Listening to the author’s obsession with 20-year-old poet and artist Everett Ruess, who in 1934 disappeared near Escalante, Utah, is as exhausting and disturbing as the author’s journey to uncover Ruess’s remains. Narrator Arthur Morey portrays Ruess’s youthful voice in readings from the journals and letters he wrote home, most of which fail to describe the “beauty” he sought and instead demand money from his parents to continue his solo adventures in the Wild West. Morey’s artful and honest presentation doesn’t ameliorate Roberts’s overwritten and tedious account, nor his quest, supported in part by The National Geographic Society, which ultimately, and embarrassingly, led to the unearthing of a Navajo grave he thought was Ruess’s burial site.
Pub Date: July 19, 2011
Duration: 12 hrs
DD ISBN: 9780307941381
Publisher: Random House Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
James Michener tells the real stories behind the man and his books. The recording is read with skill and consistency although the reader does little to enhance the robust, larger-than-life incidents related in the book. Due to the first-person narrative format, there is no opportunity for the narrator to change his voice. This makes some chapters monotonous as they go on and on in the typical Michener style. The listener may also become confused because the stories are not told chronologically. This is not a great choice for the audio format, but Michener fans may stick with it to the end.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: 22 hrs
Publisher: Books on Tape
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
In a quest for a sense of inner contentment and self-worth, Gloria Steinem brings the reader on a journey of investigation and discovery. Steinem reads the text herself in a straightforward and friendly, but not intimate, presentation which is so easy to listen to it invites repetition--thus ensuring the painless relearning of the lessons of the book. It's difficult to tell from the reading that this audiobook is abridged; each section can stand alone. Nonetheless, the listener wished the book were unabridged. Steinem left me wanting to learn more.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: 3 hrs
Publisher: Dove Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
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