Over a half century, Malibu went from an untamed ranch in the middle of nowhere to a paradise seeded with movie stars. Behind its transformation is the love story of Frederick and May Rindge. He was a Harvard-trained confidant of presidents; she grew up on a hardscrabble Midwestern farm; yet their unlikely bond would shape history.

A major audiobook about the future of the world, blending intellectual and natural history and field reporting into a powerful account of the mass extinction unfolding before our eyes. Over the last half a billion years, there have been five mass extinctions, when the diversity of life on Earth suddenly and dramatically contracted. Scientists around the world are currently monitoring the sixth extinction, predicted to be the most devastating extinction event since the asteroid impact that wiped out the dinosaurs.

Alexander von Humboldt (1769-1859) was an intrepid explorer and the most famous scientist of his age. His restless life was packed with adventure and discovery, whether climbing the highest volcanoes in the world or racing through anthrax-infested Siberia. He came up with a radical vision of nature, that it was a complex and interconnected global force and did not exist for man's use alone. Ironically, his ideas have become so accepted and widespread that he has been nearly forgotten.

America's Great Plains once possessed one of the grandest wildlife spectacles of the world, equaled only by such places as the Serengeti, the Masai Mara, or the veld of South Africa. Pronghorn antelope, gray wolves, bison, coyotes, wild horses, and grizzly bears: less than 200 years ago these creatures existed in such abundance that John James Audubon was moved to write "it is impossible to describe or even conceive the vast multitudes of these animals".

In this stunning narrative spanning more than 200 million years, Steve Brusatte, a young American paleontologist who has emerged as one of the foremost stars of the field - discovering 10 new species and leading groundbreaking scientific studies and fieldwork - masterfully tells the complete, surprising, and new history of the dinosaurs, drawing on cutting-edge science to dramatically bring to life their lost world and illuminate their enigmatic origins, spectacular flourishing, astonishing diversity, cataclysmic extinction, and startling living legacy.

In 1839 rumors of extraordinary yet baffling stone ruins buried within the unmapped jungles of Central America reached two of the world's most intrepid travelers. Seized by the reports, American diplomat John Lloyd Stephens and British artist Frederick Catherwood sailed together out of New York Harbor on an expedition into the forbidding rainforests of present-day Honduras, Guatemala, and Mexico. What they found would rewrite the West's understanding of human history.

WASPs finally get their due in this stimulating history by one of the world's leading geneticists. Saxons, Vikings, and Celts is the most illuminating book yet to be written about the genetic history of Britain and Ireland. Through a systematic, ten-year DNA survey of more than 10,000 volunteers, Bryan Sykes has traced the true genetic makeup of British Islanders and their descendants.

The best-selling author of Truman and John Adams, David McCullough has written profiles of exceptional men and women past and present who have not only shaped the course of history or changed how we see the world but whose stories express much that is timeless about the human condition. Here are Alexander von Humboldt, whose epic explorations of South America surpassed the Lewis and Clark expedition; Harriet Beecher Stowe, "the little woman who made the big war”....

At once an incredible adventure narrative and a penetrating biographical portrait, Egan's book tells the remarkable untold story behind Edward Curtis's iconic photographs, following him throughout Indian country from desert to rainforest as he struggled to document the stories and rituals of more than eighty tribes. Even with the backing of Theodore Roosevelt and J.P. Morgan, it took tremendous perseverance. The undertaking changed him profoundly, from detached observer to outraged advocate.

When a shattered kayak and camping gear are found on an uninhabited island, they reignite a mystery surrounding a shocking act of protest. Five months earlier, logger-turned-activist Grant Hadwin had plunged naked into a river in British Columbia's Queen Charlotte Islands, towing a chainsaw. When his night's work was done, a unique Sitka spruce, 165 feet tall and covered with luminous golden needles, teetered on its stump. Two days later it fell.

