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Visionary Women
- How Rachel Carson, Jane Jacobs, Jane Goodall, and Alice Waters Changed Our World
- Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell
- Length: 19 hrs and 17 mins
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Publisher's summary
Four influential women we thought we knew well - Jane Jacobs, Rachel Carson, Jane Goodall, and Alice Waters - and how they spearheaded the modern progressive movement.
This is the story of four visionaries who profoundly shaped the world we live in today. Together, these women - linked not by friendship or field, but by their choice to break with convention - showed what one person speaking truth to power can do. Jane Jacobs fought for livable cities and strong communities; Rachel Carson warned us about poisoning the environment; Jane Goodall demonstrated the indelible kinship between humans and animals; and Alice Waters urged us to reconsider what and how we eat.
With a keen eye for historical detail, Andrea Barnet traces the arc of each woman's career and explores how their work collectively changed the course of history. While they hailed from different generations, Carson, Jacobs, Goodall, and Waters found their voices in the early 60's. At a time of enormous upheaval, all four stood as bulwarks against 1950s corporate culture and its war on nature. Consummate outsiders, each prevailed against powerful and mostly male adversaries while also anticipating the disaffections of the emerging counterculture.
All told, their efforts ignited a transformative progressive movement while offering people a new way to think about the world and a more positive way of living in it.
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Story
Paris. The name alone conjures images of chestnut-lined boulevards, sidewalk cafés, breathtaking façades around every corner: in short, an exquisite romanticism that has captured the American imagination for as long as there have been Americans.
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Wish this wasn't abridged!!
- By Sarah D. on 03-25-17
By: Adam Gopnik
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Where I Was From
- By: Joan Didion
- Narrated by: Gabrielle De Cuir
- Length: 6 hrs and 28 mins
- Unabridged
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In her moving and insightful new book, Joan Didion reassesses parts of her life, her work, her history and ours. A native Californian, Didion applies her scalpel-like intelligence to the state’s ethic of ruthless self-sufficiency in order to examine that ethic’s often tenuous relationship to reality. Combining history and reportage, memoir and literary criticism, Where I Was From explores California’s romances with land and water; its unacknowledged debts to railroads, aerospace, and big government; the disjunction between its code of individualism and its fetish for prisons.
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California belongs to Joan Didion.
- By Darwin8u on 11-04-15
By: Joan Didion
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Dorothy Day: The World Will Be Saved by Beauty
- An Intimate Portrait of My Grandmother
- By: Kate Hennessy
- Narrated by: Randye Kaye
- Length: 13 hrs and 50 mins
- Unabridged
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Dorothy Day (1897-1980) was a prominent Catholic, writer, social activist, and cofounder of a movement dedicated to serving the poorest of the poor. Her life has been revealed through her own writings as well as the work of historians, theologians, and academics. What has been missing until now is a more personal account from the point of view of someone who knew her well.
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Great content.HORRIBLE Narration. Cannot listen.
- By Christian on 04-21-17
By: Kate Hennessy
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And So It Goes
- Kurt Vonnegut: A Life
- By: Charles J. Shields
- Narrated by: Fred Berman
- Length: 17 hrs and 30 mins
- Unabridged
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New York Times best-selling author and biographer Charles J. Shields crafts this fascinating portrait of literary icon Kurt Vonnegut. The first authorized biography of the influential American writer, And So It Goes examines Vonnegut’s life, from his childhood to his death in 2007, and explores how the author changed the conversation of American literature.
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Probably only for die hard Vonnegut fans
- By Watery M on 12-22-12
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The Invitation-Only Zone
- The True Story of North Korea's Abduction Project
- By: Robert S. Boynton
- Narrated by: Ralph Lister
- Length: 7 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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Throughout the late 1970s and early '80s, dozens of Japanese citizens were abducted from coastal Japanese towns by North Korean commandos. In what proved to be part of a global project, North Korea attempted to reeducate the abductees and train them to spy on the state's behalf. When the project faltered, the abductees were hidden in a series of guarded communities known as "Invitation-Only Zones" - the fiction being that these were exclusive enclaves, not prisons.
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Over enthusiastic reader!
- By AJW on 02-14-16
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In the Great Green Room
- The Brilliant and Bold Life of Margaret Wise Brown
- By: Amy Gary
- Narrated by: Bernadette Dunne
- Length: 7 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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The extraordinary life of the woman behind the beloved children's classics Goodnight Moon and The Runaway Bunny comes alive in this fascinating biography of Margaret Wise Brown. Margaret's books have sold millions of copies all over the world, but few people know that she was at the center of a children's book publishing revolution.
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Excruciatingly boring
- By Melissa S. on 01-31-19
By: Amy Gary
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Strange Stones
- By: Peter Hessler
- Narrated by: George Backman
- Length: 13 hrs and 38 mins
- Unabridged
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Full of unforgettable figures and an unrelenting spirit of adventure, Strange Stones is a far-ranging, thought-provoking collection of Peter Hessler’s best reportage - a dazzling display of the powerful storytelling, shrewd cultural insight, and warm sense of humor that are the trademarks of his work. Over the last decade, as a staff writer for The New Yorker and the author of three books, Peter Hessler has lived in Asia and the United States, writing as both native and knowledgeable outsider in these two very different regions.
