FREE/BARGAIN - Audiobooks - 2016

[Catlady]

The schedule for SYNC's free summer books has been posted.

[skinmaan]

Originally Posted by Catlady

The schedule for SYNC's free summer books has been posted.

Did it improve since TM posted the list? Looked pretty bleak to me.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by skinmaan

Did it improve since TM posted the list? Looked pretty bleak to me.

Oh, sorry, I didn't realize I was posting old news!

I never heard of most of the books; I usually am unfamiliar with SYNC's YA titles, but this time I don't even know the ones they're calling classics. Oh well.

[GtrsRGr8]

Originally Posted by skinmaan

Did it improve since TM posted the list? Looked pretty bleak to me.

.
I've got to say that the selection seems pretty bleak to me, too (the "Monkey Trial" one looked like it might be okay). But we're not 13+ year-old teens, to whom the program is intended. How would they feel about the selection?

[tubemonkey]

To expand on skinmaan's post, here's a complete listing of Penguin's current free offers:


Penguin Random House Free Offers --> Mar 2016

• FREE -- Monthly --> Bunnicula -- J Howe/ V Garber --> 1.7 hrs/ R-4.2 --> kids mystery
• FREE -- Fitness --> Short Stories -- various/ various --> sci-fi, literary fiction, humor
• FREE -- Crafter --> Killer Heat -- L Fairstein/ B Brown --> 6.0 hrs/ R-4.1 --> legal thriller
• FREE -- Business --> Insanely Simple -- K Segall/ K Segall --> 7.1 hrs/ R-4.3 --> business
• FREE -- Gardener --> Blue Monday -- N French/ B Chalmers --> 11.2 hrs/ R-4.0 --> detective

Note: these free offers are subject to change without warning

Spoiler:

Bunnicula: A Rabbit-Tale of Mystery (Bunnicula 1 of 7) --> starts 22 Mar @ 12pm ET --> This story from the popular and critically acclaimed series has been read by the talented actor, Victor Garber. Now fans who can't get enough of the vampire bunny, Bunnicula, will have something new to add to their collections. Beware the Hare! Is he or isn't he a vampire? Before it's too late, Harold the dog and Chester the cat must find out the truth about the newest pet in the Monroe household, a suspicious looking bunny with unusual habits...and fangs!

Short Stories (7 titles) --> Summer People -- K Link/ Ava Wrestles the Alligator -- K Russell/ Alphin Land -- M Atwood/ To Reach Japan -- A Munro/ Tenth of December -- G Saunders/ Part 1 -- J Lahiri/ No One Goes to Heaven to See Dan Fogelberg -- BJ Novak

Killer Heat (Alexandra Cooper, book 10/17) --> It's August in New York, and the only thing that's hotter than the pavement is Manhattan D.A. Alex Cooper's personal and professional life. Just as she's claiming an especially gratifying victory in a rape case, she gets the call: the body of a young woman has been found in an abandoned building. The brutality of the murder is disturbing enough, but when a second body is found in Brooklyn, beaten and disposed of in the exact same manner, the city's top brass want the killer found fast. Relying on razor sharp instincts, a whip-smart partner, and one big break Alex races to find the killer and keep him from killing again, even if it's at her own peril.

Insanely Simple: The Obsession that Drives Apple's Success --> To Steve Jobs, Simplicity was a religion. It was also a weapon. Simplicity isn’t just a design principle at Apple—it’s a value that permeates every level of the organization. The obsession with Simplicity is what separates Apple from other technology companies. It’s what helped Apple recover from near death in 1997 to become the most valuable company on Earth in 2011. Thanks to Steve Jobs’s uncompromising ways, you can see Simplicity in everything Apple does: the way it’s structured, the way it innovates, and the way it speaks to its customers. It’s by crushing the forces of Complexity that the company remains on its stellar trajectory.

Blue Monday (Frieda Klein, book 1/5) --> The stunning first book in a new series of psychological thrillers introducing an unforgettable London psychotherapist Frieda Klein is a solitary, incisive psychotherapist who spends her sleepless nights walking along the ancient rivers that have been forced underground in modern London. She believes that the world is a messy, uncontrollable place, but what we can control is what is inside our heads. This attitude is reflected in her own life, which is an austere one of refuge, personal integrity, and order. The abduction of five-year-old Matthew Farraday provokes a national outcry and a desperate police hunt. And when his face is splashed over the newspapers, Frieda cannot ignore the coincidence: one of her patients has been having dreams in which he has a hunger for a child. A red-haired child he can describe in perfect detail, a child the spitting image of Matthew. She finds herself in the center of the investigation, serving as the reluctant sidekick of the chief inspector.

