Audiobooks narrated by Beata Pozniak

Libreto para el desierto - poesia dedicada a las víctimas de la guerra y el genocidio

SONA VAN (en realidad: Ter-Hovhannisian) es una famosa poeta y viajera Armenia. Nació en Ereván, Armenia. Su abuelo, un respetado clérigo armenio de la ciudad de Van en Anatolia oriental (de ahí el seudónimo literario del poeta) en el terrible 1915, se quedó en Estambul con una gran parte de su familia. Todos fueron testigos presenciales o incluso víctimas de las atrocidades de las jóvenes milicias turcas. Volviendo a sus pensamientos sobre aquellos tiempos terribles, Sona hace una especie de examen de conciencia poético. En el boceto "Biografía de todo el siglo y aún más", escribe: "... considero que tocar el tema con los dedos de una víctima que no es testigo ocular es una cuestión de derecho, arrojo mis garabatos a la basura en un santiamén, después de hacerlos mil pedazos, como si me hubieran hallado in fraganti. Estoy segura de que este ensayo autobiográfico sobre el Medz Yeghern (el Gran Crimen del genocidio armenio) hubiera merecido el mismo destino si la demanda hubiera provenido nuevamente de mi imaginación pretensiosa o de mi musa charlatana, en vez del silencio de una centuria de las mandíbulas llenas de arena o en vez del deforme y sintético susurro del verdadero río de sangre que crece día a día en mis ojos." Las palabras anteriores también determinan en gran medida la composición poética "Libreto para el desierto" y la forma de la heroína lírica de todo el volumen, cuyo sonido es mudo, desprovisto de exaltación y patetismo. Este no es un boceto del paisaje del apocalipsis, es un intento de observar el sufrimiento únicamente a través de los reflejos del dolor en las pupilas de un medio excepcionalmente sensible: el dolor del mundo en las pupilas de una mujer. Libretto for the Desert ganó la Medalla Europea de Poesía y Arte HOMER.

Sona Van (Author), A Full Cast, Beata Po?niak, Beata Pozniak, Camila Valenzuela, Carlos Manuel Vesga, Diana Angel, Indhira Serrano, Jane Santos, John Alex Toro (Narrator)

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Bending Toward the Sun: A Mother and Daughter Memoir

A miraculous lesson in courage and recovery, BENDING TOWARD THE SUN tells the story of a unique family bond forged in the wake of brutal terror. Weaving together the voices of three generations of women-Rita, her daughter, Leslie, and her granddaughter, Mikaela-the memoir provides powerful and inspiring evidence of the resilience of the human spirit, relevant to every culture in every corner of the world. Unimaginably devastating and incredibly uplifting, this firsthand account of survival and healing offers a poignant message of hope in our own uncertain times. Rita Lurie was five years old when she fled her home in Poland to hide from the Nazis. From the summer of 1942 to 1944, she and fourteen members of her family shared a nearly silent existence in a cramped, dark attic, subsisting on scraps of food. Young Rita watched helplessly as her young brother and then her mother died by her side. Motherless and stateless, Rita and her surviving family spent the next five years wandering throughout Europe, waiting for a country to accept them. Decades later, Rita is the matriarch of a close-knit family in California. Yet in addition to love, Rita unknowingly passes to her children feelings of fear, apprehension, and guilt. Her daughter Leslie, an accomplished lawyer, media executive, and philanthropist began probing her mother's childhood to discover how Rita's pain has affected not only Leslie's life and outlook but also that of her children. Their collaboration produced this unforgettable story, which reveals how deeply the Holocaust remains in the hearts and minds of survivors and their descendants.

Leslie Gilbert-Lurie, Rita Lurie (Author), Beata Pozniak, Beata Poźniak, Leslie Gilbert-Lurie (Narrator)

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A Wolf for a Spell

The Girl Who Drank the Moon meets Pax in this fantastical tale of a wolf who forms an unlikely alliance with Baba Yaga to save the forest from a wicked tsar. Since she was a pup, Zima has been taught to fear humans--especially witches--but when her family is threatened, she has no choice but to seek help from the witch Baba Yaga. Baba Yaga never does magic for free, but it just so happens that she needs a wolf's keen nose for a secret plan she's brewing . . . Before Zima knows what's happening, the witch has cast a switching spell and run off into the woods, while Zima is left behind in Baba Yaga's hut--and Baba Yaga's body! Meanwhile, a young village girl named Nadya is also seeking the witch's help, and when she meets Zima (in Baba Yaga's form), they discover that they face a common enemy. With danger closing in, Zima must unite the wolves, the witches and the villagers against an evil that threatens them all. 'Karah Sutton has crafted a vivid and rollicking adventure that proves a wolf doesn't have to be big or bad to win the day!' --Rosanne Parry, New York Times bestselling author of A Wolf Called Wander

