Free Audiobook: Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder

The Guardian is once again offering several free audio books and today's offer is for Sophie's World by Jostein Gaarder

One day when Sophie comes home from school, she finds two questions in her mail: Who are you? and Where does the world come from? Before she knows it, she is pondering all the great questions of Western Philosophy (from the Greeks to Kant, to Marx and Freud) with a mysterious mentor. But Sophie is also receiving a second batch of equally unusual letters. Who is Hilde? And why does her mail keep turning up in Sophie's world? To solve this riddle, Sophie uses for new knowledge of philosophy, but the truth is far stranger than she could have imagined.

Sophie's World is a mystery that unravels and demystifies the history of philosophy. This unorthodox novel will reawaken everyone's sense of wonder and curiosity about the meaning of life.

Follow this link to download Sophie's World, using the Promo Code - SOPHIE3.


The other two books offered are:

Eat Pray Love Promo Code - EATPRAY1
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance Promo Code - ZENART2

Free Read: Philip K. Dick stories

If you enjoy the writings of Philip K. Dick or you just want to give him a try, take a look at this list, compiled by Open Culture, of free stories and audio books by Dick, available on the web.

• “Beyond the Door” – Multiple formats – iTunes
  • First published in 1954, the text is not usually found in collections of Dick’s writings.
• “Beyond Lies the Wub” – Multiple formats – iTunes
  • Dick’s first published story. Originally appeared in Planet Stories in July, 1952.
• “Mr. Spaceship” – Multiple Formats
  • Appeared first in Imagination in 1953, and later in The Collected Stories of Philip K. Dick.
• “Piper in the Woods” – Multiple Formats
  • First published in 1953 in the fantasy and science fiction magazine, Imagination.
• “Second Variety” – Multiple Formats
  • Influential short story first published in Space Science Fiction Magazine in May 1953.
• “The Crystal Crypt” – Multiple Formats
  • Sci-fi story published in the January 1952 edition of Planet Stories

See the full list here

Free Audio Books from Random House

Random House is currently offering three free audiobooks to anyone that signs up for their newsletter (though I think you can actually download the books without signing up for it). The books being offered are:



White Cat by Holly Black ( I read this one and enjoyed it)

Nate the Great Goes Undercover by Marjorie Weinman Sharmat

Survival by Louis L'Amour

For more information visit the Random House website.

Free Audio Books for the Summer

Each week throughout the summer Sync is offering two free audio books, which can be downloaded through their site. This week's titles are:

Revenge of the Witch (The Last Apprentice)
by Joseph Delaney

Capturing witches
Binding boggarts
Driving away ghosts

For years, Old Gregory has been the Spook for the county, ridding the local villages of evil. Now his time is coming to an end. But who will take over for him? Twenty-nine apprentices have tried–some floundered, some fled, some failed to stay alive.

Only Thomas Ward is left. He's the last hope; the last apprentice.

Can Thomas succeed? Will he learn the difference between a benign witch and a malevolent one? Does the Spook's warning against girls with pointy shoes include Alice? And what will happen if Thomas accidentally frees Mother Malkin, the most evil witch in the county ... ?

Beowulf - translated by Francis B. Gummere


" Tis better to die than to live in shame." The oldest existing story written in Old English, "Beowulf" is the classic tale of courage and honor. In the Great Hall of Hrothgar, King of the Danes, the warrior Beowulf, son of a Swedish King, wages battle with the monster Grendel.

Beowulf is an Old English heroic elegy, of anonymous authorship, assigned to the period 700-750, or to the time of composition of the only manuscript, circa 1010. At 3,183 lines, the poem is notable for its length. The poem is untitled in the manuscript, but has been known as Beowulf since the early 19th century. As the single major surviving work of Anglo-Saxon heroic poetry, the work — in spite of dealing primarily with Scandinavian matters — has risen to such prominence that it has become "England's national epos."

In the poem, Beowulf, a hero of the Geats, battles three antagonists: Grendel, who is destroying Heorot and its inhabitants in Denmark, Grendel's mother, and later in life (after he is King) a dragon.

Both books can be downloaded here

 And these are the titles that will be offered in the upcoming weeks:

Available July 21 - July 27

Chanda's Secrets by Allan Stratton
Tess of the D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy

Available July 28 - August 3

Ashes, Ashes by Jo Treggiari
Rescue: Stories of Survival From Land and Sea by Dorcas S. Miller [Ed.]

