Showing results by narrator "Liam" in All Categories

Today, astonishing surgical breakthroughs are making limb transplants, face transplants, and a host of other previously undreamed-of operations possible. But getting here has not been a simple story of medical progress. In Blood and Guts, veteran science writer Richard Hollingham weaves a compelling narrative from the key moments in surgical history. We have a ringside seat in the operating theater of University College Hospital in London as world-renowned Victorian surgeon Robert Liston performs a remarkable amputation in 30 seconds - from first cut to final stitch.

Growing up, I was the problem child teachers didn't know what to do with. The troubled teen whose parents wished was never born. The system's made of cracks, and I fell through each and every one, all in a futile effort to protect the family legacy. They tried to fix me. Doctors… therapists… teachers… pastors... And they failed. Epically. Now, eighteen, and fresh out of Hell, I'm thrown into the last place I ever expected. Rehab. Enter Nolan Dresden. Newly divorced. A recovering alcoholic. Almost double my age.

Working undercover at a strip club is not my usual kind of job. If it weren’t a great opportunity to show the Mike Bravo team I can run my own op, I wouldn’t have agreed to it. When my boss asks me to befriend the biggest gossip in the establishment, the person who knows everything, I’m even more reluctant. Because that happens to be one of the dancers. The only dancer to catch my attention in all the wrong ways. I need to be professional or I will never prove I’m leadership material. Only problem is, the guy with the stage name Lemon makes me want to be anything but professional.

At first, I thought it would be an easy payday. A few pew pews for bad people, a couple of suitcases of cash for me. People have done worse for an honest living. The problem is that after a couple of jobs, I’ve never actually managed to unalive someone, and not for lack of trying. Apparently, a basic requirement of a hitman is being a good shot. Despite my constant duck-ups, I’m given another name, and I very nearly follow through. Only after obliterating this guy’s ear and his fervent pleading to spare him, I’ve sent him into hiding and collected the cash anyway.

While I've always known my infatuation with Cash and Ford was meant to remain an unfulfilled dream, I never really lost hope. Hope that the two men, twice my age, would ever see me as more than just a kid. As more than just their best friend's son. I'm not a kid anymore, and at twenty-one, they're about to see that little meek and quiet Ben is old enough for many things. Old enough to finally attract their attention. And frankly, old enough to know better. To know that these stolen touches and lustful trysts behind closed doors could never really amount to more.

Since I was six years old, my world has revolved around two things: Carter Lockwood and hockey. We made a pact in college before we turned pro to always put each other first. To make each other our priority, but being in love with your straight best friend can make that hard, especially when you have to watch them fall in love with someone else. I don't want to break my best friend's heart to save my own, but I need to put some space between us to save our friendship. Only this time, it's not just the defensive zone I'm protecting, but also my heart.

My loser high school friend never deserved him anyway. If I’d had the chance, I would have locked Remy down years ago. Only, when the party leads to a drunken kiss, going on their honeymoon, and sharing their marital bed, I have to say, I’m not entirely sad that their wedding went up in flames.

I've devoted my life to my son, always putting his needs first, and honestly, I wouldn't have it any other way. Becoming a father was the best decision I've ever made, but hell, single parenting is difficult. I'm so tired of holding everything together. I need a partner, someone to share my life with. I miss intimacy and passion. I want someone who will take charge and help me let go of all this control I cling to. But an endless string of bad dates and rejection has me feeling like maybe love will never come for me. Maybe a father is all I'm meant to be in this life.

Work, sleep, and sometimes eat. Rinse and repeat. That’s been my life for the past two years. One struggle after another. Fighting to keep my sister alive. Fighting to maintain the strength to not give up. I had everything under control. I had a routine. Order. Until a certain Mr. Tall-Dark-and-Handsome turned my world on its axis. He’s relentless. No matter how much I shut him down, he keeps showing up.

