
- Life After Nuclear War
- By: Susan Southard
- Narrated by: Traci Kato-Kiriyama
- Length: 12 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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On August 9, 1945, three days after the atomic bombing of Hiroshima, the United States dropped a second atomic bomb on Nagasaki, a small port city on Japan's southernmost island. An estimated 74,000 people died within the first five months, and another 75,000 were injured. Published on the 70th anniversary of the bombing, Nagasaki takes listeners from the morning of the bombing to the city today, telling the firsthand experiences of five survivors, all of whom were teenagers at the time of the devastation.
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Truly, A Heartrending Horrorshow
- By Gillian on 12-21-17
By: Susan Southard
What listeners say about The Premonitions Bureau
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Frantabulous
- 01-26-23
A poetic & poignant look
This account was thoughtfully curated and stirs the spirit because it looks into a knowingness we hold at half embrace- existence as we know it.
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- James A. Fergus
- 05-17-22
A book about Wales read by an Englishman
Seriously, how can you have a book which revolves around the disaster at Aberfan (a Welsh mining town pronounced “AberVan”), near Pontypridd (a Welsh town pronounced “Ponteepreeth”) read by an Englishman who doesn’t bother to correctly pronounce the Welsh words in the book? It’s lazy and disrespectful to those who died, and EASILY corrected by a decent editor/producer.
It’s an interesting book, but every time the narrator said “Aber-Fan” it just made me thoroughly pissed off.
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3 people found this helpful