The Purple Decades
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Narrated by:
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Edoardo Ballerini
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By:
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Tom Wolfe
About this listen
Before he became a best-selling novelist (The Bonfire of the Vanities), Tom Wolfe was an essayist and keen observer of 1960s and 1970s culture for Esquire and Rolling Stone. (This is the man who coined the phrase "Me Decade", after all.) This ear-candy collection of 20 essays and articles narrated by Edoardo Ballerini was handpicked by Wolfe and includes some of his best-known nonfiction work. These must-listens include profiles of astronaut Chuck Yeager (who also appears in Wolfe’s The Right Stuff) and model-turned-Warhol-superstar Baby Jane Holzer. Part cultural anthropologist and part social observer, Wolfe conquers the worlds of modern art, high fashion, surfing, and stock-car racing with equal aplomb.
©1963, 1964, 1966, 1968, 1970, 1975, 1976, 1981, 1982 Tom Wolfe (P)2019 Audible, Inc.Our favorite moments from The Purple Decades
The Purple Decades safely sticks to what one might call Tom Wolfe’s Greatest Hits: his famous profiles of Baby Jane Holzer and racecar driver Junior Johnson, his explorations of 'radical chic,' 'the Right Stuff,' and 'the Me Decade,' and highlights from his recent sprees on the absurd excesses of art-think.
- The New York Review of Books
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About the Author
Born and raised in Richmond, Virginia, Tom Wolfe is perhaps best known for his work as a trailblazer in the New Journalism movement of the 1960s and as the author of searing best-sellers such as The Bonfire of the Vanities. Originally a reporter, Wolfe worked in news for ten years, writing for publications including The New York Herald Tribune, Esquire, New York Magazine, and The Washington Post. In 1965, Wolfe published his first book, The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby, a collection of essays about the freewheeling 1960s, launching him into the public sphere as a whip-smart and madly inventive cultural critic. Several best-selling nonfiction publications followed, including The Right Stuff, The Pump House Gang, The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test, and Radical Chic & Mau-Mauing the Flak Catchers, works that introduced popular slang—including statusphere,
the right stuff,
The Me Decade,
and good ol’ boy
—into the English lexicon.
Wolfe released his first novel, The Bonfire of the Vanities, in 1987 to much praise; the book remained on The New York Times best-seller list for over a year after its initial publication. Three of his books have been adapted into blockbuster films including The Last American Hero (1973), The Right Stuff (1983), and The Bonfire of the Vanities (1990). Wolfe was also the recipient of several prestigious awards, including the National Book Award, the Washington Irving Medal for Literary Excellence, the National Humanities Medal, and the National Book Foundation’s 2010 Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters. A writer with a keen eye for style and all things sensational, Wolfe was known for not only his attention-grabbing writing but also his eye-catching fashion sense—he wore his trademark white suit for decades, donning his ivory tie and matching fedora no matter the season. He died in 2018 in New York City, leaving behind a legacy of deft, neon prose and razor-sharp satire.
About the Performer
Edoardo Ballerini has narrated over 250 audiobooks and appeared in over 50 films and television series, including The Sopranos and Boardwalk Empire. His 2013 recording of Jess Walter’s Beautiful Ruins was named Audible’s Audiobook of the Year and earned him the Audie Award for Best Solo Narration. He won a second Audie Award for Best Male Narrator, for his reading of Dean Koontz’s Watchers in 2019. He recently completed work on Karl Ove Knausgaard’s My Struggle, which has garnered international acclaim. He lives in New York.
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- Narrated by: Robert Petkoff
- Length: 6 hrs
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
He's a self-described beach bum who won his houseboat in a card game. He's also a knight errant who's wary of credit cards, retirement benefits, political parties, mortgages, and television. He only works when his cash runs out, and his rule is simple: he'll help you find whatever was taken from you, as long as he can keep half.