I'm not saying I've thoroughly enjoyed the three years I've spent in captivity on a pleasure planet, shaking my money-maker for intergalactic patrons… but, I mean, it hasn't been all bad. The jelly donuts were a perk. Granted, I didn't really know what I was signing up for when I agreed to be purchased by the sexy pink shark-man, but things seem to be looking up.

Trapped in nightmares from my past, the only comfort I find is in gifts from the man who killed my mother's killer—presents wrapped in a body bag and delivered to the morgue for me to examine. From the first time I saw his mark, I knew I had to keep my killer safe, had to keep his work a secret for me and me alone. Every body is a love letter, and I'm the only one who can read them.

Returning to my hometown, to normalcy, after all I've been through feels strange, to say the least. Returning to the friends and family who have all moved on with their lives while I'm still trapped with demons of my past haunting me is the worst kind of torment. I'm safe now. Lydia, the woman who stole me when I was just nine years old, is in prison. I'm free. But I don't feel free. I don't even know who I am anymore. The child I was is dead, and the man I've become is lost.

August Mulvaney has always been exceptional. As the genius son of an eccentric billionaire, his off-putting behavior is often blamed on his high IQ. They say there’s a thin line between genius and madness. August is both - a brilliant professor loved by his students and a ruthless, obsessive killer tasked with righting the wrongs of a failing justice system. And he’s just found his latest obsession: Lucas Blackwell.

Callum Griffin is the heir to the Irish mafia. He’s ruthless, arrogant, and he wants to kill me. We got off on the wrong foot when I set a (very small) fire in his house. Our families believe a marriage pact is the only thing that will prevent all-out warfare. I think I might need to murder him while he sleeps. This would all be a lot easier if Callum wasn’t so damned good-looking.

Corwin Sanhover could almost convince himself that the night six years ago didn't happen. But when Nigel St. James is traded to South Carolina, it becomes a lot harder to keep their history in the past. Nigel St. James can't imagine a team he'd like to play for less than South Carolina, and he knows Corwin probably feels the same. But when things between them become friendly, it's clear that they both still want each other now, just as they did back then.

There’s a lot I’ve never told my best friend. The fact that I love him. That I miss him every day he’s gone. That, sometimes, I ache for him with a ferocity that leaves me breathless. Lucky Buchanan tore into my life as a boy, wild and daring, my opposite in every way. He drew me in, stole my heart without trying. He hears me, even though I rarely speak a word. But I always knew this place wouldn’t be enough for my free-spirited friend. I knew he wasn’t mine to keep.

Thara Celehar has lost his ability to speak with the dead. When that title of Witness for the Dead is gone, what defines him? While his title may be gone, his duties are not. Celehar contends with a municipal cemetery with fifty years of secrets, the damage of a revethavar he’s terrified to remember, and a group of miners who are more than willing to trade Celehar’s life for a chance at what they feel they’re owed. Celehar does not have to face these impossible tasks alone.

With incomparable wisdom, skill, and wit, world-renowned economist John Kenneth Galbraith traces the history of the major speculative episodes in our economy over the last three centuries. Exposing the ways in which normally sane people display reckless behavior in pursuit of profit, Galbraith asserts that our "notoriously short" financial memory is what creates the conditions for market collapse. By recognizing these signs and understanding what causes them we can guard against future recessions and have a better hold on our country's (and our own) financial destiny.

Who are we? Nobody really knows. We’re seven powerful heirs to empires, ruling Manhattan from our thrones on Park Avenue. By day, we’re the elite, untouchable, and more connected than you could ever imagine. By night, we revel in the darkness of our secrets, pulling strings that make the city bow to our whims.

They say love makes the world go around. Mason Lowell set mine spinning. One night. Three kisses. And the promise of more when morning came. While the city of London slept, he made good on our promise. Only to cut me with his words as the sun broke. I ran from him—I always ran. But Mason Lowell was different, and he wouldn't let me go without a fight, finding my flaws and embedding himself into them.