Showing results by narrator "Mark Bowen" in All Categories

Vanina Vanini is not a love story, though love passes through it. Nor is it a political tale, though conspiracies give it shape. In these brief pages, Stendhal observes — without illusion — how pride dresses as passion, and how ideals dissolve in the quiet collisions of character. Nothing is overstated; everything matters.

Looking to learn about how you can use martial arts for self defense or for sport? This bundle has three audiobooks of some of the most popular forms of martial arts: Karate, Ju-Jitsu, and Taekwondo.

A Brother's Betrayal is a poem about a brother failing to show compassion to his sister while she faces a cruel and unjust trial.

Are you looking for a new hobby, a great way to exercise, or perhaps a means of self-defense? Learn the ways behind the art of karate.

After his wife died in a horrific car accident, Oscar Sermons' life went into a tailspin. He's managed to keep things together, but he can't get over his desperation to talk to her just one more time. A chance meeting led him to another, a Gypsy traveler named Marica. Marica, along with her aunt, gives him advice, warning him not to dabble with forces much stronger than himself. However, their warnings fall on deaf ears. He quickly realizes he should’ve listened, his life changing forever.

In this guide, you will find 47 extremely easy ways to make money from the comfort of your own home. Making money is easy, especially when you can make it from your recliner. If you implement all of the 47 different moneymaking cheats, hacks, hints, tips, and tricks featured in this guide, you will be on your way to financial freedom in no time at all. I have spent a countless number of hours researching the best ways to make money from home. Luckily for you, I have included 47 of these ways to make money from home in this guide.

The ultimate guide to learning the Spanish language. This book provides the fundamental skills and advantages to learning the Spanish language. The modalities promoted are realistic and uncomplicated. If you take the time and energy to apply these lessons, you will achieve your goal.

In this collection of well-crafted poems, the listener will find a collection of contemporary new poetry. Variety of style is the main theme in this anthology. Each verse is a gift from the poet to you the listener. The creators of these poems hope you will unwrap each one and discover its meaning. Sometimes the essence of a poem is obvious. However, sometimes you will have to string the words together and ponder before you will be able to find the true message of each poem. Enjoy.

Step into the witty, unsettling, and delightfully ironic world of Saki (H.H. Munro), one of the sharpest voices in Edwardian literature. This classic collection gathers his most memorable and darkly humorous short stories, including The Music on the Hill, The Unrest-Cure, Gabriel-Ernest, and the widely loved The Open Window. Saki's tales are known for their unexpected twists, elegant prose, and subtle satire of British society, often exposing the absurdities behind genteel manners and upper-class conventions.

There are stories that stay quiet, even after you finish them. Roger Malvin's Burial is one of those. It's not about war, though it begins there. It's about what a man carries when no one's watching—what he tells no one, not even himself. Hawthorne doesn't accuse. He simply opens a door and lets us stand in the silence. This story doesn't resolve. It echoes.

There's a moment before the mountains go quiet—when words feel full of meaning, and a stranger's voice almost changes something. Almost. In this still, delicate story, ambition rises gently and vanishes just as softly. The path is steep, the dreams sincere, the end—unspoken, but known.

The Golden Honeymoon is a story about the road, a long marriage, old memories, and the kind of conversation that's been going on for fifty years — and shows no sign of stopping. There's Florida sunshine, checkerboard pride, the quiet company of shared days, an unexpected brush with the past, and more oranges than anyone really asked for. Told in the voice of a man who always has something to say — and a wife who's heard every word — this Ring Lardner classic is funny, plainspoken, and sharper than it first lets on. A story about what's left unsaid when you've already said everything else.

This collection brings together stories and reflections in which Leo Tolstoy turns inward. Stripped of grandeur, these works offer something more intimate: the inner noise of conscience, the weight of faith, the silence before death. A servant's silence, a horse's memory, a dying man's doubt—these are not performances. They are questions, waiting quietly for whoever dares to ask the same. Tolstoy isn't offering answers. He's writing toward something deeper. And the questions haven't aged a day.

Johann Peter Hebel's The Artful Hussar is a short story that showcases the wit and resourcefulness of a clever soldier. The tale follows a cunning hussar who, through his quick thinking and charm, manages to outsmart those around him. Set against the backdrop of military life, the story highlights themes of intelligence, deception, and survival. With Hebel's signature blend of humor and moral insight, The Artful Hussar offers a delightful and thought-provoking glimpse into human nature and ingenuity.

Bulgakov was a Soviet playwright, novelist, and short story writer best known for his humor and penetrating satire. Because of their realism and humor, Bulgakov's works enjoyed great popularity, but their trenchant criticism of Soviet mores was increasingly unacceptable to the authorities. Bulgakov's short stories are a world unto themselves—sharp, witty, and often unsettling. In these pages, the absurdity of Soviet life collides with the supernatural, the grotesque meets the comic, and reality is always just a step away from slipping into nightmare.

Jack Spaulding expected to close a deal—not become an alien breeding experiment. Now he’s back on Earth with a very personal problem: something is growing inside him and feeding on his orgasms. His career’s in jeopardy, his marriage is unraveling, and his body’s become a ticking alien time bomb.

The Heroic Slave, a Heartwarming Narrative of the Adventures of Madison Washington, in Pursuit of Liberty is a short piece of fiction, or novella, written by abolitionist Frederick Douglass, at the time a fugitive slave based in Boston. When the Rochester Ladies' Anti Slavery Society asked Douglass for a short story to go in their collection, Autographs for Freedom, Douglass responded with The Heroic Slave. The novella, published in 1852 by John P. Jewett and Company, was Douglass's first and only published work of fiction (though he did publish several autobiographical narratives).

A glittering evening. The rustle of silk. The gleam of chandeliers and whispered admiration following her every graceful turn. In that moment, she is everything she was born to be—adored, envied, radiant. But the night ends. And reality waits in the shadows. In a world where appearances speak louder than truths, how much is one willing to sacrifice to fit into a vision of elegance? And when the cost of illusion becomes a lifelong sentence, what remains of the dream?

What happens when a woman dares to imagine power in a world that denies her even autonomy? In this sharp, sly, and subversive tale, one of America's most original feminist voices turns the tables on society with cool precision and a dash of irony. Written at a time when women were expected to remain silent and self-sacrificing, this short work pulses with quiet rebellion and razor-edged wit.

1984 is George Orwell's terrifying vision of a totalitarian future in which everything and everyone is slave to a tyrannical regime lead by The Party. Winston Smith works for the Ministry of Truth in London, chief city of Airstrip One. Big Brother stares out from every poster, the Thought Police uncover every act of betrayal. When Winston finds love with Julia, he discovers that life does not have to be dull and deadening, and awakens to new possibilities.