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[tubemonkey]

Audible Daily Deal -- exp 24 Mar @ 11:59pm ET


$2.95 -- The Scribe -- Matthew Guinn/ Lloyd James --> 7.3 hrs/ R-4.2

Note: also available as a Whispersync deal for $2.95, if you already own or borrow the Kindle ebook.

Genre: Historical Thriller

A reckoning with the persistence of evil in post-Civil War Atlanta. After leaving Atlanta in disgrace three years before, detective Thomas Canby is called back to the city on the eve of Atlanta's 1881 International Cotton Exposition to partner with Atlanta's first African American police officer, Cyrus Underwood. The case they're assigned is chilling: a serial murderer who seems to be violently targeting Atlanta's wealthiest black entrepreneurs. The killer's method is both strange and unusually gruesome. On each victim's mutilated body is inscribed a letter of the alphabet, beginning with "M." The oligarchy of Atlanta's most prominent white businessmen - the same men who ran Canby out of town, known more openly before Reconstruction as "the Ring" - is anxious to solve the murders before they lose the money they've invested in both the exposition and the city's industrialization, even if resolution comes at the expense of justice. After Canby's arrival the murders become increasingly disturbing and unpredictable, and his interference threatens to send the investigation spinning off in the wrong direction. As the toll of innocent victims rises, Canby must face down enduring racism and his own prejudices to see clearly the source of these bloody crimes. Meanwhile, if he can restore his reputation, he might win back the woman he loves. With scrupulous attention to historical detail, Edgar Award finalist Matthew Guinn draws listeners into a vortex of tense, atmospheric storytelling, confronting the sins and fears of both old South and new.

[skinmaan]

Originally Posted by Catlady

Oh, sorry, I didn't realize I was posting old news!

I never heard of most of the books; I usually am unfamiliar with SYNC's YA titles, but this time I don't even know the ones they're calling classics. Oh well.

No worries, I was just hoping.

Originally Posted by GtrsRGr8

.
I've got to say that the selection seems pretty bleak to me, too (the "Monkey Trial" one looked like it might be okay). But we're not 13+ year-old teens, to whom the program is intended. How would they feel about the selection?

When Sync started out publishers (at least some of them) tried to use it to get YA readers hooked on their latest series. Those offerings, plus the classics, made it a gold mine. Now, it seems everything has to have some political bent to it. Half of the titles are pointed at a political agenda. Annoying.

[tubemonkey]

Nook Daily Find -- exp 24 Mar


$5.95 -- That's That -- Colin Broderick/ Gerard Doyle --> 8.8 hrs/ R-4.4

Note: also available as a Whispersync deal for $3.99, if you already own or borrow the Kindle ebook.

Genre: Personal Memoirs

A brutally honest and deeply affecting memoir about growing up in the countryside of rebel country in Northern Ireland

Colin Broderick was born in 1968 and spent his childhood in Tyrone County in Northern Ireland. It was the beginning of the period of heightened tension and violence known as the Troubles, and Colin’s Catholic family lived in the heart of rebel country. The community was filled with Provisional IRA members, whose lives depended on the silence and complicity of their neighbors. At times, that made for a confusing childhood. We watch as he and his brothers play ball with the neighbor children over a fence for years but are never allowed to play together because it is forbidden. We see him struggle to understand why young men from his community often just disappear. We feel his confusion when he is held at gunpoint at various military check points in the North. But even when Colin does ask his parents about these events, he never receives a clear explanation. Desperate to protect her children, Colin’s mother tries to prevent exposure to or knowledge of the harm that surrounds them. Spoken with stern finality, "That’s that" became the refrain of Colin’s childhood.

The first book to paint a detailed depiction of Northern Ireland’s Troubles, That’s That is presented against a personal backdrop and told in the wry, memorable voice of a man who has finally come to terms with his past.

[tubemonkey]

Whispersync Daily Deals (8 titles) -- exp 24 Mar

• $1.99 -- The Baby Blue Rip-Off -- Max Collins/ Dan Miller --> 4.6 hrs/ R-3.9 --> detective
• $1.99 -- No Cure for Death -- Max Collins/ Dan Miller --> 5.2 hrs/ R-3.7 --> detective
• $1.99 -- Kill Your Darlings -- Max Collins/ Dan Miller --> 5.6 hrs/ R-4.1 --> detective
• $1.99 -- A Shroud for Aquarius -- Max Collins/ Dan Miller --> 5.6 hrs/ R-4.5 --> detective
• $1.99 -- Nice Weekend for Murder -- Max Collins/ Dan Miller --> 5.5 hrs/ R-4.1 --> detective

• $1.99 -- I Am Livia -- Phyllis Smith/ Joyce Bean --> 13.2 hrs/ R-4.1 --> historical fiction
• $1.99 -- Better Off Without Him -- Dee Ernst/ Gillian Vance --> 8.4 hrs/ R-4.2 --> chick lit
• $1.99 -- Lucian Freud -- Phoebe Hoban/ Laural Merlington --> 5.5 hrs/ R-3.9 --> artist bio

Note: the Audible book is available at this price, if you own or borrow the Kindle ebook.
.

