New Reviews: History

Elisabeth Lagelee captures the author's skepticism toward the historical rise of apothecaries and physicians and the decline of home remedies. After all, the developing medical professionals used the same medicinal plants that housewives did. The author celebrates Elizabeth Blackwell, who gained a rare entry into the male-dominated physic garden, and the other women who got... Read More

Imani Perry contemplates the connection between the color blue and African and African American history and culture. From the traditional practice of dying indigo cloth in West Africa to the blues musical tradition in America, Perry posits Black life has always been entangled with the color blue. She performs her stunning narration in a soft, rhythmic voice, drawing listeners... Read More

Melancholy music opens this production, underscoring the pensive nature of Robertson's extraordinary research on safe communities Black people created to remake their lives. Narrator Dion Graham's smooth baritone carries gravitas and emotion as he presents this overview with examples of settlements developed specifically by and for Black men and women from the Reconstruction... Read More

With a stentorian delivery and an English accent, Alex Wyndham narrates this account of an overlooked aspect of the D-Day invasion. Beginning with the fiasco of the Dieppe Raid in 1942, Wyndham tells the story of how J.B.S. Haldane and Dr. Helen Spurway led a group of scientists to develop an underwater breathing apparatus and a miniature submarine for underwater reconnaissance... Read More

Elliot Fitzpatrick does a good job of narrating this account of the Siege of Leningrad, 1941-44, which has a slight twist to it. This story focuses on how a small group of botanists and their assistants saved the world's largest seed bank from being consumed. The seed bank was collected by Nikolai Vavilov, who was arrested by the secret police before the war and died in custody... Read More

This brief but delightful and highly informed audiobook begins and ends with blue spheres. First, listeners learn that the blue marble that astronauts photographed from space actually had the South Pole on top until NASA flipped the image. It ends with the ever-present iPhone blue dot that locates Apple map users. Narrator Liam Garrigan has a natural storytelling style, and his... Read More

With his friendly, reedy English accent, content creator and social media stalwart Adrian Bliss takes the listener on a wonderful and often laugh-out-loud tour of the back pages of history, told from the perspective of some very odd characters. There's the ferret (or is it an ermine) that posed for one of Leonardo da Vinci's most famous paintings. A giant oak tree that helped... Read More

Listeners who know England's King Henry V primarily through Shakespeare's history plays will be enlightened and only a little disappointed with this authenticated, unromanticized biography of the storied "warrior king." With urbane ease and a gift for telling detail, British popular historian Dan Jones guides listeners through the tangled histories of the Hundred Years War, the... Read More

Brian Nishii, who was born and raised in Tokyo, is the perfect voice to narrate these eyewitness accounts of the bombing of Hiroshima. This volume is the first of a two-volume series on the atomic bombings of August 1945. Drawing on extensive interviews with those who survived, called "hibakusha" in Japanese, author Sheftall gives great detail on the day-to-day lives of the... Read More

When you think of horses, do you just think of the animal--or do you also consider the impact they've had on the entire world? Narrator Sean Patrick Hopkins delivers a detailed history of horses themselves and their usefulness to humans, particularly how they're sometimes viewed as machines of progress. After an informative introduction, Hopkins dives into the challenges horses... Read More

Janina Edwards's warm voice and calm delivery welcome listeners into this history of the rivalry and struggle that brought about legal birth control in America. Beginning in the 1910s, Margaret Sanger and Mary Ware Dennett waged individual battles for women's reproductive autonomy. Over the years, Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood, and Dennett, author of the educational... Read More

The author, who is from Ukraine, is open about the fact that he's not presenting an unbiased history. Narrator Phillipe Bosher delivers Finkel's impassioned and erudite examination of the nation and its relations with Russia from the time of Kievan Rus' to the present day, including the present war. Bosher's intonation is perfect; his pronunciation is clear and quite... Read More

Adam Verner narrates the story of the 1924 attempt to fly around the world, which brought together American, British, French, Italian, and South American pilots. The Americans started in California and headed west--the others, east. Their goal: to circumnavigate the earth by air, hopscotching from landing fields over lakes and rivers, icy glaciers and deserts while battling... Read More

Tanya Talaga, a Canadian journalist of Anishinaabe descent, weaves her own family's history into this heartrending account of her country's shameful treatment of Indigenous peoples. Given the personal nature of this work, it's natural for the author to take on the role of narrator, but it's largely unsuccessful. The writing is frequently passionate and powerful, but its impact... Read More

Channeling the author's trademark enthusiasm, humor, and curiosity, a host of big-name actors and voice talents such as Ryan Reynolds and Golden Voice Robin Miles narrate selections from Nate DiMeo's singular and popular podcast. DiMeo's stock-in-trade includes Plymouth Rock, the nickel candy bar, and a telescope that could see the canals on Mars as he finds the beauty and... Read More

Listening to this history of the 1850s competition to decipher ancient Mesopotamian inscriptions is like listening to a Jules Verne or Conan Doyle adventure yarn. Narrator Matthew Lloyd Davies is a familiar voice in mystery and suspense fiction, and he clearly relishes what is not a musty story of scholarly reflection, but a cliff-hanger full of surprises and unexpected twists.... Read More

Jenny Funnell's authoritative performance perfectly suits this lengthy, well-researched history. Her resolute cadence and crisp tone enable listeners to engage with the many stories of women who worked, loved, and served alongside men of the ancient Mediterranean world. Author Daisy Dunn provides Funnell with details of empire builders ranging from the Minoans to the citizens... Read More

The subject here may seem too vast and esoteric for one audiobook: the influence of classical Greek culture on the last three centuries of Western civilization. But the narrative proves so rich and enriching, and the voice of narrator Justin Avoth so fluent and adept, that this unique history soon takes hold of the listener. Arranged chronologically, with each chapter focused... Read More

Vidish Athavale narrates a lengthy, largely dry examination of how the flow of information has evolved and influenced human existence and evolution. Athavale employs an appealing British-by-way-of-India inflection, rhythm, and tonality, dramatically improving the listening experience. NEXUS, which means connection, trends toward being a niche work for those who are interested... Read More

Kudos to the author, publisher, and narrator of this audiobook. Author Ewing delivers her introduction, which sets up the arguments. She then turns the body of the text over to Golden Voice narrator Robin Miles. Miles is a gifted performer whose tone, tempo, and cadence enhance the dark truths of this provocative work on the failure of our educational system. Ewing, who is a... Read More

Will Damron transports listeners to the cold of the Arctic as polar explorers attempt to reach the North Pole by airship instead of by dog and sled. The story includes triumph and failure, as well as big personalities, fraudulent history, and new media communication directly from the airships. Damron expresses the thrill of Roald Amundsen reaching the North Pole in 1926 in his... Read More

Harry Myers dives into the role of narrator for this "History of the London Police Force's Most Infamous Murder Cases." Beginning with the Ratcliffe Highway Murders in 1811, these detailed accounts of the force and a panoply of murders include Jack the Ripper and the Whitechapel Murders. Myers uses a gritty tone and an educated London accent for the narrative and various... Read More

This history of mathematics, a surprisingly accessible listen, is made even more so by Daphne Kouma's upbeat narration. The authors, a math historian and a science journalist, pop the bubble on Eurocentric math history by highlighting overlooked non-Western and female mathematical geniuses. The audiobook moves briskly, thanks to Kouma's friendly tone when delivering... Read More