Listen to an excerpt of Andrea Marcum's CLOSE TO OM audiobook, read by the author.

Andrea Marcum's Close to Om is a practical and philosophical yoga audiobook that promotes and teaches mindfulness in both your yoga practice and your everyday life.

Before Marcum was a sought after celebrity yoga teacher, she was someone who thought she couldn’t do yoga because she couldn’t be still. Now after sixteen years of teaching yoga, she works with network executives, global brands, Hollywood actresses, and everyone in between.

Yoga is the yoke of body, mind, and spirit, and in Close to Om, Marcum offers a guide to teach all three aspects of yoga showcasing Marcum’s signature unique style, this program combines the teaching of poses with the exploration of yoga philosophy and insight into meditation and mindfulness.

By the end of Close to Om, listeners will not only know a lot about yoga and its poses, but they’ll also know more about themselves: who they are, what they want, and how to get there—on and off their mat. The progression in Close to Om is the architecture of every yoga practice—and will show listeners that how they do their yoga is how they do their life.

Buy the audiobook

Close to Om by Andrea Marcum | Meditation 1

This is an excerpt from the audiobook EDUCATED by Tara Westover, narrated by Julia Whelan.

Learn more about EDUCATED here: https://bit.ly/2H4QypA

An unforgettable memoir about a young girl who, kept out of school, leaves her survivalist family and goes on to earn a PhD from Cambridge University &ldquo;Tara&rsquo;s story will find a place alongside modern classic memoirs like Wild and The Glass Castle. It&rsquo;s that special.&rdquo;&mdash;Susannah Cahalan, author of Brain on Fire Tara Westover was seventeen the first time she set foot in a classroom. Born to survivalists in the mountains of Idaho, she prepared for the end of the world by stockpiling home-canned peaches and sleeping with her &ldquo;head-for-the-hills&rdquo; bag. In the summer she stewed herbs for her mother, a midwife and healer, and in the winter she salvaged metal in her father&rsquo;s junkyard. Her father distrusted the medical establishment, so Tara never saw a doctor or nurse. Gashes and concussions, even burns from explosions, were all treated at home with herbalism. The family was so isolated from mainstream society that there was no one to ensure the children received an education, and no one to intervene when an older brother became violent. When another brother got himself into college and came back with news of the world beyond the mountain, Tara decided to try a new kind of life. She taught herself enough mathematics, grammar, and science to take the ACT and was admitted to Brigham Young University. There, she studied psychology, politics, philosophy, and history, learning for the first time about pivotal world events like the Holocaust and the Civil Rights Movement. Her quest for knowledge transformed her, taking her over oceans and across continents, to Harvard and to Cambridge University. Only then would she wonder if she&rsquo;d traveled too far, if there was still a way home. Educated is an account of the struggle for self-invention. It is a tale of fierce family loyalty, and of the grief that comes from severing ties with those closest to you. With the acute insight that distinguishes all great writers, Westover has crafted a universal coming-of-age story that gets to the heart of what an education is and what it offers: the perspective to see one&rsquo;s life through new eyes, and the will to change it. &ldquo;A punch to the gut, a slow burn, a savage indictment, a love letter: Educated somehow contrives to be all these things at once. Tara Westover guides us through the extraordinary Western landscape of her coming of age, and in clear, tender prose makes us feel what she felt, growing up among fanatics.&rdquo;&mdash;Claire Dederer, author of Love and Trouble

Educated by Tara Westover, read by Julia Whelan

From the National Book Award-winning author of Just Kids and M Train, a profound, beautifully realized memoir in which dreams and reality are vividly woven into a tapestry of one transformative year. Following a run of New Year's concerts at San Francisco's legendary Fillmore, Patti Smith finds herself tramping the coast of Santa Cruz, about to embark on a year of solitary wandering. Unfettered by logic or time, she draws us into her private wonderland with no design, yet heeding signs--including a talking sign that looms above her, prodding and sparring like the Cheshire Cat. In February, a surreal lunar year begins, bringing with it unexpected turns, heightened mischief, and inescapable sorrow. In a stranger's words, "Anything is possible: after all, it's the Year of the Monkey." For Smith--inveterately curious, always exploring, tracking thoughts, writing--the year evolves as one of reckoning with the changes in life's gyre: with loss, aging, and a dramatic shift in the political landscape of America. Smith melds the western landscape with her own dreamscape. Taking us from California to the Arizona desert; to a Kentucky farm as the amanuensis of a friend in crisis; to the hospital room of a valued mentor; and by turns to remembered and imagined places, this haunting memoir blends fact and fiction with poetic mastery. The unexpected happens; grief and disillusionment set in. But as Smith heads toward a new decade in her own life, she offers this balm to the reader: her wisdom, wit, gimlet eye, and above all, a rugged hope for a better world. Riveting, elegant, often humorous, illustrated by Smith's signature Polaroids, Year of the Monkey is a moving and original work, a touchstone for our turbulent times.