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Before the A-Team, there was Travis McGee
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 11-12-16
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Love and Other Ways of Dying
- Essays
- By: Michael Paterniti
- Narrated by: Richard Poe
- Length: 14 hrs and 20 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
In the 17 wide-ranging essays collected for the first time in Love and Other Ways of Dying, he brings his full literary powers to bear, pondering happiness and grief, memory and the redemptive power of human connection. In the remote Ukranian countryside, Paterniti picks apples (and faces mortality) with a real-life giant; in Nanjing, China, he confronts a distraught jumper on a suicide bridge.
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Incredibly intimate voice for humanity
- By Ed Hodges on 01-02-16
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Nine Lives
- Mystery, Magic, Death, and Life in New Orleans
- By: Dan Baum
- Narrated by: Jonathan Yen
- Length: 14 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Nines Lives is a multivoiced biography of a dazzling, surreal, and imperiled city, told through the lives of nine unforgettable characters and bracketed by two epic storms: Hurricane Betsy, which transformed New Orleans in the 1960s, and Hurricane Katrina, which nearly destroyed it. Dan Baum brings this kaleidoscopic portrait to life, showing us what was lost in the storm and what remains to be saved.
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Do not miss if you're interested in New Orleans
- By Kelly on 03-22-18
By: Dan Baum
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Strong Motion
- By: Jonathan Franzen
- Narrated by: Scott Aiello
- Length: 20 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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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.
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Compelling Story, Ridiculous Narrator
- By DianeReads on 02-28-16
By: Jonathan Franzen
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Player Piano
- By: Kurt Vonnegut
- Narrated by: Christian Rummel
- Length: 11 hrs and 31 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Kurt Vonnegut's first novel spins the chilling tale of engineer Paul Proteus, who must find a way to live in a world dominated by a supercomputer and run completely by machines. Paul's rebellion is vintage Vonnegut – wildly funny, deadly serious, and terrifyingly close to reality.
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A Genuine 5-Stars
- By R.A. on 06-07-19
By: Kurt Vonnegut
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On the Road: The Original Scroll
- By: Jack Kerouac
- Narrated by: John Ventimiglia
- Length: 12 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Though Jack Kerouac began thinking about the novel that was to become On the Road as early as 1947, it was not until three weeks in April 1951, in an apartment on West 20th Street in Manhattan, that he wrote the first full draft that was satisfactory to him.
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A Classic Brought to Life
- By Sil A. on 11-25-16
By: Jack Kerouac
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Netherland
- By: Joseph O'Neill
- Narrated by: Jefferson Mays
- Length: 8 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Alone and un-tethered, feeling lost in the country he had come to regard as home, Hans stumbles upon the vibrant New York subculture of cricket, where he revisits his lost childhood and, thanks to a friendship with a charismatic and charming Trinidadian named Chuck Ramkissoon, begins to reconnect with his life and his adopted country. Ramkissoon, a Gatsby-like figure who is part idealist and part operator, introduces Hans to an "other" New York populated by immigrants and strivers of every race and nationality.
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Get Your Post-Colonial Gatsby ON!
- By Darwin8u on 04-13-12
By: Joseph O'Neill
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The Invaders Plan
- Mission Earth, Volume 1
- By: L. Ron Hubbard
- Narrated by: Full Cast
- Length: 3 hrs and 8 mins
- Abridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
They are the Voltarians of Voltar - an empire 110 planets strong. They are already among us. And the invasion is about to begin...in a hundred years or so. Or is it? The truth is far more sinister. Undercover, underground, and out of sight, the invaders plan what may in fact be a massive diversion. In the darkest recesses of Voltar’s Coordinated Information Apparatus (otherwise known as the CIA), a tyrant of terror sets out to exploit the invasion in order to seize power. All that stands in his way is a planet that doesn’t exist.
