Audiobooks narrated by Curtis Michael Holland

Homegrown Radicals: A Story of State Violence, Islamophobia, and Jihad in the Post-9/11 World

In 2007, three Muslim university students left the Canadian Prairies, seemingly without a trace. In the ensuing months, their disappearance raised fears that the men had become 'radicalized,' posing a grave threat to national security. From presidential briefings and targeted drone assassinations to a politically charged trial, the men's story sheds new light not only on the figure of the 'radical,' but also on the 'moderate' Muslim, represented by a community forever changed by the men's departure. Homegrown Radicals offers a case study of the complex entanglements of the radical and moderate Muslim in post-9/11 North America. Youcef Soufi brings these figures together, providing insight into how state violence has inextricably tied them together. Focusing on the radicalization of the three students, the book traces the general sense of affective injury among North American Muslims over the loss of Muslim life in Western military campaigns overseas. In this context, a new theory of jihad rooted in a Muslim utopian imagination emerged, marking a significant rupture with premodern Islamic thought. The three 'radicals' were among thousands of Anglophone Muslims who found this new theory compelling as both a diagnosis and a solution to the violence unleashed in the War on Terror. The book examines how and why this theory resonated, as well as its consequences.

Youcef Soufi (Author), Curtis Michael Holland (Narrator)

Audiobook

Brokers of Deceit: How the U.S. Has Undermined Peace in the Middle East

For more than seven decades the conflict between Israel and the Palestinian people has raged on with no end in sight, and for much of that time, the United States has been involved as a mediator in the conflict. Khalidi closely analyzes three historical moments that illuminate how the United States' involvement has, in fact, thwarted progress toward peace between Israel and Palestine. The first moment he investigates is the 'Reagan Plan' of 1982, when Israeli prime minister Menachem Begin refused to accept the Reagan administration's proposal to reframe the Camp David Accords more impartially. The second moment covers the period after the Madrid Peace Conference, from 1991 to 1993, during which negotiations between Israel and Palestine were brokered by the United States until the signing of the secretly negotiated Oslo accords. Finally, Khalidi takes on President Barack Obama's retreat from plans to insist on halting the settlements in the West Bank. Through in-depth research, as well as his own firsthand experience as an advisor to the Palestinian delegation at the 1991 pre-Oslo negotiations in Washington, DC, Khalidi reveals how the United States and Israel have actively colluded to prevent a Palestinian state and resolve the situation in Israel's favor.

Rashid Khalidi (Author), Curtis Michael Holland (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Troublemaker: How Jimmy Lai Became a Billionaire, Hong Kong's Greatest Dissident, and China's Mo

The astonishing story of the billionaire businessman Jimmy Lai who became one of Hong Kong's leading activists for democracy and is today China's most famous political prisoner. Jimmy Lai escaped mainland China when he was twelve years old, at the height of a famine that killed tens of millions. In Hong Kong, he hustled; no work was beneath him, and he often slept on a table in a clothing factory where he did odd jobs. At twenty-one, he was running a factory. By his mid-twenties, he owned one and was supplying sweaters and shirts to some of the biggest brands in the United States, from Polo to The Limited. His ideas about retail led him to create Giordano in 1981, and with it "fast fashion." A restless entrepreneur, as Giordano prepared to go public, he was thinking about a dining concept that would disrupt Hong Kong's fast-food industry. But then came the Tiananmen Square democracy protest and the massacre of 1989. His reaction to the violence was to enter the media business to push China toward more freedoms. He started a magazine, Next, to advocate for democracy in Hong Kong. Then, just two years before the city was to return to Chinese control, he founded the Apple Daily newspaper. Its mix of bold graphics, gossip, local news, and opposition to the Chinese Communist Party was an immediate hit. For more than two decades, Lai used Apple and Next as part of a personal push for democracy—in weekly columns, at rallies and marches, and, memorably, sitting in front of a tent during the 2014 Occupy Central movement. Lai took his activism abroad, traveling frequently to Washington, where he was well known in Congress and in political circles. China reacted with fury in 2019 when he met with Vice President Mike Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo. A draconian new security law came into effect in Hong Kong in mid-2020, effectively making free speech a crime and censorship a fact. Lai was its most important target. Apple Daily was raided on August 10, 2020. He was arrested and held without bail before being convicted of trumped-up charges ranging from lighting a candle ("incitement to riot") to violating a clause in his company's lease ("fraud"). At the end of 2023, a lengthy trial began alleging "collusion with foreign forces" and printing seditious materials. China's most famous political prisoner has been in jail for more than 1,100 days and could spend the rest of his life there. The Troublemaker is his story.

