Throwback Special
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Narrated by:
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R.C. Bray
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By:
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Chris Bachelder
About this listen
The Throwback Special is the story of 22 ordinary guys who gather each fall to reenact what ESPN has called "the most shocking play in NFL history": the November 1985 play in which Joe Theismann of the Washington Redskins had his leg horribly broken by Lawrence Taylor of the New York Giants on Monday Night Football. (The play was known by the Redskins as "the Throwback Special".) Over the course of a weekend, we follow the men as they choose roles; spend a long night of the soul revealing their secret hopes, fears, and passions as they prepare for the game; and finally enact their strange and yet oh, so American ritual for what may be the last time.
With his trademark "microfine sense of humor and tragic sense of history" (Michael Chabon), Chris Bachelder fills his moving and very funny tale with pitch-perfect observations about manhood, marriage, and middle age.
©2016 Chris Bachelder. Recorded by arrangement with W.W. Norton & Company, Inc. (P)2016 HighBridge, a division of Recorded BooksListeners also enjoyed...
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- By Vira on 04-02-13
By: Juliann Garey
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Idoru
- By: William Gibson
- Narrated by: John McLain
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Colin Laney is here looking for work. He is an intuitive fisher for patterns of information. But Laney knows how to sift for the dangerous bits. Which makes him useful - to certain people. Chia McKenzie is here on a rescue mission. Her idol is the singer Rez, of the band Lo,Rez. When the Seattle chapter of the Lo,Rez fan club decided that he might be in trouble in Tokyo, they sent Chia to check it out. Rei Toei is the idoru - the beautiful, entirely virtual media star adored by all Japan. Rez has declared that he will marry her. This is the rumor that has brought Chia to Tokyo.
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The narrator made me turn this off in 10 seconds
- By Rob on 12-02-18
By: William Gibson
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A Nail Through The Heart
- A Poke Rafferty Thriller
- By: Timothy Hallinan
- Narrated by: Victor Bevine
- Length: 10 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Poke Rafferty was writing offbeat travel guides for the young and terminally bored when Bangkok stole his heart. Now the American expat is assembling a new family with Rose, the former go-go dancer he wants to marry, and Miaow, the tiny, streetwise urchin he wants to adopt. But trouble in the guise of good intentions comes calling just when everything is beginning to work out.
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Ever been to Bangkok?
- By Richard Delman on 12-11-11
By: Timothy Hallinan
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The Yiddish Policemen's Union
- A Novel
- By: Michael Chabon
- Narrated by: Peter Riegert
- Length: 12 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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For 60 years Jewish refugees and their descendants have prospered in the federal district of Sitka, a temporary safe haven created in the wake of the Holocaust and the shocking 1948 collapse of the fledgling state of Israel. The Jews of the Sitka District have created their own little world in the Alaskan panhandle, a vibrant and complex frontier city that moves to the music of Yiddish. But now the district is set to revert to Alaskan control, and their dream is coming to an end.
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Didn't finish...
- By Ann E O'Connor on 10-16-17
By: Michael Chabon
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The Portable Veblen
- By: Elizabeth Mckenzie
- Narrated by: Julia Gibson
- Length: 12 hrs and 43 mins
- Unabridged
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An exuberant, one-of-a-kind novel about love and family, war and nature, new money and old values by a brilliant New Yorker contributor. The Portable Veblen is a dazzlingly original novel that's as big-hearted as it is laugh-out-loud funny. Set in and around Palo Alto amid the culture clash of new money and old (antiestablishment) values, and with the specter of our current wars looming across its words, The Portable Veblen is an unforgettable look at the way we live now.
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Not what it was cracked up to be
- By Linda on 02-03-16
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Revised Fundamentals of Caregiving
- By: Jonathan Evison
- Narrated by: Jeff Woodman
- Length: 9 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
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Benjamin Benjamin has lost virtually everything - his wife, his family, his home, his livelihood. With few options, Ben enrolls in a night class called The Fundamentals of Caregiving taught in the basement of a local church. There Ben is instructed in the art of inserting catheters and avoiding liability and how to keep physical and emotional distance between client and provider. But when Ben is assigned to 19-year-old Trev, he discovers that the endless mnemonics and service plan checklists have done little to prepare him.
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Unlike!
- By Pamela Harvey on 01-02-13
By: Jonathan Evison
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She's Come Undone
- By: Wally Lamb
- Narrated by: Linda Stephens
- Length: 18 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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Meet Dolores Price. She's 13, wise-mouthed but wounded, having bid her childhood goodbye. Beached like a whale in front of her bedroom TV, she spends the next few years nourishing herself with the Mallomars, potato chips, and Pepsi her anxious mother supplies. When she finally rolls into young womanhood at 257 pounds, Dolores is no stronger and life is no kinder. But this time she's determined to rise to the occasion and give herself one more chance before really going belly-up.
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Really disappointing narrator!
