Welcome to Hard Times
A Novel
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Narrated by:
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John Rubinstein
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By:
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E. L. Doctorow
About this listen
Here is E. L. Doctorow’s debut novel, a searing allegory of frontier life that sets the stage for his subsequent classics.
Hard Times is the name of a town in the barren hills of the Dakota Territory. To this town there comes one day one of the reckless sociopaths who wander the West to kill and rape and pillage. By the time he is through and has ridden off, Hard Times is a smoking ruin. The de facto mayor, Blue, takes in two survivors of the carnage - a boy, Jimmy, and a prostitute, Molly, who has suffered unspeakably - and makes them his provisional family. Blue begins to rebuild Hard Times, welcoming new settlers, while Molly waits with vengeance in her heart for the return of the outlaw.
Here is E. L. Doctorow's debut novel, a searing allegory of frontier life that sets the stage for his subsequent classics.
Praise for Welcome to Hard Times:
“Terse and powerful.” (Newsweek)
“A taut, bloodthirsty read.” (The Times Literary Supplement)
“A superb piece of fiction.” (The New Republic)
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- By: Audrey Couloumbis
- Narrated by: Lee Adams
- Length: 8 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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Eleven-year-old Sallie March is a whip-smart tomboy and voracious reader of Western adventure novels. When she and her sister, Maude, are orphaned for the second time, they decide to escape their new self-serving guardians for the wilds of the frontier and an adventure the likes of which Sallie has only read about. This time, however, the wanted woman isn't a villain out of a dime novel: it's Sallie's very own sister!
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A fun book to listen to.
- By Jean on 09-04-13
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Demon's Pass
- By: Robert Vaughn, Ralph Compton
- Narrated by: Jack Garrett
- Length: 8 hrs and 3 mins
- Unabridged
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Parker Stanley's family had a dream: to start a new life in the Far West. But en route, a Cheyenne band slaughters his parents and abducts his sister. Then cowboy Clay Springer rides to the rescue - and comes up with an idea. He's got a team ready to deliver goods to the Mormons in Utah, but he's short on funds for supplies. He knows that Parker managed to hold on to his family's savings, so he suggests a 50-50 partnership. With a three-wagon, seven-man team, Parker and Clay will traverse the barren land, but out in the wilderness, Parker's sister needs saving - and he has vowed to find her.
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DEMONS PASS
- By Danny Harr on 10-15-24
By: Robert Vaughn, and others
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High Country Bride
- By: Linda Lael Miller
- Narrated by: Jack Garrett
- Length: 13 hrs and 17 mins
- Unabridged
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One ranch. Three sons. Only one will inherit...and on one condition. Tired of waiting for his sons to settle down, Arizona-territory rancher Angus McKettrick announces a competition: the first son to marry and produce a grandchild will inherit Triple M ranch. Now, three distinctly different, equally determined cowboys are searching high and low for brides.
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good book but not what was in the summary:
- By Zandra Zavalza on 01-30-16
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Cataloochee
- By: Wayne Caldwell
- Narrated by: Scott Sowers
- Length: 12 hrs and 19 mins
- Unabridged
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Debut novelist Wayne Caldwell's Cataloochee -a rich, vivid, arresting work beginning at the dawn of Reconstruction - sprawls across the succeeding generations like the vast green mountains of its rural North Carolina setting. Best-selling author Charles Frazier calls it "a brilliant portrait of a community and a way of life long gone, a lost America." This enthralling saga evokes the full color spectrum of mountain life, from lights to darks and every shade in between.
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Love It!
- By Cynthia J. Hakansson on 02-27-09
By: Wayne Caldwell
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Deadwood Gulch
- By: Ralph Compton
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 8 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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Deadwood Gulch stars bounty hunter Cas Everett, lightning fast on the draw and deadly as a nest of rattlers. When Cas returns home and finds his ma, pa, and siblings planted in fresh graves, he vows to call down the thunder on all those responsible.
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Good western
- By Richard on 01-02-08
By: Ralph Compton
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Vengeance Road
- By: Erin Bowman
- Narrated by: Amy Rubinate
- Length: 7 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
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When Kate Thompson's father is killed by the notorious Rose Riders for a mysterious journal that reveals the secret location of a gold mine, the 18-year-old disguises herself as a boy and takes to the gritty plains looking for answers and justice. What she finds are devious strangers, dust storms, and a pair of brothers who refuse to quit riding in her shadow. But as Kate gets closer to the secrets about her family, she gets closer to the truth about herself and must decide if there's room for love in a heart so full of hate.
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Hunting for a gold mine
- By RueRue on 06-28-16
By: Erin Bowman
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Mr. Shivers
- By: Robert Jackson Bennett
- Narrated by: T. Ryder Smith
- Length: 9 hrs and 49 mins
- Unabridged
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Robert Jackson Bennett makes a stunning debut with this deliciously dark tale sure to hold readers in its menacing thrall. The grinding poverty brought on by the Great Depression is nowhere more apparent than in the untold thousands looking for work along America’s railroad system. But one man haunting the rail camps has been moved by an entirely different brand of desperation: revenge.
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From the Cormac McCarthy Playbook
- By J. Cons on 08-09-10
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Hard Country
- A Novel
- By: Michael McGarrity
- Narrated by: George Guidall
- Length: 15 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
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National best-selling author and New Mexico native Michael McGarrity takes listeners to the wild territory of the late 19th-century American Southwest for this epic tale. After the deaths of his wife and brother, John Kerney gives up his West Texas ranch and heads south in search of a new home. Soon Kerney is offered work trailing cattle to the New Mexico Territory - a job that will forever change his life.
