Author: Richard P. Feynman
Narrator: Raymond Todd
Unabridged Nonfiction
Audio Length: 12 hours

With his characteristic eyebrow-raising behavior, Richard P. Feynman once provoked the wife of a Princeton dean to remark, "Surely you're joking, Mr. Feynman!" But the many scientific and personal achievements of this Nobel Prize-winning physicist are no laughing matter. In addition to solving the mystery of liquid helium, Feynman has been commissioned to paint a naked female toreador and asked to crack the uncrackable safes guarding the atomic bomb's most critical secrets. He has traded ideas with Einstein and Bohr, discussed gambling odds with Nick the Greek, and accompanied a ballet on the bongo drums. Here, woven with his scintillating views on modern science, Feynman relates the defining moments of his accomplished life.

©1985 by Richard P. Feynman; (P)1997 by Blackstone Audiobooks

Author: James Patterson
Narrator: Hope Davis and Stephen Lang
Unabridged Fiction
Audio Length: 7 hours and 35 min.

Six extraordinary children are trying to lead normal lives in the Rocky Mountain countryside. They live in different homes, with different families, but there is something powerful that connects them. Something that puts them in terrible danger.

The only time they've ever felt safe was when they were together in the waterfront cabin they call the Lake House. And the only people they've ever trusted are Frannie and Kit, the couple who rescued them from unimaginable evil once before.

When that evil resurfaces, the kids reconnect with Frannie and Kit and set off on an astonishing adventure. They flee to the Lake House, but even that haven may no longer be safe.

Dr. Ethan Kane is chief of surgery at Liberty Hospital, one of the most esteemed hospitals in the nation. It is here that terrible secrets lie, secrets that will change the world for all of us.

©2003 James Patterson; (P)2003 Time Warner AudioBooks. A division of the AOL Time Warner Book Group.

Author: Bob Woodward
Narrator: Boyd Gaines
Abridged Nonfiction
Audio Length: 6 hours and 42 min.

Plan of Attack is the definitive account of how and why President George W. Bush, his war council, and allies launched a preemptive attack to topple Saddam Hussein and occupy Iraq. Bob Woodward's latest landmark account of Washington decision making provides an original, authoritative narrative of behind-the-scenes maneuvering, examining the causes and consequences of the most controversial war since Vietnam.

Based on interviews with 75 key participants and more than three-and-a half hours of exclusive interviews with President Bush, Plan of Attack is part presidential history charting the decisions made during 16 critical months; part military history; and part a harrowing spy story as the CIA dispatches a covert paramilitary team into northern Iraq six months before the start of the war.

What emerges are astonishingly intimate portraits: President Bush in war cabinet meetings and in private conversation; Dick Cheney, the focused and driven vice president; Colin Powell, the conflicted and cautious secretary of state; Donald Rumsfeld, the controlling war technocrat; George Tenet, the activist CIA director; Tommy Franks, the profane and demanding general; Condoleezza Rice, the ever-present referee and national security adviser; Karl Rove, the hands-on political strategist; other key members of the White House staff and congressional leadership; and foreign leaders ranging from British Prime Minister Blair to Russian President Putin.

Plan of Attack provides new details on the intelligence assessments of Iraq's alleged weapons of mass destruction and the planning for the war's aftermath.

©2004 Bob Woodward; (P)2004 Simon & Schuster Inc. AUDIOWORKS is an imprint of Simon & Schuster Audio Division, Simon & Schuster Inc.

Author: Douglas Adams
Narrator: Douglas Adams
Unabridged Fiction
Audio Length: 5 hours 25 mins.

Join confused Earthling Arthur Dent whose day begins with a visit from Wowbagger the Infinitely Prolonged (whose goal is to insult everyone in the universe - alphabetically) and ends with a discovery of the Truth, the Whole Truth and Nothing but the Truth about Life, the Universe, and Everything. Strangely, the Truth turns out to have entirely too much to do with frogs. Arthur's also learning a thing or two, like why it's a mistake to think you can solve any major problem with just potatoes. It's all in the third (but not last!) volume of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy "trilogy."

©1982 by Douglas Adams; Copyright (P)1991 by Dove Audio

Author: Bill Bryson
Narrator: Bill Bryson
Unabridged Nonfiction
Audio Length: 12 hours

Every time Bill Bryson walks out the door memorable travel literature threatens to break out. His previous excursion up, down, and over the Appalachian Trail resulted in the sublime best seller A Walk in the Woods. Now he has traveled around the world and all the way "Down Under" to Australia, the only island that is also a continent and the only continent that is also a country. Australia exists on a vast scale, a shockingly under-discovered country with the friendliest inhabitants, the hottest, driest weather, the most peculiar and lethal wildlife to be found on this planet, and more things that can kill you in extremely malicious ways than anywhere else: sharks, crocodiles, the ten most deadly poisonous snakes on the planet, fluffy yet toxic caterpillars, seashells that actually attack you, and the unbelievable box jellyfish. In a Sunburned Country is a delectably funny, fact-filled and adventurous performance by a writer who combines humor, wonder, and unflagging curiosity. Wherever Bryson goes he finds Australians who are cheerful, extroverted, and unfailingly obliging. They are the beaming products of a land with clean, safe cities, cold beer, and constant sunshine. Australia is an immense and fortunate land, and it has found in Bryson its perfect guide.

©2000 Bill Bryson; (P)2000 Random House, Inc., Bantam Doubleday Dell Audio Publishing, A Division of Random House Inc.

