-
Kook
- What Surfing Taught Me About Love, Life, and Catching the Perfect Wave
- Narrated by: Mike Chamberlain
- Length: 10 hrs and 9 mins
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Publisher's summary
With grit, poetry, and humor, Peter Heller, acclaimed author of The Whale Warriors, recounts his remarkable journey of discovery - of surfing, an entirely new challenge; of the ocean's beauty and power; of the strange surf subculture; of love; and, most of all, of how to seek adventure while crafting a meaningful life.
Having resolved to master a big - hollow wave - that is, to go from kook (surfese for beginner) to shredder-in a single year, Heller travels from Southern California down the coast of Mexico in the company of his girlfriend and the eccentric surfers they meet. Exuberant and fearless, Heller explores the technique and science of surfing the secrets of its culture, and the environmental ravages to the stunning coastline he visits.
As Heller plumbs the working of his own heart and finds joy in both love and surfing, he affords listeners vivid insight into this fascinating world, with all of its perils and pleasures, its absurdity and wonder. Exhilarating, entertaining, and moving, Kook is a love story between a man and his surfboard, a man and his girlfriend, a not-so-old man and the sea.
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Every morning Boone Daniels is out with the Dawn Patrol: four men and one woman as single-minded about surfing as he is, or nearly. They have real jobs; Boone works as a P.I. just enough to keep himself in fish tacos and in the water. But Boone is also obsessed with the unsolved case of a young girl named Rain who was abducted while he was with the San Diego police.
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Don Winslow always surprises me
- By Hannah Coale on 09-08-15
By: Don Winslow
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Mannheim Rex
- By: Robert Pobi
- Narrated by: Peter Berkrot
- Length: 14 hrs and 46 mins
- Unabridged
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Performance
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Story
Recently widowered and grieving, Gavin flees New York City for the quiet of the country. His new home on Lake Caldasac has surprisingly few visitors, and the author soon learns why: a suspiciously high number of people have gone missing in the small town. The deaths have all been ruled accidents, but Finn Horn, a handicapped boy obsessed with fishing, knows the truth. There’s a monster in the lake. And it wants to feed.
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Interesting and fun
- By Bob on 01-14-13
By: Robert Pobi
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Fluke
- Or, I Know Why the Winged Whale Sings
- By: Christopher Moore
- Narrated by: Bill Irwin
- Length: 9 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Just why do humpback whales sing? That's the question that has marine behavioral biologist Nate Quinn and his crew poking, charting, recording, and photographing very big, wet, gray marine mammals - until the extraordinary day when a whale lifts its tail into the air to display a cryptic message spelled out in foot-high letters: Bite Me.
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Best way to ruin a good book.
- By colleen on 02-18-08
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Shipwrecked
- By: Mishka Shubaly
- Narrated by: Mishka Shubaly
- Length: 1 hr and 5 mins
- Unabridged
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In the Year of the Shark, a chance encounter between a ne'er-do-well writer and a tropical storm left him marooned on the deserted end of a Caribbean island and charged with the rescue of his four shipmates. There, Mishka Shubaly learned some valuable life lessons - among them that in the absence of whiskey, wine, and water, urine will get the job done.
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Great juxtaposition of two life changing stories
- By Andy on 07-11-16
By: Mishka Shubaly
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A Delirious Summer
- By: Ray Blackston
- Narrated by: Andrew Peterson
- Length: 9 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Story
To Neil Rucker, seven months, one week, and a day is too long to wait in between dates. But life as a Spanish teacher to missionaries in Ecuador affords little opportunity for romance.
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If I had a teen...
- By Connie on 09-27-08
By: Ray Blackston
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Wild Montana Skies
- Montana Rescue, Book 1
- By: Susan May Warren
- Narrated by: Cynthia Farrell
- Length: 12 hrs and 4 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Search-and-rescue pilot Kacey Fairing is home on leave in Mercy Falls, Montana, 12 years after she joined the military to escape the mistakes of her past. With a job waiting for her as the new lead pilot of Peak Rescue in Glacier National Park, Kacey hopes to reconnect with the now-teenage daughter she sees only between deployments. What she doesn't realize is that someone else is also back in town.
