The Samurai's Garden
A Novel
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Narrated by:
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David Shih
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By:
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Gail Tsukiyama
About this listen
The daughter of a Chinese mother and a Japanese father, Gail Tsukiyama uses the Japanese invasion of China during the late 1930s as a somber backdrop for her unusual story about a 20-year-old Chinese painter named Stephen who is sent to his family's summer home in a Japanese coastal village to recover from a bout with tuberculosis. Here he is cared for by Matsu, a reticent housekeeper and a master gardener. Over the course of a remarkable year, Stephen learns Matsu's secret and gains not only physical strength, but also profound spiritual insight. Matsu is a samurai of the soul, a man devoted to doing good and finding beauty in a cruel and arbitrary world, and Stephen is a noble student, learning to appreciate Matsu's generous and nurturing way of life and to love Matsu's soulmate, gentle Sachi, a woman afflicted with leprosy.
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Will Kiehn is seemingly destined for life as a humble farmer in the Midwest when, having felt a call from God, he travels to the vast North China Plain in the early twentieth century. There he is surprised by love and weds a strong and determined fellow missionary, Katherine. They soon find themselves witnesses to the crumbling of a more than two-thousand-year-old dynasty that plunges the country into decades of civil war.
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What We're Here For
- By Annette on 10-14-10
By: Bo Caldwell
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The Magic of Ordinary Days
- A Novel
- By: Ann Howard Creel
- Narrated by: Justine Eyre
- Length: 7 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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Olivia Dunne, a studious minister's daughter who dreams of being an archaeologist, never thought that the drama of World War II would affect her quiet life in Denver. An exhilarating flirtation reshapes her life, though, and she finds herself banished to a rural Colorado outpost, married to a man she hardly knows. Overwhelmed by loneliness, Olivia tentatively tries to establish a new life, finding much-needed friendship and solace in two Japanese American sisters who are living at a nearby internment camp.
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I purchased this audio book not 15 minutes ago...
- By Kim on 09-15-16
By: Ann Howard Creel
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Ember Island
- By: Kimberley Freeman
- Narrated by: Jennifer Vuletic
- Length: 13 hrs and 9 mins
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A compelling tale of two women separated by a century who discover long-buried secrets in an Australian manor house. In 1891, Tilly Kirkland is reeling with shock and guilt after her tempestuous marriage ends in horrific circumstances. Fleeing to the farthest place she knows, Tilly takes a job on Ember Island in Moreton Bay, Australia, where she becomes the governess to the prison superintendent's precocious young daughter, Nell.
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Not her best book
- By Beth on 05-02-18
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Call Me Zelda
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From New York to Paris, Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald reigned as king and queen of the Jazz Age, seeming to float on champagne bubbles above the mundane cares of the world. But to those who truly knew them, the endless parties were only a distraction from their inner turmoil and from a love that united them with a scorching intensity.
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If you want to read about Zelda and Scott, move on
- By Leahmgordon on 11-14-17
By: Erika Robuck
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Lighthouse Bay
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This breathtaking novel travels more than a century between two love stories set in the Australian seaside town of Lighthouse Bay. In 1901, a ship sinks off the coast of Lighthouse Bay in Australia. The only survivor is Isabella Winterbourne - escaping her loveless marriage and the devastating loss of her son - who clutches a priceless gift meant for the Australian Parliament. Suddenly, this gift could be her ticket to a new life, free from the bonds of her husband and his overbearing family.
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Excellent story!
- By Kate B. on 11-30-17
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Archangel
- Samaria, Book 1
- By: Sharon Shinn
- Narrated by: Tamara Marston
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A tale of the distant future by the author of The Shape-Changer's Wife brings listeners to a world in which the fate of all life rests on the voice of an angel.
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An All-TIme Favorite
- By Carol on 02-27-11
By: Sharon Shinn
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Midnight at the Electric
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2065: Adri has been handpicked to live on Mars. But weeks before launch, she discovers the journal of a girl who lived in her house more than a hundred years ago and is immediately drawn into the mystery surrounding her fate. 1934: Amid the fear and uncertainty of the Dust Bowl, Catherine’s family’s situation is growing dire. She must find the courage to sacrifice everything she loves in order to save the one person she loves most.
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Beautiful, Heart-wrenching, and Unbelievably Engaging
- By Brad&Britney on 01-10-18
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Someone Named Eva
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M. Wolf traveled to the Czech Republic, birthplace of her great-grandmother, for further insight into this remarkable story. Someone Named Eva is the devastating tale of a young girl whose identity is threatened by the allconsuming sweep of Nazi aggression. Before she loses everything, Milada is a normal, happy girl. But then come the Nazis, tearing her from her family’s arms and leaving her with little but her grandmother’s lingering words: “Remember who you are.”