[tubemonkey]

Kindle Monthly Deal --> exp 31 Mar

Whispersync: the Audible book is $0.99, if you own or borrow the Kindle ebook ($1.99)


$0.99 -- The Outer Rims -- Clint Morey/ Nick Podehl --> 8.5 hrs/ R-3.9 --> sci-fi thriller

The universe is shrinking as humans spread throughout the stars. But expansion means contact with new worlds and species - and with them, new challenges.

As a young boy, Matthew Wallace experienced this as the child of missionaries on the planet Altair, living a rugged existence on the undeveloped world. Undeveloped, but not uninhabited. For Altair was home to a proud race of warriors - the Ananke.

The same warriors Matthew watched as they murdered his parents.

Now he is the Marshal of the place he swore he’d never return to, and his hatred for the Ananke is only tempered by his desperation to treat his wife’s terrible illness. For located on Altair is a clinic performing medical miracles, curing men and women of terminal diseases that even the most advanced technologies can’t touch. Yet nothing is without its price, and as Matthew learns more about the world where he’s now charged with keeping the peace, he slowly realizes he’s going to have to decide what is more important: the life of his wife…or the lives of an entire species.

A sci-fi thriller that calls to mind the grand masters of the genre, The Outer Rims explores the morality of doing whatever is necessary and the question of whether humanity and sentience are one and the same.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by skinmaan

When Sync started out publishers (at least some of them) tried to use it to get YA readers hooked on their latest series. Those offerings, plus the classics, made it a gold mine. Now, it seems everything has to have some political bent to it. Half of the titles are pointed at a political agenda. Annoying.

Yeah, I noticed that they're being pretty heavy-handed in pushing diversity and YA "problem" books, to the seeming exclusion of all else. That seems fine for current books, but in the past years they've done a better job of finding classic/older titles that explore the same territory in subtler ways.

I know I should be grateful for freebies, and I really am, but it's still a bit of a letdown!

[GtrsRGr8]

Originally Posted by skinmaan

<snip>
Now, it seems everything has to have some political bent to it. Half of the titles are pointed at a political agenda. Annoying.

Yes, I agree. I noticed that for the first time last year. I won't say which one, but I noticed one in this year's selection from just the cursory glance that I did of the selection.

I feel that people who resort to things like this know that their position is weak or, at least unpopular. So they feel that they must ram their ideology down people's throats every chance that they get, especially with the young and impressionable, such as 13+ year-old teenagers.

[GtrsRGr8]

Originally Posted by tubemonkey

To expand on skinmaan's post, here's a complete listing of Penguin's current free offers:
<snip>
Penguin Random House Free Offers -- Mar 2016
<snip>[*]FREE -- Business --> Insanely Simple -- K Segall/ K Segall --> 7.1 hrs/ R-4.3 --> business

Awesome find. Rated 4.2 (168) stars at Amazon for the ebook.

[tubemonkey]

Kindle Monthly Deal --> exp 31 Mar

Whispersync: the Audible book is $3.99, if you own or borrow the Kindle ebook ($2.99)


$3.99 -- Agent Garbo -- Stephan Talty/ Clinton Wade --> 8.9 hrs/ R-4.3 --> WWII history

Agent Garbo - The Brilliant, Eccentric Secret Agent Who Tricked Hitler & Saved D-Day

Before he remade himself as the master spy known as Garbo, Juan Pujol was nothing more than a Barcelona poultry farmer. But as Garbo, he turned in a masterpiece of deception that changed the course of World War II. Posing as the Nazis’ only reliable spy inside England, he created an imaginary million-man army, invented armadas out of thin air, and brought a vast network of fictional subagents to life. The scheme culminated on June 6, 1944, when Garbo convinced the Germans that the Allied forces approaching Normandy were just a feint - the real invasion would come at Calais. Because of his brilliant trickery, the Allies were able to land with much less opposition and eventually push on to Berlin.

As incredible as it sounds, everything in Agent Garbo is true, based on years of archival research and interviews with Pujol’s family. This pulse-pounding thriller set in the shadow world of espionage and deception reveals the shocking reality of spycraft that occurs just below the surface of history.

[GtrsRGr8]

I've scooped the 'monkey!

50 Audiobooks at Downpour for only $5 each. Here's the linkage.