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Hard Country lives up to it's title.
- By mar on 12-14-12
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Devils Unto Dust
- By: Emma Berquist
- Narrated by: Devon Sorvari
- Length: 9 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
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Ten years ago, a horrifying disease began spreading across the West Texas desert. Infected people - "shakes" - attacked the living and created havoc and destruction. No one has ever survived the infection. Daisy Wilcox, known as Willie, has been protecting her siblings within the relatively safe walls of Glory, Texas. But when Willie's good-for-nothing father steals a fortune from one of the most dangerous shake-hunters in town, she finds herself on the hook for his debt. With two hunters, including the gruff and handsome Ben, to accompany her, she sets out across the desert in search of her father.
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Not What I Expected
- By L on 11-16-22
By: Emma Berquist
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Beneath A Dakota Cross
- Fortunes of the Black Hills, Book 1
- By: Stephen Bly
- Narrated by: Jerry Sciarrio
- Length: 7 hrs and 8 mins
- Unabridged
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When locals threaten the lives and property of his family. Brazos abandons his Texas homestead for a new ranch in the West he has seen in a dream. It's a war against corrupt lawmen, wild outlaws, and bitter winter weather as Brazos wrestles with his newfound hunger for gold and the burning desire to be reunited with his family. He must test himself against the untamed frontier, confront the greedy miners who try his Christian convictions, and find the new home God showed him Beneath a Dakota Cross.
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Family Friendly Western . . . Great Listen
- By Debbie on 01-01-17
By: Stephen Bly
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It's Your Misfortune and None of My Own
- Code of the West #1
- By: Stephen Bly
- Narrated by: Jerry Sciarrio
- Length: 5 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Pepper Paige is tired of her life as a dance-hall girl, and tired of fearing Jordan Beckett, a violent patron who has turned his attentions on her. When a stagecoach wrecks and an injured woman dies in her room, Pepper assumes her identity and leaves town.
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A western with a twist
- By Jean on 03-19-14
By: Stephen Bly
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What listeners say about Welcome to Hard Times
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Jean
- 08-11-15
A lesson in moral and civic responsiblity
This is Doctorow’s first book written in 1960. I understand a movie was made from the book staring Henry Fonda. The book’s genre is classified as a serious western.
“Welcome to Hard Times” is about average people who fail to organize and stand as one against evil and never recover from the devastating results of their failure to act. The story also has many subplots for a book that is only 224 pages or 6 hours audio.
Doctorow has the traditional characters of a typical western, a bullying evil villain, the noble prostitute and the unwilling hero. But the author provides the reader with a big twist in that the hero fails to act. I was reminded of one of my favorite movies “High Noon” but in Doctorow’s story there is no Gary Cooper or John Wayne to do the job.
The book provides an important lesson. The book is well written and moves at a fast pace. It is easy to read for a story with such an important topic. John Rubinstein narrated the story.
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8 people found this helpful
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- Edgar
- 04-25-18
A very short review
This is a classic which I read as a young academic when the book was first published. It's been interesting to compare my young assessment with my more sharply-developed perceptions. Clearly the story, together with its structure and (especially) the dialogue, stands up remarkably well and is an entertaining and provocative read. I also wanted to note the outstanding narration, putting it into the top five narrations for my (so far) 1300 books.
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7 people found this helpful
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- Frank Donnelly
- 05-06-19
An Excellent But Dark Debut Novel, Well Read
This is a debut novel by E. L. Doctorow. It is western, but a dark "Noir" type western. I thought it was excellent.
The narration by John Rubinstein was particularly good. I read the book n Kindle while simultaneously listening. The narration definitely added to the reading experience for me. Thank You...
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2 people found this helpful
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- Rick
- 11-16-16
Grit on the Great Plains
E.L. Doctorow’s premiere novel in 1960 gives a tantalizing introduction to the diverse, powerful historical fiction of the brilliant career that followed. It is narrated by a man named Blue, the informal mayor of Hard Times—a desolate dot of a settlement on the bleak plains of Dakota territory.
Right from the start, the town is singlehandedly destroyed overnight by a “bad man” who brings a brutal penchant for murder, rape and arson to his solitary task of burning the whole settlement to the ground. His dark shadow hangs over the rest of the story, which drives people together to rebuild Hard Times, fueled by the pocket money of the miners who work the gold mines nearby and seek rowdy mayhem on Saturday nights.
Do not look for an uplifting story here. Hard Times is a gritty place, without a tree for hundreds of miles, populated by a gallery of flawed misfits. The town is doomed, like so many forgotten settlements of its time, tied to the fortunes of the mines, or a road, or the whims of the railroad bosses. Blue believes it can be resurrected, and he is either a heroic optimist or a pitiful fool. At each sign of hope he leads a new attempt and is defeated, musing at the end, “Why does there have to be promise before destruction?”
In this slogging struggle between good and evil, it seems that evil can’t be beaten by any normal mortal means. If you shoot the bad man, the evil remains.
It’s a beautifully written book, but the real tour de force of this production is the narrator, John Rubinstein. His voicing of Blue is a rich western drawl, but he also plays a range of characters convincingly, including the Russian saloonkeeper, a boy of twelve, an immigrant Swede, and a woman with an Irish brogue. It’s a gripping story, well told, and time well spent.
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7 people found this helpful