Year of the Monkey by Patti Smith, read by Patti Smith

In a dramatic account of violence and espionage, Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter Ronan Farrow exposes serial abusers and a cabal of powerful interests hell-bent on covering up the truth, at any cost.

In 2017, a routine network television investigation led Ronan Farrow to a story only whispered about: one of Hollywood's most powerful producers was a predator, protected by fear, wealth, and a conspiracy of silence. As Farrow drew closer to the truth, shadowy operatives, from high-priced lawyers to elite war-hardened spies, mounted a secret campaign of intimidation, threatening his career, following his every move, and weaponizing an account of abuse in his own family.

All the while, Farrow and his producer faced a degree of resistance they could not explain -- until now. And a trail of clues revealed corruption and cover-ups from Hollywood to Washington and beyond.

This is the untold story of the exotic tactics of surveillance and intimidation deployed by wealthy and connected men to threaten journalists, evade accountability, and silence victims of abuse. And it's the story of the women who risked everything to expose the truth and spark a global movement.

Both a spy thriller and a meticulous work of investigative journalism, Catch and Kill breaks devastating new stories about the rampant abuse of power and sheds far-reaching light on investigations that shook our culture.

Available October 15, 2019 from Hachette Audio as a digital download, and in Print and Ebook from Little, Brown & Company. 

Download: 
https://www.downpour.com/the-making-of-world-wars
https://audiobookstore.com/audiobooks/catch-and-kill.aspx
https://www.audible.com/pd/Catch-and-Kill-Audiobook/1549170848?qid=1569872588&sr=1-1&pf_rd_p=e81b7c27-6880-467a-b5a7-13cef5d729fe&pf_rd_r=DN94Q29D1G0QDJFY0QE7&ref=a_search_c3_lProduct_1_1
https://play.google.com/store/audiobooks/details/Ronan_Farrow_Catch_and_Kill?id=AQAAAEAsjgbOOM
https://libro.fm/audiobooks/9781549170843-catch-and-kill
https://www.audiobooks.com/audiobook/catch-and-kill-lies-spies-and-a-conspiracy-to-protect-predators/398673
https://www.nookaudiobooks.com/audiobook/295721/catch-and-kill
https://www.estories.com/audiobook/302662/Ronan-Farrow_Walter-Stevenson/Catch-and-Kill
https://www.kobo.com/us/en/audiobook/catch-and-kill-5
https://books.apple.com/us/audiobook/catch-and-kill/id1481699947

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CATCH AND KILL by Ronan Farrow Read by Author - Audiobook Excerpt

The founder of a female-focused recovery program offers a radical new path to sobriety. &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t know how much you need this book, or maybe you do. Either way, it will save your life.&rdquo;&mdash;Melissa Hartwig Urban, Whole30 co-founder and CEO We live in a world obsessed with drinking. We drink at baby showers and work events, brunch and book club, graduations and funerals. Yet no one ever questions alcohol&rsquo;s ubiquity&mdash;in fact, the only thing ever questioned is why someone doesn&rsquo;t drink. It is a qualifier for belonging and if you don&rsquo;t imbibe, you are considered an anomaly. As a society, we are obsessed with health and wellness, yet we uphold alcohol as some kind of magic elixir, though it is anything but. When Holly Whitaker decided to seek help after one too many benders, she embarked on a journey that led not only to her own sobriety, but revealed the insidious role alcohol plays in our society and in the lives of women in particular. What&rsquo;s more, she could not ignore the ways that alcohol companies were targeting women, just as the tobacco industry had successfully done generations before. Fueled by her own emerging feminism, she also realized that the predominant systems of recovery are archaic, patriarchal, and ineffective for the unique needs of women and other historically oppressed people&mdash;who don&rsquo;t need to lose their egos and surrender to a male concept of God, as the tenets of Alcoholics Anonymous state, but who need to cultivate a deeper understanding of their own identities and take control of their lives. When Holly found an alternate way out of her own addiction, she felt a calling to create a sober community with resources for anyone questioning their relationship with drinking, so that they might find their way as well. Her resultant feminine-centric recovery program focuses on getting at the root causes that lead people to overindulge and provides the tools necessary to break the cycle of addiction, showing us what is possible when we remove alcohol and destroy our belief system around it. Written in a relatable voice that is honest and witty, Quit Like a Woman is at once a groundbreaking look at drinking culture and a road map to cutting out alcohol in order to live our best lives without the crutch of intoxication. You will never look at drinking the same way again.