Author: Stephen King
Narrator: Stephen King
Unabridged Fiction
Audio Length: 3 hours

This collection of short stories from the master of modern fiction is available only as an audiobook. In Blood and Smoke, Stephen King takes us inside a world of yearning and paranoia, isolation and addiction. It is the world of the smoker. In this audio-only collection, the now politically incorrect habit plays a key role in the fates of three different men in three unabridged stories of unfiltered suspense. In Lunch at the Gotham Café, Steve Davis is suffering through intense withdrawal - from both nicotine and his wife. His desperation for a cigarette and for his ex are almost too much to bear, but that's nothing compared to the horrors that await him at a trendy Manhattan restaurant. In 1408, Mike Enslin, best selling author of "true" ghost stories, decides to spend the night in New York City's most haunted hotel room. But he must live to write about it without the help of his ex best-friends, his trusty smokes. And in In the Deathroom, a man named Fletcher is held captive in a Central American stronghold. His captors will use any torturous means necessary to extract the information they want from him. His only hope lies with his last request - one last cigarette, please.

©2000 Stephen King, All Rights Reserved; (P)2000 Simon & Schuster Inc., All Rights Reserved, AUDIOWORKS Is an Imprint of Simon & Schuster Audio Division, Simon & Schuster, Inc.

Nonfiction
Audio Length: 53 min.

Since this country's last public execution in 1936, all U.S. executions have been carried out solely in front of state-selected witnesses. Courts have consistently ruled that, although the media do have a place in witnessing executions, they have no right to record the scene. In 1998, however, audio tapes of 22 Georgia executions - recorded by members of the state's Department of Corrections for their own records - entered the court record when criminal defense lawyer Mike Mears subpoenaed the tapes in a lawsuit challenging the state's use of the electric chair.

The Execution Tapes is an hour-long public radio special hosted by Ray Suarez featuring excerpts of recordings made in Georgia's death house during electrocutions. This broadcast marked the first time a national audience was able to hear what takes place during a state-sponsored execution. In addition to audio of the 1984 execution of Ivon Ray Stanley, the program features audio of a botched execution in which the inmate was still alive after being electrocuted for two minutes, requiring that he be electrocuted again.

You will also hear a selection of inmates' final statements, recorded immediately before their execution. Excerpts of the tapes are followed by two roundtable discussions about the implications of the tapes' broadcast. Participants include 60 Minutes co-editor Mike Wallace, First-Amendment lawyer Martin Garbus, former Georgia Attorney General Michael Bowers, professor of psychiatry and psychology Robert Jay Lifton, and Diane Clements, president of the victims' rights organization, Justice for All.

After you have listened to this program, check out The Execution Tapes: A National Discussion, featuring a special report from NPR's On the Media. When you are done, you can step up on the WNYC Soapbox.

Author: Sun Tzu, Adaptation and Introduction by Stefan Rudnicki
Narrator: Ron Silver and B.D. Wong
Abridged Nonfiction
Audio Length: 2 hours and 14 min.

"To win without fighting is best," Sun Tzu said. For the Chinese philosopher/general war was coeval with life. Tzu viewed the world as a network of combat zones where the stakes are high and struggle is the primary mode of being, where no one is to be trusted, and survival depends on nothing less than unconditional victory. Actors Ron Silver and B.D. Wong narrate this 2,500-year-old work of wisdom that continues to guide and inspire people of all cultures, teaching the principles of strategy required in everything from sports to business to affairs of the heart. Augmented by commentaries and anecdotes, this audio edition maintains the spare, near-poetic tone of the original.

Copyright (P)1996 by Dove Audio, Inc.

Author: Richard P. Feynman
Narrator: Dan Cashman
Unabridged Nonfiction
Audio Length: 8 hours and 47 min.

"This marvelous collection of talks, interviews, and essays offers a memorable sample of the wit, brilliance, and irreverence of the most celebrated physicist of our time," says Alan Guth, author of The Inflationary Universe. "The more one reads of Feynman, the more one falls in love with his refreshingly enthusiastic view of the world."

The late Richard P. Feynman won the 1965 Nobel Prize in physics for his many contributions to physics, especially for his work on quantum electrodynamics. One of the most famous and beloved figures of our era, both in physics and in the public arena, he is the author of many popular and scholarly books, including The Meaning of It All and Six Easy Pieces, which was named one of the best 100 nonfiction books of the 20th century by The Modern Library.

"Every one of the short works is a pleasure," says Rocky Kolb, author of Blind Watchers of the Sky. "Feynman is always outrageous, at times courageous, and often movingly eloquent as he ranges from computers to the role of science in society."

Author: The Editors of Penthouse Magazine
Narrator: Alison Valentine, Eliza Foss, and Libby Kimball
Unabridged Fiction
Audio Length: 8 hours and 58 min.

Is it any wonder that the world's top writers of erotic fiction have found a home in the world's number-one magazine of erotic entertainment? Now, from the pages of Penthouse, come 36 torrid tales that give new meaning to the words "bedtime stories." From the lingerie dressing room that's all about stripping down to the babysitter who picks up a little extra something from the lady of the house, from the woman who holds an entire room in thrall with a single stick of peppermint candy to the indecent encounter between strangers on a London double-decker bus, these are stories that will ignite your imagination and put the sizzle back...Between the Sheets.

For Adults Only: Explicit language. Must be 18 years of age to purchase.

Executive Producer: Orli Moscowitz
Producer: Lisa Briscoe
Cover design Julie Metz
Cover photo © Lisa Spindler/Graphistock

© 2001 by General Media Communications, Inc.
(P) 2002 Random House, Inc.