- By Jessica Williams on 01-21-12
By: Wally Lamb
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The Flood Girls
- A Novel
- By: Richard Fifield
- Narrated by: Kathleen Early
- Length: 12 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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This snappy, sassy redemption story set in small-town Montana is "a wild and crazy debut novel by a talented young writer" (Jackie Collins), filled with an uproarious and unforgettable cast of characters you won't want to leave behind.
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WOW! Just WOW.
- By chamilton on 07-09-16
By: Richard Fifield
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Our Little Secret
- By: Roz Nay
- Narrated by: Erin Moon
- Length: 6 hrs and 18 mins
- Unabridged
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Angela is being held in a police interrogation room. Her ex's wife has gone missing, and Detective Novak is sure Angela knows something, despite her claim that she's not involved. At Novak's prodding, Angela tells a story going back 10 years, explaining how she met and fell in love with her high school friend HP. But as her past unfolds, she reveals a disconcerting love triangle and a dark, tangled web of betrayals. Is Angela a scorned ex-lover with criminal intent? Or a pawn in someone else's revenge scheme?
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Amazing
- By lisa on 12-31-19
By: Roz Nay
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A Death in Kitchawank, and Other Stories
- By: T. C. Boyle
- Narrated by: T. C. Boyle
- Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Few authors write with such sheer love of story and language as T. C. Boyle, and that is nowhere more evident than in his inventive, wickedly funny, and always entertaining short stories. Here are 14 new tales previously unpublished in book form. By turns mythic and realistic, farcical and tragic, ironic and moving, Boyle's stories have mapped a wide range of human emotions. The stories here reflect his maturing themes.
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Mixed Bag
- By AuntGert on 09-22-20
By: T. C. Boyle
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How Like a God
- By: Brenda W. Clough
- Narrated by: Bronson Pinchot
- Length: 8 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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What would it be like, to get absolute power? Would you wear a cape and fight crime? Rule the planet? Or perhaps you would be like Rob Lewis, and watch your world collapse around you. Does absolute power corrupt absolutely? Rob is going to find out.
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At one point the main character rapes at 13 year old girl
- By Richard Davis on 05-29-21
By: Brenda W. Clough
What listeners say about Throwback Special
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Russ Handwork
- 01-05-23
Wonderful!
Didn't know what to expect. Bachelder tells an amazing story that flows well with humor and emotion.
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- David Andrew Levy
- 07-17-17
Definitely appeals to me as a middle-aged male.
Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?
Very funny in several unexpected ways. Definitely appeals to me as a middle-aged male. I loved how all the men whose heads we got inside were all weak in some way and never told each other certain things about themselves which actually could have brought some of them closer together (e.g., the 3 men who went out to smoke their customary cigarette, even though all 3 had quit, but were embarrassed or ashamed to tell the others).
What other book might you compare Throwback Special to and why?
Not sure. I don't normally listen to sports-themed books and I don't read (or listen to) enough short stories to be familiar with stories where the main characters are all pretty much the same at the end of the story as the beginning. Not sure who to compare the humor to, either. Carl Hiassen, maybe (sans the super-crazy characters).
Which scene was your favorite?
After all the build-up, I really like the depiction of the climactic scene!
Was this a book you wanted to listen to all in one sitting?
Yes, although I couldn't. I did manage to listen to it all over about 2 days.
Any additional comments?
Very funny. Loved the reader and also the writing. Will probably examine other works by both.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Barbara S
- 03-31-23
Very clever!
I needed this audio! What joy, what fun, how silly!!
The premise is that twenty-two middle-aged men annually reenact Joe Theismann’s career ending play, the Throwback Special. For you non-football enthusiasts, it happened in 1985 and Theismann’s leg was severely broken, in fact, audibly broken. The late Frank Gifford commentated the game and advised those with weak stomachs to NOT watch the playback.
What makes this fun is that author Chris Bacheider ‘s clever narrative of ordinary guys getting together once a year and having a “boys weekend”. The weekend ends up being like what I imagine a woman’s weekend. The men discuss their children, their marriages obsessions, and Bacheider has great fun with it. The observations about manhood, middle age, and marriage, from a male perspective is refreshingly astute. The men even share beds! What cracked me up? Passages such as this:
“They were all young sales associates for Prestige Vista Solutions 2 or 3 years out of college. After a day in the conference room the felt like falsely convicted inmates exonerated by DNA evidence. The interior of the sedan was humid with fertility and body spray. The seat belts felt like a form of sexual restraint, a precaution.”
“Robert unsnapped the chinstrap from the helmet, and from his duffle bag he removed a sewing kit, a wicker box with a hinged lid that had originally belonged to his first wife’s aunt…Robert selected a needle from the tomato pincushion”
Narrator R.C. Bray does a fantastic job. This is just short of a 5 hour listen. It’s a freebee with Audible. I chuckled throughout the whole story. It’s silly in a very clever way. I highly recommend the audio for when you need a fun change of pace.
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- elo
- 10-28-16
Not the least bit interested
The narrator was the best part of this book. I am not a football fan. This book is for guys only. The author tried way too hard to be funny. I was bired to oieces. Didn't care about any part of it. Works have put it down had it not been a book group sekection. Boring.....
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