Marriage & Family Audiobooks | Health & Wellness

Fighting for Family: The Relentless Pursuit of Building Belonging

Read by the authors. A husband-and-wife team put their philosophy of "We don't quit on family" into action, demonstrating how to combat isolation, build healthy relationships, and fight for (not with!) the ones you love, right where you are. When Chris and Julie Bennett and their four kids decided to move from Norman, Oklahoma, to Los Angeles, California, they knew they were setting out on a great adventure. They'd be leaving behind the church Chris and Julie had pastored, the comfort of their community, and the familiarity of their daily routines, but the new city promised to bring some much-needed change. Most of all, they looked forward to connecting with others in one of the most disconnected cities in the United States. What they didn't expect was how this adventure-complicated by a cancer diagnosis, a relapse, and a worldwide pandemic-would challenge their notions of what it means to care for each other well, both as a nuclear family and as part of a broader community. It turns out that becoming family is stressful, messy, exhausting-and absolutely, totally worth fighting for. In a time when so many suffer from loneliness and it feels like developing authentic relationships is impossible, Chris and Julie invite you to step into their story to discover the fundamentals that lead to healthy, thriving families and friendships. You'll discover the power of embracing vulnerability, accepting imperfection, and extending forgiveness, while finding fulfillment through enforcing boundaries and honoring and serving others. Whether you are looking to build your own community from scratch or strengthen your existing connections, Fighting for Family will inspire you to go all in on your relationships, no matter what your circumstances. Questions for reflection can be found in the audiobook companion PDF download.

Chris Bennett, Julie Bennett (Author), Chris Bennett, Julie Bennett (Narrator)

Audiobook

Little Girl Lost: Amelia just wants a home she feels safe in…

The new fostering memoir from the Sunday Times bestselling author Casey Watson Six-year-old Amelie lives with her mother, Kelly, who suffers from bipolar disorder. After Kelly attempts to burn down their family house, it becomes clear that her daughter is in grave danger. Amelie is quickly taken into care. When she arrives with foster carer Casey Watson, Amelie acts much younger than her age. Casey must get to the root of Amelie’s behaviour, while doing what she can to keep the family together. Will Amelie ever find the safety of home?

Casey Watson (Author), Kate Lock, TBD (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness

Brought to you by Penguin. An urgent and insightful investigation into the collapse in youth mental health, from the influential social psychologist and international bestselling author Jonathan Haidt has spent his career speaking wisdom and truth in some of the most the most difficult spaces - communities polarized by politics and religion, campuses battling culture wars, and now the perfect storm contributing to a public health emergency for teenagers today. In The Anxious Generation, Haidt argues that for the cohort that hit puberty around 2009, their sense of self developed as the threads of three dramatic technological and social changes emerged: smartphones and life with the constant companionship of a screen, front-facing cameras and apps that thrive on selfie-culture, and social networks that reduce engagement and affirmation to likes and hearts alone. This book shows how the ground for the current crisis in teen mental health was seeded by a decades-long shift from play-based childhoods to ones defined by over-supervision, structure, and fear: how adults began to overprotect children in the real world while unwittingly offering scant protection in the brutal online world. Haidt delves into the latest psychological and biological research to show the four fundamental ways in which a phone-based childhood disrupts development - sleep deprivation, social deprivation, cognitive fragmentation, and addiction - while offering concrete and scientifically based advice to parents, schools, universities, governments, and to teens themselves. Drawing on ancient wisdom and cutting-edge research, this eye-opening book is a life-raft and a powerful call-to-arms. ©2024 Jonathan Haidt (P)2024 Penguin Audio

Jonathan Haidt (Author), Sean Pratt, TBD (Narrator)

Audiobook

Children of Coercive Control

Children of Coercive Control extends Evan Stark's path-breaking analysis of interpersonal violence to children, showing that coercive control is the most important cause and context of child abuse and child homicide outside a war zone, as well as of the sexual abuse, denigration, exploitation, isolation, and subordination of children. The book provides a working model of the coercive control of children and illustrates its dynamics and consequences with dramatic cases drawn from the headlines and Dr. Stark's forensic practice. The cases include those in which the coercive control of children runs in tandem with the coercive control of women, where children are 'weaponized' in the coercive control of their mother and cases where abused mothers harm their children to survive or protect them from worse. By highlighting a criminal cause of child maltreatment and a plausible justice response, Evan Stark challenges the common assumptions that child abuse and neglect fall on a continuum of problems rooted in maternal deficits, immaturity, poverty, and environmental stressors as well as the combination of Child Welfare and Child Protection Services that currently provide the ameliorative response.