One of the most brilliant biologists of our time, and a charismatic daredevil, Dr. Joe Slowinski had been obsessed with venomous snakes since his youth. In 2001 Slowinski led a team of young scientists deep into the wilds of Burma on a final tragic expedition. Immediately after being bitten by the many-banded krait, the deadliest serpent in Asia, Joe knew his life was in grave and imminent peril.

In 1994 Professor Bryan Sykes, a leading world authority on DNA and human evolution, was called in to examine the frozen remains of a man trapped in glacial ice in northern Italy. News of both the Ice Man's discovery and his age, which was put at over 5,000 years, fascinated scientists and newspapers throughout the world. But what made Sykes's story particularly revelatory was his successful identification of a genetic descendant of the Ice Man, a woman living in Great Britain today. How was Sykes able to locate a living relative?

Pulitzer Prize winner Wallace Stegner recounts the remarkable career of Major John Wesley Powell, the distinguished ethnologist and geologist who explored the Colorado River, the Grand Canyon, and the homeland of the Southwest Indian tribes. This classic work is a penetrating and insightful study of the Powell’s career, from the beginning of the Powell Survey, in which Powell and his men famously became the first to descend the Colorado River, to his eventual expulsion from the Geological Survey.

In 1994, a team led by fossil-hunting legend Tim White—"the Steve Jobs of paleoanthropology"—uncovered the bones of a human ancestor in Ethiopia's Afar region. The findings challenged many assumptions about human evolution and repudiated a half-century of paleoanthropological orthodoxy. An intriguing tale of scientific discovery, obsession and rivalry that moves from the sun-baked desert of Africa to modern high-tech labs and academic lecture halls, Fossil Men is popular science at its best, and a must-listen for fans of Jared Diamond, Richard Dawkins, and Edward O. Wilson.

Author Brian Switek is a charming and enthusiastic osteological raconteur. In this natural and cultural history of bone, he explains where our skeletons came from, what they do inside us, and what others can learn about us when these wondrous assemblies of mineral and protein are all we've left behind.

Jack loves his childhood toy Dur Pig. DP has always been there for him, through good and bad. Until one Christmas Eve something terrible happens - DP is lost. But Christmas Eve is a night for miracles and lost causes, a night when all things can come to life...even toys. And Jack’s newest toy - the Christmas Pig (DP’s annoying replacement) - has a daring plan: Together they’ll embark on a magical journey to seek something lost and to save the best friend Jack has ever known....

The kingdom of Cornucopia was once the happiest in the world. It had plenty of gold, a king with the finest moustache you could possibly imagine, and butchers, bakers, and cheesemongers whose exquisite foods made a person dance with delight when they ate them. Everything was perfect - except for the misty Marshlands to the north, which, according to legend, were home to the monstrous Ickabog. Anyone sensible knew that the Ickabog was just a myth to scare children into behaving. But the funny thing about myths is that sometimes they take on a life of their own.

Olaf, Arendelle’s adorable snowman, loves to read. One day, an unexpected message leads Olaf and his friends Anna, Kristoff, and Sven on a quest for a place known as Haus Biblio, described as a “sea of stories”. This Audible Original spans the group’s journey to Haus Biblio as they cross over mountains, search for monsters under bridges, and have conversations with friendly sheep. During his travels, Olaf makes new friends and hears lots of exciting stories along the way.

Mary Lennox starts her life as an unhappy victim of circumstance. After the loss of her parents, she moves to rural Yorkshire to live with a distant uncle where she resents the wildness of the countryside. At first, she struggles to find a place in this new existence. Although unsure about her surroundings and its occupants, through the gentle guidance of the maid she gradually becomes interested in the story of Mrs Craven, who apparently used to spend her time in a garden at the house, the key to which has vanished.

Belle lives in a beautiful castle with a Beast and Enchanted Objects that have come to life. But that isn’t the strangest thing about the castle. Rose petals and leaves have begun to mysteriously appear in random places, leading Belle and her companions Cogsworth the clock and Lumiere the candelabra on a hunt for an intruder.