Karah Sutton (Author), Beata Pozniak, Beata Poźniak (Narrator)

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The Light in Hidden Places: Based on the true story of war heroine Stefania Podgórska

Brought to you by Penguin. DEATH PENALTY FOR ALL WHO GIVE AID TO A JEW. DEATH TO ALL WHO HARBOUR A JEW. DEATH TO ALL WHO FEED A JEW. DEATH TO ALL WHO PROVIDE TRANSPORTATION TO A JEW. One knock at the door could be the death of them all… It is 1943, and sixteen-year-old Stefania Podgórska has been working for the Diamant family in their grocery store in Przemsyl, Poland, for four years. She has even made a promise to one of their sons, Izio - an engagement they must keep secret since she is Catholic and the Diamants are Jewish. But everything changes when the German army invades Przemsyl. The Diamants are forced into the ghetto, and Stefania is alone in an occupied city, the only one left to care for her six-year-old sister. And then comes the knock at the door. Max Diamant has jumped from the train headed to a death camp. Stefania and Helena make the extraordinary decision to hide Max, and eventually twelve more Jews. Then they must wait, every day, for the next knock at the door, the one that could destroy everything... A powerful novel from a New York Times Bestselling author, based on the remarkable true story of Stefania Podgórska, a Polish teenager who hid 13 Jews in her attic during World War Two. © Sharon Cameron 2020 (P) Penguin Audio 2020

Sharon Cameron (Author), Beata Pozniak (Narrator)

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A Libretto for the Desert

In A Libretto for the Desert, Sona Van's subject is the Armenian genocide, also known as the Great Catastrophe. Van's parents and grandparents were driven into exile due to this horrific event. Her poems reflect a personal connection to this history as well as the universality of loss, persecution, and intolerance.

Sona Van (Author), Beata Po?niak, Beata Pozniak, Beata Poźniak (Narrator)

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The Tsar of Love and Techno

Random House presents the unabridged, downloadable audiobook edition of The Tsar of Love and Techno by Anthony Marra, read by Mark Bramhall, Beata Pozniak and Rustam Kasymov. The Tsar of Love and Techno begins in 1930s Leningrad, where a failed portrait artist employed by Soviet censors must erase political dissenters from official images and artworks. One day, he receives an antique painting of a dacha inside a box of images due to be altered. The mystery behind this painting threads together the stories that follow, which take us through a century and introduce a cast of characters including a Siberian beauty queen, a young soldier in the battlefields of Chechnya, the Head of the Grozny Tourist Bureau, a ballerina performing for the camp director of a gulag and many others. Praise for A Constellation of Vital Phenomena 'Storytelling of magical purity, illuminated by hope... Marra is a magnificent writer' The Times 'Extraordinary... a 21st-century War and Peace' New York Times Book Review 'An absolute masterpiece' Sarah Jessica Parker, Entertainment Weekly

Anthony Marra (Author), Beata Pozniak, Mark Bramhall, Rustam Kasymov (Narrator)

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The Tsar of Love and Techno: Stories

From the New York Times bestselling author of A Constellation of Vital Phenomena-dazzling, poignant, and lyrical interwoven stories about family, sacrifice, the legacy of war, and the redemptive power of art. This stunning, exquisitely written collection introduces a cast of remarkable characters whose lives intersect in ways both life-affirming and heartbreaking. A 1930s Soviet censor painstakingly corrects offending photographs, deep underneath Leningrad, bewitched by the image of a disgraced prima ballerina. A chorus of women recount their stories and those of their grandmothers, former gulag prisoners who settled their Siberian mining town. Two pairs of brothers share a fierce, protective love. Young men across the former USSR face violence at home and in the military. And great sacrifices are made in the name of an oil landscape unremarkable except for the almost incomprehensibly peaceful past it depicts. In stunning prose, with rich character portraits and a sense of history reverberating into the present, The Tsar of Love and Techno is a captivating work from one of our greatest new talents.

Anthony Marra (Author), Beata Pozniak, Mark Bramhall, Rustam Kasymov (Narrator)

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The Winter Palace (A novel of the young Catherine the Great)

When Vavara, a young orphaned Polish girl, is brought to serve at Empress Elizabeth's glittering, dangerous court in St Petersburg, she is schooled by the Chancellor himself in skills from lock-picking to love-making, learning above all else to stay silent - and listen. Soon, she is Elizabeth's 'tongue' - her secret eyes and ears. Then Sophie, a vulnerable young princess, arrives from Prussia as a prospective bride for Elizabeth's heir. Set to spy on her by the Empress, Vavara soon becomes her friend and confidante, and helps her navigate the illicit seductions and the treacherous shifting allegiances of the court.But Sophie's destiny is to become the notorious Catherine the Great. Are her ambitions more lofty and far-reaching than anyone suspected, and will she stop at nothing to achieve absolute power?

