Audiobooks narrated by Ian Esmo

Iron Man: The Cal Ripken, Jr., Story Audiobook

In 1995, Cal Ripken, Jr. succeeded in toppling baseball’s most unbreakable streak of 2,130 consecutive games played. He has also won the 1982 Rookie of the Year Award, two American League MVP awards, an All-Star Game MVP award, two Gold Gloves, and a World Series title. This is the story of Junior’s ascent to superstardom. What was it like playing baseball with a father as manager and a brother as a double-play combination? How did his father’s firing and his brother’s trade affect him? What made him choose the strike over the Streak? His story captures the grit and determination it took to become one of the greatest shortstops ever to play the game of baseball. “A solid biography that will be in great demand.”—Booklist

Harvey Rosenfeld (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

If I Knew Then What I Know Now: CEOs and Other Smart Executives Share Wisdom They Wish They'd Been T

Experience is the best teacher. If only it didn't take so long! And if only you didn't have to suffer the consequences while learning your lessons. Now you don't. The answers for many of them are collected in this recording. That's because Richard Edler has tracked them down along with some of the questions that are worth knowing, posing, and pondering. He's done so by consulting those in a position to know: successful business people, seasoned CEOs, and others. To each he's posed a simple question: What do you know now that you wish you knew twenty-five years ago? The result is a compendium that will spare you a lifetime of "shoulda," "coulda," and "woulda." “This conversationally written book would make a fine gift for an ambitious and philosophical friend.”—Publishers Weekly

Richard Edler (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Rainbow Trail

Three desperate people who had fled Mormon persecution were being held prisoner in a lost canyon. Among them was a beautiful lady named Fay Larkin, whom John Shefford was in love with. The secret to the canyon lay in a hidden Mormon village of "sealed" wives, where the penalty for trespassing was death. And the treacherous half-breed Shad and his murderous crew were blocking the way to the village. The tenderfoot Shefford was desperate to rescue his lady. To accomplish this was no easy task, especially considering he didn't even pack a gun. He would have to fight his way to the canyon, knowing that his efforts might end in bloody slaughter. "[Zane Grey is] an amazingly significant literary phenomenon."-Hamlin Garland

Zane Grey (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

Cobb: A Biography

As a boy in the 1890s, he went looking for thrills in a rural Georgia that still burned with the humiliation of the Civil War. As an old man in the 1960s, he dared death, picked fights, refused to take his medicine, and drove off all his friends and admirers. He went to his deathbed alone, clutching a loaded pistol and a bag containing millions of dollars' worth of cash and securities. During the years in between, he was, according to Al Stump, 'the most shrewd, inventive, lurid, detested, mysterious, and superb of all baseball players.' He was Ty Cobb. Al Stump tells how the dying Cobb hired him in 1960 to ghostwrite his autobiography, giving him a fascinating window into the life and times of the Georgia Peach. 'Cobb is a big, raw, rough-cut diamond of a book and the most powerful baseball biography I have read. More than a baseball story, it is an account of life and death. Strong as the baseball scenes are, it is Cobb in his last days'defiant, angry, drunken, prayerful, brave, and desperate to be remembered'that is so haunting and so memorable and so terrifying.''Roger Kahn, New York Times bestselling author of The Boys of Summer

Al Stump (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

Diary of a Dirty Little War: The Spanish-American War of 1898

From its beginnings, America has acted out much of its history on the battlefront. Yet for the average American, little is known of the Spanish-American War. The reasons for our entry never seemed compelling-at times, yellow fever seemed more the enemy than did Spanish troops-and the United States was ill prepared for the venture. Nevertheless, this conflict served to unify a country that only thirty years before had been hopelessly divided by civil strife. This colorful account reveals how every aspect of American life was ultimately touched by the war. War heroes abounded in the Spanish-American war: George Dewey, Richmond Pearson Hobson, Joe Wheeler, William T. Sampson, and of course, Teddy Roosevelt and his Rough Riders. Rosenfeld strikes a balance between scholarly and popular writing, bringing to life a war that has often been overlooked. "Rosenfeld brings in an impressive worldwide scope. What unfolds is a living history enthusiast's dream, a cornucopia of the way things really were at a specific time in a particular place!"-Reviewers Consortium

Harvey Rosenfeld (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

Cobb: A Biography

As a boy in the 1890s, he went looking for thrills in a rural Georgia that still burned with the humiliation of the Civil War. As an old man in the 1960s, he dared death, picked fights, refused to take his medicine, and drove off all his friends and admirers. He went to his deathbed alone, clutching a loaded pistol and a bag containing millions of dollars' worth of cash and securities. During the years in between, he was, according to Al Stump, 'the most shrewd, inventive, lurid, detested, mysterious, and superb of all baseball players.' He was Ty Cobb. Al Stump has redefined America's perception of one of its most famous sports heroes with this gripping look at Ty Cobb, a man who walked the line between greatness and psychosis. Based on Stump's interviews with Cobb while ghostwriting the Hall of Famer's 1961 autobiography, this account of Cobb's life and times reveals both the darkness and the brilliance of the 'Georgia Peach'.