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overly abridged
- By Pielle Szabo on 01-10-17
By: L. Ron Hubbard
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Koko
- Blue Rose Trilogy, Book 1
- By: Peter Straub
- Narrated by: Patrick Lawlor
- Length: 22 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
KOKO. Only four men knew what it meant. Now they must stop it. They are Vietnam vets — a doctor, a lawyer, a working stiff, and a writer. Very different from each other, they are nonetheless linked by a shared history and a single shattering secret. Now, they have been reunited and are about to embark on a quest that will take them from Washington, D.C., to the graveyards and fleshpots of the Far East to the human jungle of New York.
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7 hours in and I am done
- By bionichands on 01-26-12
By: Peter Straub
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Welcome to the Monkey House
- By: Kurt Vonnegut
- Narrated by: David Strathairn, Maria Tucci, Bill Irwin, and others
- Length: 11 hrs and 24 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Welcome to the Monkey House is a collection of Kurt Vonnegut's shorter works. Originally printed in publications as diverse as The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction and The Atlantic Monthly, what these superb stories share is Vonnegut's audacious sense of humor and extraordinary range of creative vision.
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Classic Vonnegut
- By Michael Carrato on 08-17-06
By: Kurt Vonnegut
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Acid West
- Essays
- By: Joshua Wheeler
- Narrated by: Andrew Eiden
- Length: 12 hrs and 40 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Early on July 16, 1945, Joshua Wheeler's great grandfather awoke to a flash, and then a long rumble: the world's first atomic blast filled the horizon north of his ranch in Alamogordo, New Mexico. Out on the range, the cattle had been bleached white by the fallout. Acid West, Wheeler's stunning debut collection of essays, is full of these mutated cows: vestiges of the Old West that have been transformed, suddenly and irrevocably, by innovation. Traversing the New Mexico landscape, Wheeler excavates and reexamines these oddities.
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In The Year of our Lord 2018
- By Ruffkutt on 05-05-18
By: Joshua Wheeler
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Bullet in the Brain
- By: Tobias Wolff
- Narrated by: Anthony Heald
- Length: 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Anders is an angry, cynical man. A book critic known for his scathing reviews, he finds any excuse to dismiss, belittle, or insult. This afternoon is no more agitating than the next. Angers finds himself in a long line at the bank, waiting to reach a teller. Even after two men - wearing masks and carrying guns - take control of the building, Anders is unfazed. It's this behavior that lands him with a pistol against his stomach and a man screamingin his face. And when the bank robber, indignant over Anders' behavior, shoots the book critic in the head, his mind floats through the memories of his life, settling on one particular event....
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The Perfect Example
- By Sarah on 08-01-17
By: Tobias Wolff
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This is Not a Drill
- Just Another Glorious Day in the Oilfield
- By: Paul Carter
- Narrated by: Paul Carter
- Length: 4 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Picking up right where he left off, Paul Carter pulls out more tall tales of a mad, bad and dangerous life in the international oil trade. Starting with action and mayhem galore This Is Not A Drill sets an unrelenting pace that just doesn't let up, as Paul almost drowns when the Russian rig he's working on begins to capsize; is reunited with his Dad - another adrenaline junkie; gets married; hangs out with his rig pig buddies in exotic locations; and spends a couple of interesting weeks in Afghanistan.
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I want to party with this guy!
- By colleen on 05-06-14
By: Paul Carter
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Humboldt's Gift
- By: Saul Bellow
- Narrated by: Christopher Hurt
- Length: 18 hrs and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
For years, they were the best of friends: the grand, erratic Humboldt and the ambitious young Charlie. But now Humboldt has died a failure, and Charlie's success-ridden life has taken various turns for the worse. Then Humboldt acts from the grave to change Charlie's life: he has left Charlie something in his will.
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Great Book, Great Reader
- By Scott on 05-10-08
By: Saul Bellow
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What listeners say about The Purple Decades
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- John C. Simmons
- 11-03-24
Spite in short-story form
Slice-in-time recounting of past decades by a mean-spirited little man who, apparently, hated everyone.
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