Crime is intrinsically interesting. From an early age, we’re taught behavioral norms. Hearing of transgressions, we ask, “How’d this happen?... Is it true?... What’s the deeper meaning?” Audiobooks also have a unique ability to engage us. With my reporting background plus a historical novel under my belt, I began researching the real-life case behind Takers Mad, aiming to bring it to life with the intimacy, suspense, and power of an audio drama. Then I was gobsmacked to find fresh evidence in this Gilded Age murder. Now, with Khristine Hvam’s ultra-talented narration, I hope our work entertains and also leads listeners to ponder vital questions—just like the best crime audiobooks.
Madhuri Shekar’s groundbreaking psychological thriller helped show new ways that audiobooks could plunge listeners into a story. I’m sure I wasn’t the only author who took note. Evil Eye follows a mother who immigrated to the U.S. from India as she prepares to accept her daughter’s partner into the family. But she is troubled by an old crime. The tale is told almost entirely through phone calls and voice messages. That meticulously constructed delivery heightens the suspense as we discover how trauma can span oceans and overlap generations.
Evil Eye garnered an Audie Award for Original Work in 2020.
Usha is convinced that the Evil Eye, a curse that brings continuous misfortune, was cast upon her daughter, Pallavi, in the womb. What else could have possibly left her driven, career-oriented daughter edging closer and closer to 30 without a prospective husband? Determined to set Pallavi on the right path, Usha arranges date after date with potential suitors - but after yet another setup fails, it seems her efforts are proving fruitless. But in an unexpected turn of events, Pallavi becomes her own matchmaker when she meets - and…
Greg Donahue uses a trove of archival audio to dive into how David Hardy, a Pulitzer-Prize-nominated reporter who was instrumental in integrating newsrooms, struck up an unlikely friendship with his most mysterious source, David Friedland—a lawyer, fraudster, and government witness whose pastimes include chess and hand-feeding sharks. After faking his own death in the Bahamas to avoid arrest, Friedland also became one of the FBI’s most-wanted fugitives. The dynamism of these two real-life characters kept drawing me in. As did the revealing, decades-old recordings and the author’s impressive framing of history.
A lonely chalet at the summit of a snow-capped peak was the last place you would expect to find David Hardy. As an intrepid political reporter for the Daily News, the New Jersey native spent most of his time cornering officials in the halls and backrooms of the state’s government buildings or poring over the endless handwritten notes that covered his cluttered newsroom desk. In fact, the flight to Switzerland was one of the first times that Hardy had ever been on a plane.
But in March of 1986, a cassette tape landed on Hardy’s desk that changed everything. The…
Adapted from a one-woman performance at the Minetta Lane Theater by the talented stage actor Carey Mulligan, Girls & Boys is a gripping and sometimes painful examination of domestic violence. The writer Dennis Kelly, who is acclaimed for his work in British television and film, creates a strikingly realistic narrator and an unforgettable storyline to examine how relationships can go horribly wrong. It’s a sad story, well-written and with brilliant acting. Kelly and Mulligan left a lasting mark on me.
When they met at an airport, it was love at first sight. But in time, everything collapsed. As an unnamed but unforgettable woman muses on her life—from meet cute to marriage and parenthood—her recollections inexorably build to a devastating truth. In this shattering performance, Carey Mulligan, star of the critically lauded drama An Education, captivates audiences with playwright Dennis Kelly’s harrowing ruminations on family, ambition, gender, and violence. An acclaimed Off-Broadway play, the gut-wrenching world of Girls & Boys now thrives as an Audible Theater production.
After the play, this program includes an interview with Tony-winning playwright Dennis Kelly, who…
We Are the Water People is an eerie tale about how a community – human and supernatural – tries to process an unspeakable calamity on the shores of Lake Victoria. The telling is as deep and mysterious as the murky waters on which the story is set. I quickly became immersed in the poetry of the language and the moody atmosphere filling my headphones.
From critically acclaimed author Troy Onyango comes a dark, suspenseful tale of spirits bearing witness to a crime that rocks an island community, based on the Luo legend of the water people.
When fishermen on Nam Lolwe (commonly known as Lake Victoria) return with the body of a young boy found inside the sack, a close-knit island is thrown into mourning, and they all suspect foul play in the death of the child. But who could have committed such a terrible crime, and why? To discover the truth, the islanders must rely on the water spirits beneath the lake’s surface…
Unspooled as an episodic series, Danielle Elliot traces the true story of one woman’s long-running nightmare in Vancouver. Police received hundreds of complaints about a stalker and then repeatedly arrived at shocking scenes. But authorities began to doubt the victim’s claims—until she was found dead. I’ve long admired the hard-boiled writing of Ross Macdonald and Margaret Millar, and I don’t think it is only the Canadian setting that makes Death by Unknown Event remind me of their work, but rather the psychological intrigue. Except the twisting plot of these 12 episodes is no work of fiction—sometimes life just can be that strange.
For seven years, Vancouver nurse Cindy James reported more than 100 separate incidents of harassment, ranging from threatening phone calls to home invasions to ritualistic assaults, including strangulations and stabbings. Canada’s Royal Mounted Police spent over a million dollars investigating her claims and found zero evidence of foul play, leading them to suspect she was making it all up. Then, in 1989, Cindy was found dead, bound and naked, half a mile from where her car was parked in a shopping mall. What happened to Cindy James remains one of the most bizarre and perplexing true crime stories in recent…
A tantalizing drama available exclusively on Audible, Takers Mad guides listeners down a shadowy path to explore a true-crime pulled from New York’s gritty past.As newspapers reported in the 1890s, a woman dubbed "Shakespeare" was found dead in a seedy hotel along Manhattan’s waterfront. The chilling scene recalled for press and police alike Jack the Ripper’s victims in London. After panic quickly spread, the city only sighed relief when detectives abruptly arrested an Algerian immigrant for the crime. But the question lingered—did authorities catch the right man?
Based on the author’s fresh research findings in this infamous real-life case, Takers Mad is a ruminative, atmospheric, and sometimes morbidly funny work of historical and literary suspense.
I’m an OB/GYN, passionate about adventuring beyond what’s expected. This has led me to pivot multiple times in my career, now focusing on writing. I’ve written a play, The Post-Roe Monologues, to elevate women’s stories. I cherish the curiosity that drives outer and inner exploration, and I love memoirs that skillfully weave the two. The books on this list feature extraordinary women who took risks, left comfort and safety, and battled vulnerability to step into the unknown. These authors moved beyond the stories they’d believed about themselves–or that others told about them. They invite you to think about living fuller and bigger lives.
Tap Dancing on Everest, part coming-of-age memoir, part true-survival adventure story, is about a young medical student, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor raised in N.Y.C., who battles self-doubt to serve as the doctor—and only woman—on a remote Everest climb in Tibet.
The team attempts a new route up the East Face without the use of supplemental oxygen, Sherpa support, or chance for rescue. When three climbers disappear during their summit attempt, Zieman reaches the knife edge of her limits and digs deeply to fight for the climbers’ lives and to find her voice.
The plan was outrageous: A small team of four climbers would attempt a new route on the East Face of Mt. Everest, considered the most remote and dangerous side of the mountain, which had only been successfully climbed once before. Unlike the first large team, Mimi Zieman and her team would climb without using supplemental oxygen or porter support. While the unpredictable weather and high altitude of 29,035 feet make climbing Everest perilous in any condition, attempting a new route, with no idea of what obstacles lay ahead, was especially audacious. Team members were expected to push themselves to their…