Available August 4 - August 10

Immortal by Gillian Shields
Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë

Available August 11 - August 17

Storm Runners by Roland Smith
The Cay by Theodore Taylor

For those of you who have never tried out an audio book before, this is a great opportunity to do so.

Free Audio Download: Full Dark, No Stars by Stephen King

As a promotion for Stephen King's new short story collection, Full Dark, No Stars, Scribner is releasing an audiobook sample of four different stories from the book, every week between October 12th and November 2nd.

So far, the stories released include 1922, Big Driver and Fair Extension. Next week A Good Marriage will available for download as well. The short stories can be downloaded as mp3 files, or they can be streamed through the online player.

Publisher's Description: I believe there is another man inside every man, a stranger . . ." writes Wilfred Leland James in the early pages of the riveting confession that makes up "1922," the first in this pitch-black quartet of mesmerizing tales from Stephen King. For James, that stranger is awakened when his wife, Arlette, proposes selling off the family homestead and moving to Omaha, setting in motion a gruesome train of murder and madness.

In "Big Driver," a cozy-mystery writer named Tess encounters the stranger along a back road in Massachusetts when she takes a shortcut home after a book-club engagement. Violated and left for dead, Tess plots a revenge that will bring her face-to-face with another stranger: the one inside herself.

"Fair Extension," the shortest of these tales, is perhaps the nastiest and certainly the funniest. Making a deal with the devil not only saves Dave Streeter from a fatal cancer but provides rich recompense for a lifetime of resentment.

When her husband of more than twenty years is away on one of his business trips, Darcy Anderson looks for batteries in the garage. Her toe knocks up against a box under a worktable and she discovers the stranger inside her husband. It's a horrifying discovery, rendered with bristling intensity, and it definitively ends a good marriage.

Follow this link to listen to the audio book samples from Full Dark, No Stars

Free Audio Book: Matter by Iain M. Banks

Today is the second day of The Guardian and Observer's week of free audio book giveaways and the book being offered for download is Matter by Iain M. Banks.

In a world renowned even within a galaxy full of wonders, a crime within a war. For one brother it means a desperate flight, and a search for the one - maybe two - people who could clear his name. For his brother it means a life lived under constant threat of treachery and murder. And for their sister, even without knowing the full truth, it means returning to a place she'd thought abandoned forever.

Only the sister is not what she once was; Djan Seriy Anaplian has changed almost beyond recognition to become an agent of the Culture's Special Circumstances section, charged with high-level interference in civilizations throughout the greater galaxy.

Concealing her new identity - and her particular set of abilities - might be a dangerous strategy, however. In the world to which Anaplian returns, nothing is quite as it seems; and determining the appropriate level of interference in someone else's war is never a simple matter.

Unlike yesterday's book, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, which turned out to be an abridged version of the book (to my great disappointment) today's download is unabridged.

To download the audio version of Matter for free, follow this link.
As I mentioned yesterday, you do need an Audible UK account to be able to download the audio book but it shouldn't be any problem to set up

Free Audiobooks: The Hunger Games & The Lottery

For one week only, these two awesome audiobooks are available for free download over at Audiobookcommunity.

Katniss is a 16-year-old girl living with her mother and younger sister in the poorest district of Panem, the remains of what used be the United States. Long ago the districts waged war on the Capitol and were defeated. As part of the surrender terms, each district agreed to send one boy and one girl to appear in an annual televised event called, "The Hunger Games." The terrain, rules, and level of audience participation may change but one thing is constant: kill or be killed. When Kat's sister is chosen by lottery, Kat steps up to go in her place.

NARRATED by Carolyn McCormick

Who can forget the first time they heard the story? Considered one of the masterpieces of American literature, "The Lottery" created a sensation when it was first published in The New Yorker. Since then it has become one of the most anthologized stories in American literature. Powerful and haunting, subtle and horrifying, the tale demonstrates Shirley Jackson's mastery of storytelling. This one-of-a-kind audio collection, from the only anthology published during the author's lifetime, unites "The Lottery" with seven other equally unique stories. Jackson reveals the hidden evils of the human mind and society in these compelling stories. Carol Stewart, an award-winning reader, combines her extensive background as a voice talent for audiobooks with her deft sense of delivery, tone, and pacing to illuminate Jackson's uncommon characters and storytelling artistry. Winner of the 1998 Publishers Weekly "Listen Up Award" for short stories, "chosen for content, narration, production values, packaging...demonstrates the vitality of what this still-growing industry has to offer."

To download these two audio books visit audiobookcommunity.com