Evan Stark (Author), Mike Lenz (Narrator)

Audiobook

Forgiveness after Trauma: A Path to Find Healing and Empowerment

Susannah Griffith wishes she had spent less time thinking about forgiveness. But as a Christian minister, a biblical scholar, and a survivor of abuse, she has learned a lot about it. In Forgiveness after Trauma, Griffith explores what the Bible says-and doesn't say-about the biblical call to forgive. She helps listeners understand this command in ways that are healing and restorative, framing it within broader concerns around lament, anger, accountability, release and rebirth, and reconciliation. The result is what Griffith calls 'trauma-informed forgiveness,' which takes seriously God's forgiveness of sinners while centering survivors of abuse and aiding their healing. This view also empowers those who have been harmed in other ways by abuses of power and justice in religious institutions. Listeners will resonate with Griffith's astute biblical analysis and personal reflection, which point to God's love-a love that never includes abuse and strives for justice for the vulnerable.

Susannah Griffith (Author), Suzie Althens (Narrator)

Audiobook

[German] - Sie haben Ihren Rollator beim Zumba vertauscht (ungekürzt)

Das Seniorenheim Haus Sonnenuntergang ist in Gefahr Die konkurrierende Luxus-Residenz Senior Palace, droht das Heim aufzukaufen und ihm seine profitorientierten Strukturen aufzuzwingen. Aber nicht mit Pflägekraft Sybille Bullatschek! Kurzerhand schleust sie sich mit der betagten Seniora Frau Spielmann undercover bei den Reichen und Schönen ein und stellt deren Luxusleben mal so richtig auf den Kopf. Bei so viel Action kann es schon mal passieren, dass man seinen Rollator beim Zumba vertauscht. Nebenbei müssen die Pflegekräfte auch noch einen Kriminalfall lösen, der mit der ominösen Tasche eines Seniors in Verbindung steht. Und wer Sybille kennt, der weiß, dass auch im Liebesleben der engagierten Single-Pflägekraft wieder die ein oder andere Überraschung wartet.

Sybille Bullatschek (Author), Sybille Bullatschek (Narrator)

Audiobook

More: A Memoir of Open Marriage

Brought to you by Penguin. The instant New York Times bestselling memoir that everyone is talking about Molly Roden Winter was a mother of small children with a husband, Stewart, who often worked late. One night when Stewart missed the kids’ bedtime—again—she stormed out of the house to clear her head. At a bar, she met Matt, a flirtatious younger man. When Molly told her husband that Matt had asked her out, she was surprised that Stewart encouraged her to accept. So began Molly’s unexpected open marriage and, with it, a life-changing journey of self-discovery. Molly signs up for dating sites, enters into passionate flings, and has sex in hotels and public places around New York City. For Molly it’s a mystery why she wants what she wants. In therapy sessions, fuelled by the discovery that her parents had an open marriage, too, she grapples with her past and what it means to be a mother and a whole person. Molly and Stewart, who also begins to see other people, set ground rules: Don’t date an ex. Don’t date someone in the neighbourhood. Don’t go to anyone’s home. And above all, don’t fall in love. In the years that follow, they break most of their rules, even the most important one. They grapple with jealousy, insecurity, and doubts, all the while wondering: Can they love others and stay true to their love for each other? Can they make the impossible work? More is an electric debut that offers both steamy fun and poignant reflections on motherhood, daughterhood, marriage, and self-fulfilment. With warmth, humour, and style, Molly Roden Winter delivers an unputdownable journey of a woman becoming her most authentic self. 'This book about open marriage is going to blow up your group chat' The Washington Post ©2024 Molly Roden Winter (P)2024 Penguin Audio

Molly Roden Winter (Author), Molly Roden Winter (Narrator)

Audiobook

[German] - Liebe Enkel: oder Die Kunst der Zuversicht

»Die Welt mit ihren Herausforderungen wahrnehmen und trotzdem gern und engagiert in ihr leben: Das ist die große Kunst. Die Kunst der Zuversicht.« »Es gehört zum Wesen der Hoffnung, dass sie enttäuscht werden kann, sonst wäre sie ja Zuversicht«, schrieb Ernst Bloch. Aber wie bleiben oder werden wir zuversichtlich in diesen fragilen Zeiten? Mit Neugier und Herzglut macht Gabriele von Arnim sich auf die Suche. Denn sie ist überzeugt davon, dass wir Zuversicht brauchen, weil sonst Chaos und Stillstand zugleich herrschen würden. Die Kunst der Zuversicht, sagt sie, kann, nein muss man üben. Wie das gelingt, verrät Gabriele von Arnim ihren Enkeln und uns allen in diesem zuversichtlichen Buch.