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funny, entertaining
- By Katherine on 08-02-13
By: Peter Hessler
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Unbowed
- A Memoir
- By: Wangari Maathai
- Narrated by: Chinasa Ogbuagu
- Length: 11 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
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Winner of the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004, Wangari Maathai has been fighting for environmental responsibility and democracy in her native Kenya for over 35 years. Unbowed recounts the incredible journey that culminated in her appointment to Parliament in 2002. Despite repeated jailings, beatings, and other obstacles along the way, Maathai created the Green Belt Movement and never relented in her goal to bring democracy to Kenya.
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Amazing story of this woman, but missing something
- By Peter on 06-29-11
By: Wangari Maathai
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Bend, Not Break
- A Life in Two Worlds
- By: Ping Fu, MeiMei Fox
- Narrated by: Robin Miles
- Length: 10 hrs and 22 mins
- Unabridged
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Ping Fu knows what it’s like to be a child soldier, a factory worker, and a political prisoner. To be beaten and raped for the crime of being born into a well-educated family. To be deported with barely enough money for a plane ticket to a bewildering new land. To start all over, without family or friends, as a maid, waitress, and student. Ping Fu also knows what it’s like to be a pioneering software programmer, an innovator, a CEO, and Inc. magazine’s Entrepreneur of the Year.
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A true account as good as any Horatio Alger story!
- By Roy B. Paschal on 01-14-13
By: Ping Fu, and others
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To See Every Bird on Earth
- A Father, A Son, and a Lifelong Obsession
- By: Dan Koeppel
- Narrated by: John McDonough
- Length: 10 hrs and 6 mins
- Unabridged
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From well-known nature and adventure writer Dan Koeppel, whose work has appeared in Audubon and National Geographic Adventure, comes this true story of one bird watcher's incredible achievements.
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Reader is Ancient
- By Caroline on 06-18-05
By: Dan Koeppel
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Eleanor and Hick
- The Love Affair That Shaped a First Lady
- By: Susan Quinn
- Narrated by: Kimberly Farr
- Length: 13 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
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In 1932 Eleanor Roosevelt entered the claustrophobic, duty-bound existence of the first lady with dread. By that time she had put her deep disappointment in her marriage behind her and developed an independent life - now threatened by the public role she would be forced to play. A lifeline came to her in the form of a feisty campaign reporter for the Associated Press: Lorena Hickok. Over the next 30 years, until Eleanor's death, the two women carried on an extraordinary relationship.
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An Icon who was real.
- By Francine Fields on 08-17-17
By: Susan Quinn
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Napa
- By: James Conaway
- Narrated by: John Morgan
- Length: 20 hrs and 29 mins
- Unabridged
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James Conaway's remarkable bestseller delves into the heart of California's lush and verdant Napa Valley, also known as America's Eden. Long the source of succulent grapes and singular wines, this region is also the setting for the remarkable true saga of the personalities behind the winemaking empires. This is the story of Gallos and Mondavis, of fortunes made and lost, of dynasties and destinies.
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Excellent But Marred by Non-Stop Mispronunciations
- By Robert R. on 08-15-13
By: James Conaway
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Pearl Buck in China
- Journey to The Good Earth
- By: Hilary Spurling
- Narrated by: Hilary Spurling
- Length: 9 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
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The author of the much honored two-volume biography of Henri Matisse unearths the life and work of the Nobel Prize and Pulitzer Prize winner Pearl Buck, whose novels in the 1930's and 40's were the first written for a Western audience to describe ordinary life in the still secret China of the late 19th and early 20th century.
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Very good
- By M. Brandman on 06-15-10
By: Hilary Spurling
What listeners say about Visionary Women
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Anonymous User
- 08-27-23
Inspiring
Four inspiring women whose accomplishments should be known widely by adults and children. Bravo to all four.
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- Jennifer K.
- 01-29-23
Visionary Women
Really enjoyed learning more about these four amazing women, and liked the way the author tied them together. Wish I could have read this in high school.
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- an exerciser
- 07-05-18
Engagingly written
Great subject matter, wonderfully written and very enjoyable to listen to (the narrator matters!!!). I had never heard of Jane Jacobs so not only did I find out much more about the stories of those I was familiar with but also learned about another visionary person. I appreciated the summary which led me to consider examples of the legacies from these ladies' lives around where I live (Klyde Warren Park in downtown Dallas, the FW Zoo, Seasons 52, my own Frisco Environmental Services Department). So glad I pitched this book for my book club early on so that others might become familiar with the impactful work of Carson, Jacobs, Goodall, and Waters. Highly recommend.
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7 people found this helpful
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- C. Cage
- 01-10-21
Very creative
Andrea Barnet has put a lot of thought into these four short biographies. Not only to they tell about the women and their contributions but do so within the context of the times in which they lived. Really interesting.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Karathoner
- 01-16-23
Important Contributions
How four visionary women changed our thoughts in nature, environment, and ecology. Jane Jacobs, Rachael Carson, Jane Goodall, and Alice Waters lives, work, and contributions to society are presented. Their childhood and family dynamics are interesting. Some of the details of their work get lengthy but in areas of interest fascinating. I am tired of the trend of the lengthy discussion of some of their private lives in adulthood, especially the belabored details of their sexual choices. I realize the authors who now include this information in their books are trying to make the individuals seem more human and wanting us to understand and accept all their choices but I find the information too dragged out and really care more about the women’s research and accomplishments and could care less about their sexual preferences.
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1 person found this helpful