Eva Stachniak (Author), Beata Pozniak (Narrator)

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Empress of the Night: A Novel of Catherine the Great

Perfect for readers of Hilary Mantel, Alison Weir, and Philippa Gregory, Empress of the Night is Eva Stachniak's engrossing new novel, told in the voice of Catherine the Great as the Romanov monarch reflects on her ascension to the throne, her rule over the world's greatest power, and the sacrifices that made her the most feared and commanding woman of her time. A critically acclaimed historical drama and instant #1 international bestseller, The Winter Palace brilliantly reimagined the rise of Catherine the Great through the watchful eyes of her clever servant Varvara. Now, in Eva Stachniak's enthralling new novel, Catherine takes center stage as she relives her astonishing ascension to the throne, her rule over an empire, and the sacrifices that made her the most feared and commanding woman of her time. As the book opens, the charismatic monarch is in her final hours. From the fevered depths of her mind, Catherine recalls the fateful trajectory of her turbulent life: her precarious apprenticeship as Russia's Grand Duchess, the usurpers who seek to deprive her of a crown, the friends who beg more of her than she was willing to give, and her struggle to know whom to trust and whom to deceive to ensure her survival. "We quarrel about power, not about love," Catherine would write to the great love of her life, Grigory Potemkin, but her days were balanced on the razor's edge of choosing her head over her heart. Power, she learns, is about resolve, strategy, and direction; love must sometimes be secondary as she marshals all her strengths to steer her volatile country into a new century and beyond-to grow the Romanov empire, to amass a vast fortune, and to control a scheming court in order to become one of history's greatest rulers. Gorgeously written with vivid detail and lyrical prose, Empress of the Night is an intensely intimate novel of a woman in charge of her fortunes, who must navigate the sorrows, triumphs, and hopes of both her soul and a nation.Praise for Empress of the Night "[Eva] Stachniak's absorbing novel opens readers' hearts to an extraordinary and misunderstood woman. . . . Wonderfully, lyrically written, Stachniak's story vibrates with passion, drama and intrigue. This is a feast for fans."- RT Book Reviews "Stachniak's insight into the opulent lives of Russia's rulers continues in this reflective second novel. . . . Historical fiction fans will appreciate this personal account of a formidable and, indeed, infamous ruler."- Library Journal "The book takes on a dreamlike quality. . . . Ambitious . . . moving . . . structurally complex and psychologically intense . . . vivid descriptions."- Quill & Quire "Stachniak brings to life one of the most fascinating-and controversial-female rulers of all time."- DuJour " Empress of the Night casts light on Catherine's life with unflinching honesty and intimacy. This fun novel of lovers, intrigue, and malicious and manipulative nobility keeps readers enthralled with every page."- Virtuoso Life From the Hardcover edition.

Eva Stachniak (Author), Beata Pozniak (Narrator)

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The Winter Palace

From award-winning author Eva Stachniak comes this passionate novel that illuminates, as only fiction can, the early life of one of history's boldest women. The Winter Palace tells the epic story of Catherine the Great's improbable rise to power—as seen through the ever-watchful eyes of an all-but-invisible servant close to the throne. Her name is Barbara—in Russian, Varvara. Nimble-witted and attentive, she's allowed into the employ of the Empress Elizabeth, amid the glitter and cruelty of the world's most eminent court. Under the tutelage of Count Bestuzhev, Chancellor and spymaster, Varvara will be educated in skills from lock picking to lovemaking, learning above all else to listen—and to wait for opportunity. That opportunity arrives in a slender young princess from Zerbst named Sophie, a playful teenager destined to become the indomitable Catherine the Great. Sophie's destiny at court is to marry the Empress's nephew, but she has other, loftier, more dangerous ambitions, and she proves to be more guileful than she first appears. What Sophie needs is an insider at court, a loyal pair of eyes and ears who knows the traps, the conspiracies, and the treacheries that surround her. Varvara will become Sophie's confidante—and together the two young women will rise to the pinnacle of absolute power. With dazzling details and intense drama, Eva Stachniak depicts Varvara's secret alliance with Catherine as the princess grows into a legend—through an enforced marriage, illicit seductions, and, at last, the shocking coup to assume the throne of all of Russia. Impeccably researched and magnificently written, The Winter Palace is an irresistible peek through the keyhole of one of history's grandest tales.

Eva Stachniak (Author), Beata Pozniak (Narrator)

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Audiobooks Narrated by Beata Pozniak