Mark L. Clifford (Author), Curtis Michael Holland, Kayden Lukakis, TBD (Narrator)

Audiobook

Palestine Hijacked: How Zionism Forged an Apartheid State from River to Sea

The Israel-Palestine 'conflict' is typically understood to be a clash between two ethnic groups—Arabs and Jews—inhabiting the same land. Thomas Suárez digs deep below these preconceptions and their supporting 'narratives' to expose something starkly different: The violent take-over of Palestine by a European racial-nationalist settler movement, Zionism, using terror to assert by force a claim to the land that has no legal or moral basis. Drawing extensively from original source documents, Suárez interweaves secret intelligence reports, newly-declassified military and diplomatic correspondence, and the terrorists' own records boasting of their successes. His shocking account details a litany of Zionist terrorism against anyone in their way—the indigenous Palestinians, the British who had helped establish Zionism, and Jews who opposed the Zionist agenda. Far from being isolated atrocities by rogue groups, the use of terror was deliberate and sustained, carried out or supported by the same leaders who then established and led the Israeli state. We are still living this history: The book proves that Israel's regime of Apartheid against the Palestinians and the continued expropriation of their country are not the result of complex historical circumstances, but the intended, singular goal of Zionism since its beginning.

Thomas Suárez (Author), Curtis Michael Holland (Narrator)

Audiobook

Fighting Censorship

Fighting Censorship: A Handbook for Pushing Back on Book Bans equips listeners with arguments against the common reasons that are given to ban books in schools and public libraries. In September 2021, the school board in York, Pennsylvania, voted to remove many books from school libraries in its community. The Panther Anti-Racist Union (PARU) at Central York High School, comprised of four students and two advisors, successfully fought the ban by organizing protests and media interviews to raise awareness. In this book, the group takes on book banning and gives listeners actionable advice for how to fight back against book bans, speak out against censorship in their communities, and win the right to intellectual freedom.

Ben Hodge, Christina Ellis, Edha Gupta, Olivia Pituch, Patricia A. Jackson, Renee Ellis (Author), Angela Juarez, Curtis Michael Holland (Narrator)

Audiobook

Rattling the Cages: Oral Histories of North American Political Prisoners

The official story is that the United States has no political prisoners. The reality is that there are hundreds of people rounded up, placed behind bars, and kept there for inordinately long sentences because of their political beliefs and activities. A project of abolitionist Josh Davidson and political prisoner Eric King, this book is filled with the experience and wisdom of over thirty current and former North American political prisoners. It provides first-hand details of prison life and the political commitments that continue to lead prisoners into direct confrontation with state authorities and institutions. The people Josh Davidson has interviewed include former radicals and Black liberation militants from the sixties and seventies, current antifascists, nonviolent Catholic peace activists, Animal and Earth Liberation Front saboteurs, and more. Their stories are moving, often tragic, yet deeply inspiring. Collectively, these people have spent hundreds of years behind bars, and their experiences speak directly to the cruelty and immorality of our prison and so-called criminal justice systems. This wide range of voices come together to embody what bell hooks called 'a legacy of defiance.' It is this legacy—of tirelessly struggling to right today's wrongs and create a better tomorrow—that the prison system tries, yet fails, to extinguish.

Angela Y. Davis (Author), Curtis Michael Holland, Gary Tiedemann, Krystal Hammond, Mirron Willis (Narrator)

Audiobook

Chromatic

Light is Found in Every Hue Magus is dying from the inside out, and only the destruction of the barrier can save it. Even color magic can't defend against earthquakes, strange weather patterns, and erratic wildlife behavior. After discovering hundreds of captive Yellow magic-users, Ava and Elm fight to set them free. However, new dangers and unexpected enemies await at every turn, forcing them to face their greatest challenges yet. The calamities inside the barrier slowly manifest in the outside world as well, pulling citizens from both sides of the battle into the fray. In this new war, they may not all make it out alive. Elm and Ava must confront the growing darkness and create a future in a world that has been all but stripped of hope. Can Magus be restored, or is it already too late?

Ashley Bustamante (Author), Curtis Michael Holland, Jennifer Jill Araya (Narrator)

Audiobook

Violence Over the Land: Indians and Empires in the Early American West

American Indians remain familiar as icons, yet poorly understood as historical agents. In this ambitious book that ranges across Utah, Nevada, New Mexico, Colorado, and eastern California (a region known as the Great Basin), Ned Blackhawk places Native peoples squarely at the center of a dynamic and complex story as he chronicles two centuries of Indian and imperial history that profoundly shaped the American West. On the distant margins of empire, Great Basin Indians increasingly found themselves engulfed in the chaotic storms of European expansion and responded in ways that refashioned themselves and those around them. Focusing on Ute, Paiute, and Shoshone Indians, Blackhawk illuminates this history through a lens of violence, excavating the myriad impacts of colonial expansion. Brutal networks of trade and slavery forged the Spanish borderlands, and the use of violence became for many Indians a necessary survival strategy, particularly after Mexican Independence when many became raiders and slave traffickers. Throughout such violent processes, these Native communities struggled to adapt to their changing environments, sometimes scoring remarkable political ends while suffering immense reprisals. Violence over the Land is a passionate reminder of the high costs that the making of American history occasioned for many indigenous peoples.