Quit Like a Woman by Holly Whitaker, read by Holly Whitaker

Like a lot of people, lockdown has made us think about intimacy. As separation from our loved ones drags on, we're all having to find different ways to connect, and in this socially distant reality, intimacy feels more necessary than ever - however we can get it (hot tip: books are good!). Writing and reading can be intimate acts, so for this episode we'll be discussing what intimacy means in literature, which writers - from Henry James to Sally Rooney to Maggie Nelson - have been able to capture it, and what it means to write in an intimate way. Our guest this month is Garth Greenwell, a writer whose work chronicles and explores intimacy in many forms, so he couldn't be a better person to talk to. His second book, Cleanness, follows an American teacher living in Sofia, Bulgaria as he navigates relationships with his students, love and sex. Listen in for our interview with Garth, our thoughts about intimacy in literature, and all the usual recommendations. Come closer, let us put our arms around you, and get enveloped for the next hour by Literary Friction. 

Recommendations on the theme, Intimacy: 
Octavia: The Argonauts by Maggie Nelson https://www.graywolfpress.org/books/argonauts
Carrie: Giovanni’s Room by James Baldwin https://www.penguin.co.uk/books/573/57368/giovanni-s-room/9780141186351.html

General Recommendations:
Octavia: This Brutal House by Niven Govinden https://www.hachette.co.uk/titles/niven-govinden/this-brutal-house/9780349700687/
Garth: Where Reasons End by Yiyun Li https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/594959/where-reasons-end-by-yiyun-li/
Carrie: The Years by Annie Ernaux https://fitzcarraldoeditions.com/books/the-years

Email us: litfriction@gmail.com
Tweet us & find us on Instagram: @litfriction 
This episode is sponsored by Picador https://www.panmacmillan.com/picador

Literary Friction - Intimacy With Garth Greenwell

When did America give up on fairness?&#160;The&#160;New York Times&#160;bestselling author of&#160;Fantasyland&#160;tells the epic history of&#160;how America decided that big business gets whatever it wants, only the rich get richer, and nothing should ever&#160;change&mdash;and charts a way back to the future. &#160; &ldquo;The one book everyone must read as we figure out how to rebuild our country.&rdquo;&mdash;Walter Isaacson, author of&#160;Steve Jobs&#160;and&#160;Leonardo da Vinci During the twentieth century, America managed to make its economic and social systems both more and more fair and more and more prosperous. A huge, secure, and contented middle class emerged. All boats rose together. But then the New Deal gave way to the Raw Deal. Beginning in the early 1970s, by means of a long war conceived of and executed by a confederacy of big business CEOs, the superrich, and right-wing zealots, the rules and norms that made the American middle class possible were undermined and dismantled. The clock was turned back on a century of economic progress, making greed good, workers powerless, and the market all-powerful while weaponizing nostalgia, lifting up an oligarchy that served only its own interests, and leaving the huge majority of Americans with dwindling economic prospects and hope. Why and how did America take such a wrong turn? In this deeply researched and brilliantly woven cultural, economic, and political chronicle, Kurt Andersen&#160;offers a fresh, provocative, and eye-opening history of America&rsquo;s undoing, naming names, showing receipts, and unsparingly assigning blame&mdash;to the radical right in economics and the law, the high priests of high finance, a complacent and complicit Establishment, and liberal &ldquo;useful idiots,&rdquo; among whom he includes himself. Only a writer with Andersen&rsquo;s crackling energy, deep insight, and ability to connect disparate dots and see complex systems with clarity could make such a book both intellectually formidable and vastly entertaining. And only a writer of Andersen&rsquo;s vision could reckon with our current high-stakes inflection point, and show the way out of this man-made disaster.

Evil Geniuses by Kurt Andersen, read by Kurt Andersen

We're still on our summer break, so we wanted to use this chance to bring you a re-run of one of our favourite shows from our archive. In 2018, we spoke to Thomas Page McBee about his book Amateur, which tells the true story of his quest to become the first trans man to box at Madison Square Garden in New York City. The theme of the show is Masculinity: what makes a man? Why do men fight? Is there a crisis of masculinity? These are some of the questions that authors from Ernest Hemingway to Grayson Perry have asked, and questions that Thomas Page McBee addresses head on in his searching, beautiful and wise book.

Literary Friction - RE-RUN: Masculinity with Thomas Page McBee

Will Harris and Nick Makoha, prizewinning poets both, talk about Nick’s poems in the spring 2020 issue of The Poetry Review and how these poems exemplify his interest in song, story and myth, the parameters of self, reconfiguring the problem of the white lens, and how the act of writing poems produces unlooked-for discoveries. Nick gives electrifying readings of his poems ‘Codex 1’ and Codex 2, both published in the Review, and ‘Bird In Flames’ from his Forward-shortlisted debut Kingdom of Gravity.

Nick Makoha talks to Will Harris

Listen to an excerpt from ANXIOUS PEOPLE by Fredrik Backman and read by Marin Ireland

ANXIOUS PEOPLE Audiobook Excerpt

Listen to an excerpt from DARK TIDES by Philippa Gregory and read by Louise Brealey

Close to Om by Andrea Marcum | Meditation 1

MacmillanAudio