Al Stump (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

Still a Legend: The Story of Roger Maris

This book recounts the slugger Roger Maris's life before, during, and after his headline season of 1961, when the taciturn North Dakota native topped Babe Ruth's all-time record by hitting sixty-one homers. From his youth as a star high-school athlete and American Legion baseball player, Maris went on to big-time sports with the Cleveland Indians, Kansas City Athletics, New York Yankees, and St. Louis Cardinals. Author Rosenfeld argues that Roger's treatment by the press was both shabby and tragic and that Maris's midwestern modesty and his strength, his need for privacy, and his straightforward bluntness were often wrongly interpreted as arrogance and sullenness, a factor that led many to downplay his claim on the record books.

Harvey Rosenfeld (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

Honus Wagner

Honus Wagner was the first American sports superstar of the twentieth century. One of the first five players to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in its first year in 1939, he was probably the best shortstop in baseball's history. His great career, which stretched from 1895 to 1917, most of it with the Pittsburgh Pirates, occurred simultaneously with the dawn of baseball as a popular entertainment. His 1909 baseball card, one of which sold for $451,000, is a holy grail of American memorabilia. This first major biography shows why Wagner was America's favorite image of sport during baseball's transition to the modern era. "A valuable book for baseball fans, this is the most comprehensive biography of Wagner.... Esmo's reading is as relaxing as a summer afternoon. His voice has a soothing quality that makes the book interesting and informative."-AudioFile

Dennis DeValeria, Jeanne DeValeria (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

Rogers Hornsby

In the 1920s, Rogers Hornsby was the National League's foremost star, its biggest since Honus Wagner-and its principal answer to the American League's Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb. He was a seven-time National League batting champion, and his 1924 average remains the major-league high for this century. From his Texas childhood until his death in 1962, Hornsby lived his entire life in the world of baseball, building a legend through his remarkable involvement in every phase of the sport. His career as a player, manager, and instructor was spectacular in its unpredictability, and the story of his life chronicles the golden age of baseball. "The long-overdue study of one of baseball's most important and most enigmatic figures....Anyone seriously interested in the history of baseball...will want to add this soundly researched and very readable volume to his library."-St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Charles C. Alexander (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

Sandra Nichols Found Dead

A dead body discovered in a rural Massachusetts wetland turns out to belong to a woman with a past: Sandra Nichols, missing for seven months. Wrongful death? Murder one? We'll leave that to Jerry Kennedy. Judge Henry Lawler has his own reasons for appointing classmate Jerry Kennedy to try the case of the Estate of Sandra Nichols v. Peter Wade, on behalf of Sandra's three orphaned children. An old hand at criminal cases, Jerry makes an exception for Judge Henry to try this civil case; after all, what are friends for if not to impose on a guy? Inasmuch as Sandra was murdered several months before her body was found, alibis are fairly easy to come by-even for Peter Wade, her ex, who is the most likely suspect. Since the evidence is too elusive to establish Wade's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, wrongful death is the easier verdict; Jerry just needs to make Wade's guilt 51% certain. "Face it: Higgins isn't a novelist, he's a magician."-Booklist

George V. Higgins (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

Honus Wagner

Honus Wagner, whose career in baseball stretched from 1895 to 1917, was the first American sports superstar of the twentieth century. One of the first five players to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in its first year (1939), he was arguably the best shortstop in baseball history. His great career and the dawn of baseball as a popular entertainment occurred simultaneously, and he has become an icon of the early game; his 1909 baseball card, one of which sold for $451,000, is a holy grail of American memorabilia. This first major biography shows why Wagner was America's favorite image of sport during baseball's transition to the modern era.

Dennis Devaleria, Jeanne Burke Devaleria (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

Still a Legend: The Story of Roger Maris

This book recounts the slugger Roger Maris' life before, during, and after his headline season of 1961, when the taciturn North Dakota native topped Babe Ruth's all-time record by hitting sixty-one home runs. From his youth as a star high-school athlete and American Legion baseball player, Maris's went on to play for the Cleveland Indians, the Kansas City Athletics, the New York Yankees, and the St. Louis Cardinals. Author Rosenfeld argues that Maris's treatment by the press was both shabby and tragic, and that the famous player's Mid-western modesty, need for privacy, and straightforward nature were often wrongly interpreted as arrogance and sullenness—a factor that led many to downplay his claim on the record books. Rosenfeld makes a forceful case for awarding Maris a place in the Baseball Hall of Fame, three decades after his record-breaking 1961 season with the New York Yankees.

Harvey Rosenfeld (Author), Ian Esmo (Narrator)

Audiobook

Audiobooks Narrated by Ian Esmo