Gabriele Von Arnim (Author), Gabriele Von Arnim (Narrator)

Audiobook

Disability Intimacy: Essays on Love, Care, and Desire

The much-anticipated follow up to the groundbreaking anthology Disability Visibility: another revolutionary collection of first-person writing on the joys and challenges of the modern disability experience, and intimacy in all its myriad forms. What is intimacy? More than sex, more than romantic love, the pieces in this stunning and illuminating new anthology offer broader and more inclusive definitions of what it can mean to be intimate with another person. Explorations of caregiving, community, access, and friendship offer us alternative ways of thinking about the connections we form with others-a vital reimagining in an era when forced physical distance is at times a necessary norm. But don't worry: there's still sex to consider-and the numerous ways sexual liberation intersects with disability justice. Plunge between these pages and you'll also find disabled sexual discovery, disabled love stories, and disabled joy. These twenty-five stunning original pieces-plus other modern classics on the subject, all carefully curated by acclaimed activist Alice Wong-include essays, photo essays, poetry, drama, and erotica: a full spectrum of the dreams, fantasies, and deeply personal realities of a wide range of beautiful bodies and minds. Disability Intimacy will free your thinking, invigorate your spirit, and delight your desires.

Alice Wong (Author), TBD (Narrator)

Audiobook

Maurice and Maralyn: A Whale, a Shipwreck, a Love Story

Brought to you by Penguin. What begins as an eccentric English love story turns into one of the most dramatic adventures ever recorded... Maurice and Maralyn couldn't be more different. He is as cautious and awkward as she is charismatic and forceful. It seems an unlikely romance, but it works. Bored of 1970s suburban life, Maralyn has an idea: sell the house, build a boat, leave England - and its oil crisis, industrial strikes and inflation - forever. It is hard work, turning dreams into reality, but finally they set sail for New Zealand. Then, halfway there, their beloved boat is struck by a whale. It sinks within an hour, and the pair are cast adrift in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. On their tiny raft, over the course of days, then months, their love is put to the test. When Maurice begins to withdraw into himself, it falls upon Maralyn to keep them both alive. Their pet turtle helps, as does devising menus for fantasy dinners and dreaming of their next voyage. Filled with danger, spirit and tenderness, this is a book about human connection and the human condition; about how we survive - not just at sea, but in life. Somewhere, deep within, unspoken, we must know, we do know, that we'll all have our time adrift. For what else is a marriage, really, if not being stuck on a small raft with someone and trying to survive ©2024 Sophie Elmhirst (P)2024 Penguin Audio

Sophie Elmhirst (Author), Florence Howard, TBD (Narrator)

Audiobook

Healthy Conflict, Peaceful Life: A Biblical Guide for Communicating Thoughts, Feelings, and Opinions

Author, speaker, and pastor's wife Donna Jones gives women a practical, biblical blueprint for making regret-free choices in the middle of real-life conflict so they can exchange relational turmoil for personal and relational peace. We've all had moments where we look back on a conflict, shake our heads, and think, why did I handle it that way? With three decades of ministry experience, Donna Jones has had a front-row seat to--and been in the middle of--all kinds of conflict and she understands the regret, guilt, heartache, and hurt conflict can produce. But she also knows it's possible for God to use those chaotic, painful moments and turn them into opportunities for better connection with those around us. With encouragement, warmth, and wisdom, Donna shows readers how to navigate the stressful confusion conflict can bring and helps them to - discover the single most important quality necessary to handle conflict well; - communicate thoughts, feelings, and opinions with grace, truth, and zero regret; - be equipped to handle conflict in a God honoring way by exchanging conflict styles that hurt with conflict styles that heal; - identify common conflict mistakes and prevent unnecessary disagreements and defeat; and - stop being pulled into other people's drama and remain calm in the midst of chaos. Whether readers are dealing with daily disagreements or occasional blowups, Healthy Conflict, Peaceful Life offers them a new paradigm, one where they learn how to honor God when they've been hurt, communicate when they'd rather retaliate, and move toward others when it seems easier to run away.

Donna Jones (Author), Donna Jones (Narrator)

Audiobook

Come Together: The Science (and Art) of Creating Lasting Sexual Connections

Brought to you by Penguin. What does it really take to create lasting sexual connections in long-term relationships? Most couples struggle at some point to maintain their sexual connection. But a lot of the advice we are given on sex is either not very good or steeped in cultural assumptions and expectations that can end up hurting us. In Come Together, leading sexual wellness educator, Dr Emily Nagoski, takes on one of the most misunderstood subjects of all time - good sex - and shows us that most of what we've been taught about enjoying sex is wrong. Featuring inclusive stories and examples from a wide range of couples and individuals, you'll find out what great sex really looks like and the best way to overcome obstacles - including relationship conflicts, gendered beliefs about how sex 'should be' and body image worries. With insight, humour and empathy, Come Together will radically transform the way you approach sex and desire, and empower you to create long-term, fulfilling sexual connections. ©2024 Emily Nagoski (P)2024 Penguin Audio

Emily Nagoski (Author), Emily Nagoski, TBD (Narrator)

Audiobook

Marriage & Family Audiobooks in Health & Wellness