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This narrator practically ruined the book
- By Carol on 05-03-18
By: Susan May Warren
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Downriver
- By: Will Hobbs
- Narrated by: Christina Moore
- Length: 5 hrs and 35 mins
- Unabridged
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Fifteen-year-old Jessie is angry with her father for sending her on an outdoor survival program for troubled teens. Confused about her life back home and unsure of herself, she is drawn to the powerful personality of a teammate, the charismatic Troy. At their first opportunity to rebel, she and her six companions "borrow" their instructor's gear and attempt the dangerous Colorado River through the Grand Canyon on their own.
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Amazing book!
- By Emily DeVocht on 02-28-24
By: Will Hobbs
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Track of the Cat
- By: Nevada Barr
- Narrated by: Barbara Rosenblat
- Length: 8 hrs and 27 mins
- Unabridged
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From the vivid opening vista, high in craggy mountains, to the final haunting glimpse of a moonlit canyon, Nevada Barr's first mystery, Track of the Cat, instantly caught the attention of readers and reviewers. Its popularity gained it both an Agatha and an Anthony Award.
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Guadalupe Mountain Mystery
- By Sara on 10-15-15
By: Nevada Barr
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The Deep Blue Good-By
- A Travis McGee Novel, Book 1
- By: John D. MacDonald
- Narrated by: Robert Petkoff
- Length: 6 hrs
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
He's a self-described beach bum who won his houseboat in a card game. He's also a knight errant who's wary of credit cards, retirement benefits, political parties, mortgages, and television. He only works when his cash runs out, and his rule is simple: he'll help you find whatever was taken from you, as long as he can keep half.
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Before the A-Team, there was Travis McGee
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 11-12-16
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Flabbergasted
- A Novel
- By: Ray Blackston
- Narrated by: Andrew Peterson
- Length: 8 hrs and 56 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Churches outnumber bars 20 to 1 in Greenville, South Carolina, so that's where new-in-town stock broker Jay Jarvis sets out to meet women. New in town, young and successful, Jay figures the best way to meet girls is to sit in a pew! What he finds is a beautiful, unusual missionary with a wild throwing arm and a warped sense of humor. She and her wacky assortment of friends turn Jay's perceptions of life upside down, beginning a roller-coaster ride of events.
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Loved it!
- By Tonya on 05-28-04
By: Ray Blackston
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The Beach House
- By: Mary Alice Monroe
- Narrated by: Mary Alice Monroe
- Length: 14 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Caretta Rutledge thought she’d left her Southern roots and troubled family far behind. But an unusual request from her mother – coming just as her own life is spinning out of control – has Cara heading back to the scenic Lowcountry of her childhood summers. Before long, the rhythms of the island open her heart in wonderful ways as she repairs the family beach house, becomes a bona fide “turtle lady” and renews old acquaintances long thought lost.
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Good story, very poor audio quality
- By Dawn on 04-11-16
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The Plover
- By: Brian Doyle
- Narrated by: David Drummond
- Length: 9 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
Declan O Donnell has sailed out of Oregon and deep into the vast, wild ocean, having had just finally enough of other people and their problems. He will go it alone, he will be his own country, he will be beholden to and beloved of no one. No man is an island, my butt, he thinks. I am that very man.... But the galaxy soon presents him with a string of odd, entertaining, and dangerous passengers, who become companions of every sort and stripe. The Plover is the story of their adventures and misadventures in the immense blue country one of their company calls Pacifica.
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Poetry, the sea and finally story
- By WA islander on 09-12-15
By: Brian Doyle
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RIpoff Audio Recording
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Let My People Go Surfing
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In his long-awaited memoir, Yvon Chouinard - legendary climber, businessman, environmentalist, and founder of Patagonia, Inc. - shares the persistence and courage that have gone into being head of one of the most respected and environmentally responsible companies on earth. From his youth as the son of a French Canadian blacksmith to the thrilling, ambitious climbing expeditions that inspired his innovative designs for the sport's equipment.