Ned Blackhawk (Author), Curtis Michael Holland (Narrator)

Audiobook

Wandering Stars

Tommy Orange (Author), Alma Cuervo, Calvin Joyal, Charley Flyte, Christian Young, Curtis Michael Holland, Emmanuel Chumaceiro, Macleod Andrews, Phil Ava, Shaun Taylor-Corbett, TBD (Narrator)

Audiobook

Taken to Heimo

Svera There are a few things my Tri-God did not prepare me for. The first? Niahhorru pirates. They want the coordinates to an unprotected human satellite, and I have them. The confusing? The human Council's secrets that I've uncovered and that may get me killed. The most sinful? The pressure in my stomach...well, lower than my stomach...that draws me to the male who hates me most in this universe. Krisxox There's nothing my warrior training did not prepare me for. Even though my body desires to bond to hers, I'll fight until I break it. She's a disgusting human, filthy and impure, a worshipper of a fickle human god and, worst of all, not Drakesh. Nox, that isn't the worst. Worse, is that she's got space pirates, traitors, and other enemies chasing her. Worst, is that I won't let them touch her because she's my Xiv—nox! I'll fight. But fighting is harder when I don't really want to win... Taken to Heimo is a full-length sci-fi space-opera romance complete with an angry alien and a head-scarf-wearing human heroine who is far too polite to meet anger with anger...at least most of the time. It is book 4 in the Xiveri mates series and should be read after books 1 and 2. Books 3, 6, and 8 are complete standalones (on other planets) and can be read at any point. Trigger warning! The heroine in this book is attacked more than once ,and there are multiple violent battle scenes before reaching the HEA.

Elizabeth Stephens (Author), Curtis Michael Holland, Joy Beharie, TBD (Narrator)

Audiobook

Halal Investing for Beginners: How to Start, Grow and Scale Your Halal Investment Portfolio

An intuitive and eye-opening guide to halal investing. In Halal Investing for Beginners: How to Start, Grow and Scale Your Halal Investment Portfolio, a team of Oxford-educated Islamic finance gurus deliver a one-of-a-kind investing roadmap for Muslims who want to watch their savings grow while abiding by Islamic law. You'll learn to distinguish between halal and haram investment products, get key strategies for saving on your taxes, learn to build a variety of portfolios, and more. In the book, the authors introduce and explain the wide variety of investment products available to investors who wish to restrict their financial activity to that which is consistent with Shariah law, including asset categories like equities, gold, art, start-ups, and even property. You'll also find: - Advice for every stage of life, including how to go halal for the first time, how to write an Islamic will, and how to build a halal pension - Portfolio construction guidance for every risk tolerance, from high-growth to low risk - Explanations of the important difference between 'ethical' and 'ESG' investment products and halal investments

Ibrahim Khan, Mohsin Patel (Author), Curtis Michael Holland (Narrator)

Audiobook

Who Needs Gay Bars?: Bar-Hopping through America's Endangered LGBTQ+ Places

Gay bars have been closing by the hundreds. The story goes that increasing mainstream acceptance of LGBTQ+ people, plus dating apps, have rendered these spaces obsolete. Beyond that, rampant gentrification in big cities has pushed gay bars out of the neighborhoods they helped make hip. Who Needs Gay Bars? considers these narratives, accepting that the answer for some might be: maybe nobody. And yet . . . Jarred by the closing of his favorite local watering hole in Cleveland, Ohio, Greggor Mattson embarks on a journey across the country to paint a much more complex picture of the cultural significance of these spaces, inside 'big four' gay cities, but also beyond them. From the historical archives of Seattle's Garden of Allah, to the outpost bars in Texas, Missouri, or Florida that serve as community hubs for queer youth-these are places of celebration, where the next drag superstar may be discovered. They are also fraught grounds for confronting the racial and gender politics within and without the LGBTQ+ community. The question that frames this story is not asking whether these spaces are needed, but for whom, earnestly exploring the diversity of folks and purposes they serve today.

Greggor Mattson Phd, Greggor Mattson, Phd (Author), Curtis Michael Holland (Narrator)

Audiobook

Audiobooks Narrated by Curtis Michael Holland