Showing results by narrator "Jim Roberts" in All Categories

W. H. Hudson was born in 1841 in Buenos Aires and seems to have been a sort of permanently displaced person. He moved to London in 1869 and wrote a series of remarkable books, most with a wilderness setting. In 1904, when he was 63, he focused on an Indian legend for Green Mansions, a memorable romance of the jungle for which he is now chiefly remembered. His epitaph reads, "He Loved Birds and Green Places and the Wind on the Heath, and Saw Brightness of the Skirts of God."

William Hazlitt was an English writer remembered for his humanistic essays and literary criticism. He is considered one of the greatest critics and essayists in English and is placed by literary historians in the same company as Samuel Johnson and George Orwell. This essay is considered by most critics to be the best short explanation of the nature and importance of poetry evey written.

In Planet of the Damned, Brion Brandd, the winner of "The Twenties", a kind of planet-wide Olympics of both mind and body, barely has time to savor his victory when he is called away by a previous winner to help save Dis, a planet that seems intent on its own destruction and the destruction of it's neighbor.

Twenty more stories in this popular series by Edith Nesbit, Hans Christian Anderson, Abby Phillips Walker, The Brothers Grimm, L. Frank Baum, Frank Stockton, Henry Beston, Nathaniel Hawthrone, Olive Thorn Miller, Ignas Kunos, Mary E. Wilkins Freeman, and Anna R. Annan.

Robert E. Howard, best known as the creator of Conan the Barbarian, also wrote stories in a diverse range of genres. He was particularly masterful with horror stories. This 1938 spell-binding story is one of his best. In 1983, Stephen King, wrote that he considered Pigeons from Hell to be "one of the finest horror stories of our century".

The tale takes place on one of Jupiter's moons, Ganymede, where a home sick Olaf Johnson shares the legend of Santa Claus with the "Ossies" (local inhabitants) who are employed by the same company he works for. The Ossies' embrace the story whole-heartedly and declare a shut-down in production unless "Sante" pays them a visit. Will Olaf be able to re-create this Earth legend in outer space? Will Olaf keep his job after Commander Pelham (his boss) learns what he has done? Listen and find out!

The Four Million was written in 1906 when roughly four million people lived in New York City. It opens with a reference to Ward McAllister's "assertion that there were only "400" people in New York City who were really worth noticing.

The third volume of this popular series includes 23 classic stories from popular authors such as the Brothers Grimm, Hans Christian Anderson, and L. Frank Baum.

The entire story takesplace in a fabulous world created in the mind of a dreamer, Randolph Carter, and inhabited by weird and awesome creatures. There are cats who fly to the moon, named and unnamable monsters, gigantic flying creatures and a quest to find Kadath, a fortress where the gods live and play. The book is a veritable tour de force of horror and imagination that only the genius of Lovecraft could create.

Eight of Shakespeare's most celebrated plays have been specifically adapted to introduce young listeners to his works. Based on the work of E. Nesbit, these classic retellings capture the drama and flavor of each original play, while simplifying plot and detail.

In this story, World War II veteran Edward Bond, is a fighter pilot recuperating from a plane crash. Suddenly his life takes a strange turn into weirdness. He steps through a portal into a world of magic and swordplay that is terrible but somehow hauntingly familiar. He meets a giant wolf, a red witch, and something called the "need-fire." In this strange Dark World, Bond finds himself opposed to the dread lord Ganelon and his terrible army of werewolves, wizards, and witches.

Years before J.J. Abrams' new Science Fiction TV series Revolution, or Newt Gingrich's prediction of a doomsday power outage, Raymond Jones wrote a spell-binding sci-fi novel with a similar theme. The world suddenly finds that, due to an unknown cause, all machines have stopped working. That means no electricity, no cars, no computers, none of the things the modern world has come to rely on. The story follows the population of a small college town as events unfold. Will scientists, using only primitive equipment be able to find the cause...and a solution? Will people band together and find a way to survive or will chaos ensue?

The midwestern town of Middletown is the "first strike" of a new super bomb. However, instead of destroying the town, the attack rips a hole in the space-time continuum, sending the town and it's inhabitants to a distant Earth, cold and foreboding. The story of their struggle, survival and ultimate success in rekindling the planet and dealing with the people and aliens of the future, is the stuff of great science fiction. As you listen, see if you agree with the many who think this story was the origin of the Star Wars characters Chewbacca and Leia.

F. Scott Fitzgerald's finest work is generally thought to be The Great Gatsby. However, he also wrote many wonderful short stories. This one, very much like "The Curious Case of Benjamin Button," shows Fitzgerald's amazing imagination and creativity. What would it be like, Fitzgerald wondered, to be rich beyond the dreams of avarice? This story is his answer.

The Border Legion is the adventure of a daring frontierswoman and the men she inspires. Joan Randle is a strong, capable woman living with her uncle in the wilds of Idaho. She likes Jim Cleve but is impatient with his laziness. After a quarrel, Jim heads to the lawless Montana border to prove himself, and a remorseful Joan tries to track him and bring him back.

Andrew North was a pen name of Andre Norton, one of the best and most prolific science fiction writers ot the 20th century. She was the first woman to win the Gandalf Grand Master Award from the World Science Fiction Society in 1977. In this story, a young spaceman is delighted to be invited to a fantastic vacation planet but soon finds himself in the middle of a battle where the weapons resemble a powerful form of Voodoo.

Poul Anderson was one of America's premier science-fiction and fantasy writers. This collection shows his incredible versatility, with everthing from a humorous short story to two sci-fi/fantasy novellas. Titles in this collection are: "The Sentitive Man", "Duel on Syrtis", "Witch of the Demon Seas", "The Burning Bridge", "Industrial Revolution", "The Virgin of Valkarion", "Security", "Sentiment, Inc", and "Innocent at Large".

This story branches off into two tracks. The first begins thousands of years ago, when an alien ship from a doomed world, seeking a planet to colonize, crashes on earth. There is only one survivor, and it becomes his mission to find an intelligence on Earth - or in Earth's future - equal to his own. To do this, he puts himself into a suspended animation and makes jumps forward in history, at each stop looking for the most intelligent human of that time.

Jack London gained his first and most lasting fame as the author of tales of the Klondike gold rush. This, his first collection of stories, draws on his experience in the Yukon. The stories tell of gambles won and lost, of endurance and sacrifice, and often turn on the qualities of exceptional women and on the relations between the white adventurers and the native tribes. Stories included are: "The white Silence," "The Son of the Wolf," "The Men of Forty Mile," "In a Far Country," "To the Man on Trail," "The Priestly Perogative," "The Wisdom of the Trail," "The Wife of the King.""An Odyssey of the North."

Lacking gun fights and horses that appear in other Zane Grey novels, this story is nonetheless just as captivating. Young wheat farmer Kurt Dorn is at odds with his father over his plan to leave the farm and enlist in the army to fight in World War One. Wheat crops are needed to feed the troops and the nation. When unscrupulous union organizers with foreign ties appear on the scene, a battle just as dramatic forces Kurt to take action that leads to life-changing decisions.