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Good presentation, though a little preachy
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Welcome to Paradise, Now Go to Hell
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Welcome to Paradise, Now Go to Hell is surfer and former war reporter Chas Smith's wild and unflinching look at the high-stakes world of surfing on Oahu's North Shore - a riveting, often humorous, account of beauty, greed, danger, and crime. For two months every winter, when Pacific storms make landfall, swarms of mainlanders, Brazilians, Australians, and Europeans flock to Oahu's paradisiacal North Shore for surfing's Triple Crown competition. Smith reveals how this influx transforms a sleepy strip of coast into a lawless, violent, drug-addled, and adrenaline-soaked mecca.
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Chas Smith is a jerk, but he writes well
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What listeners say about Kook
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Mark B.
- 01-04-17
Call it Average
As a book, there’s not that much info on surfing, it is not a book of surf tips. It also is not a “road trip” book centered around surfing, like Captain Zero. It also is not at all insightful about relationships (the author travels with his girlfriend/wife). While I really liked the author’s book Dog Stars, which was powerful and not entirely predictable, this book could have been condensed down into a long magazine article. Call it average because it was still interesting, especially for anyone who surfs.
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- Amazon Customer
- 07-08-17
Useful but long winded and hard to believe
found it useful for beginner surfing tips, got a little tired of the dramaticizing...... too much waxing poetic, not enough waxing boards. lots of repetive themes and statements on environmentalism. personally would have preferred a more straightforward account.
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- michael wakeman
- 10-06-17
Great book, makes you want to paddle out
really liked it some passages were a bit too drawn out. sections on the enviroment, wales, japan for example.
but the story on a whole is great.
really wjat you meed whem you camt get out and surf, or are just startimg out.
also good lessons on patience and love, life.
good book.
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- Amazon Customer
- 07-12-22
Hollower than the waves he is looking to surf
As an aspiring middle-aged surfer, I decided to listen to this book with some trepidation. I have not read anything by Peter Heller and was not familiar with the narrator, Mike Chamberlain. My trepidation was justified, and I would only recommend this Audible book with the caveat, "proceed with caution."
With respect to the narrator, I will say only that his nasal, sometimes unpleasant voice doesn't enhance the experience of listening to this book. Alas, de gustibus non est disputandum. On a less querulous note, his rendering of Spanish words and phrases is amateurish, and that beautiful language deserves better.
I chose to listen to this book on account of my interest in the author's experience of learning to surf in the middle of his fifth decade. There are many parts of that story that are enjoyable and enriching. What I did not expect or want from Kook is something that the author provides in unwelcome abundance: a soft-headed, ego-centric telling of his evolving romance with his girlfriend and (later) wife, and a muddled hectoring melange of environmental mumbo jumbo that emerges in the most awkward moments against the backdrop of a story supposedly about surfing.
In this last regard, it is not that the author mistakes the gravity of the situation we face with respect to the health of the world's oceans. Rather, it is that he contributes nothing new on this topic, has an off-putting pietistic style, and mistakes one objective good (e.g., global economic growth of 2%) as being fundamentally in conflict with another (e.g., clean and healthy oceans). His thinking on these topics is lazy; his writing sophomoric; his tone hectoring - all hollower than the waves he is looking to surf.
Proceed with caution,
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- Jimmy P
- 12-14-17
Narrator....
Narrator has kook voice. Midwest accent made story sound ignorant, not a growth learning story
No, save you money
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- AmazonianJ
- 09-30-16
Disappointing
If you'd like to listen to a good book on surfing check out William Finnegan's "barbarian days: a surfing life" because this book is simply not worth your time. Its uninspiring tone and stereotypical oversimplification of the sport of kings was disappointing.
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