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It was good
- By S. R. Jordan on 02-20-24
By: Joan M. Wolff
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All the Lives We Never Lived
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From the Man Booker Prize-nominated author of Sleeping on Jupiter, The Folded Earth, and An Atlas of Impossible Longing, a poignant and sweeping novel set in India during World War II and the present day about a son’s quest to uncover the truth about his mother....
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Beautiful book
- By Sonia S. on 12-13-19
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Green City in the Sun
- By: Barbara Wood
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In 1917 Dr. Grace Treverton arrives in Kenya determined to bring modern medicine to the African natives. Her brother, Sir Valentine Treverton, has his own dream for the British protectorate: to establish an agricultural empire to rival any in England. The aspirations of the wealthy Trevertons collide with those of the Mathenge tribe, an African family that has lived on the land for years. Grace soon finds a deadly rival in Mama Wachera, an African medicine woman who fights to maintain native traditions against the encroaching whites.
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Beautifully written
- By nancy wanty on 12-18-23
By: Barbara Wood
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Minamoto Yoshitsune should not have been a samurai. But his story is legend in this real-life saga. This epic warrior tale may sound like a novel, but this is the true story of the greatest samurai in Japanese history. When Yoshitsune was just a baby, his father went to war with a rival samurai family - and lost. His father was killed, his mother captured, and his surviving half-brother banished. Yoshitsune was sent away to live in a monastery. Skinny, small, and unskilled in the warrior arts, he nevertheless escaped and learned the ways of the samurai.
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Best-selling author Thrity Umrigar won the Nieman Fellowship and earned a finalist spot for the PEN/Beyond Margins award with The Space Between Us. Set in modern-day India, this evocative novel follows upper-middle-class Parsi housewife Sera Dubash and 65-year-old illiterate household worker Bhima as they make their way through life. Though separated by their stations in life, the two women share bonds of womanhood that prove far stronger than the divisions of class or culture.
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A Story that stays with you
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At night, in Huda's fragrant garden, a breeze sweeps in from the desert encircling Baghdad, rustling the leaves of her apricot trees and carrying warning of visitors at her gate. Huda, a secretary at the Australian embassy, lives in fear of the Mukhabarat - the secret police who watch and listen for any scrap of information that can be used against America and its allies. They have ordered her to befriend Ally Wilson, the deputy ambassador's wife. Huda has no wish to be an informant, but fears for her teenage son, who may be forced to join a deadly militia.
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Great Historical Fiction
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What listeners say about The Samurai's Garden
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Karen O.
- 02-25-23
Lovely story of gentle characters.
This gave me a wonderful look at two cultures with only a few very well developed characters that became like friends.
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- Paul Vincent
- 10-15-17
Outstanding Story
First of all I love her writing this book was no exception to others I have read great story and great performance from the reader !
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2 people found this helpful
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- I'm all ears
- 08-13-22
Lovely
Such a wonderful, poignant story! Although haunted by the ominous echoes of a distant war, the events related are quite ordinary, the day-to-day happenings of a small group of characters in a little resort town in rural Japan. And yet there’s something truly compelling about it all. I couldn’t stop listening. The characters completely drew me in. It is a beautifully told tale and, by the end, deeply moving. I loved it.
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- Ray
- 02-19-18
A story of friendship and nature
Meaningful connection. It is available and accessible if we open ourselves to it. A beautiful garden grows when It is properly tended. Thank you for this wonderful story
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3 people found this helpful
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- lindamarie
- 12-08-23
Defines beauty in life
During prewar preparations the book examines coming of age in a boy isolated by illness, He discovers beauty and value of life where these do not appear at first.
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- Peter W. Kalnin
- 02-11-24
A Beautiful Story of a Troubled Time
A Beautiful Story of a Troubled Time
Gail Tsukiyama writes very well, with a fluid way of telling a tale.
David Shih is an excellent narrator.
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- ransom whistler
- 07-09-17
Historical and spiritual fiction, pulls you in...
Leaves the reader with much to think about. Well developed characters, engaging storyline, human character studies in a very readable work of fiction.
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8 people found this helpful
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- mommermom
- 08-29-22
It became be long......
I did enjoy this book. It was different than my usual listen. It had a very calming and peaceful narrative. It was not an exciting book but if you're looking for something soothing and easy this might be a good choice for you. It was interesting to learn about the time period from a different point of view. I liked it but towards the end it became a little tedious. Lots of detail.
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- Annee S.
- 03-21-23
Great story
This was a great story about so many things. All of which, I only knew a fraction about. Generally, it was what we were told on the news.
It becomes so much more when you have real people. I really loved the three main characters.
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- C. Oliver
- 06-09-23
love love love
Normally, I don't like reading however we were given this book as an option for my AP 11th grade english class. It was amazing. This story truly captures everything and I definitely recommend.
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