Patrick Wells

4 books read for LibriVox

filter sort genre era audiobooks

Facing the Flag Jules Verne, translated by F. Tennyson Neely
Lesser-known Verne, but fun: a half-mad inventor with a doomsday weapon gets kidnapped to a pirate's hideout inside a hollow island, and you watch it all through his keeper's secret diary. Pulpy and a bit stiff in places, though the villain's lair alone earns its keep.
The Child of the Cavern Jules Verne, translated by Vincent Parke and Company
You’re here for Jules Verne’s fascination with machinery, mines, and whole communities hidden underground, with engineer James Starr and the mysterious Nell giving the adventure some human warmth. The suspense is old-fashioned and occasionally creaky, but the coal-lit setting stays wonderfully strange.
The Social Contract Jean-Jacques Rousseau, translated by G. D. H. Cole non-fiction
You get a bracing argument about political freedom, especially in Rousseau’s insistence that obeying laws you help make is different from submitting to a ruler. The prose can feel abstract and combative, but his questions about inequality, citizenship, and the general will keep needling you afterward.
Topsy-Turvy Jules Verne, translated by J. G. Ogilvie
Verne in a mischievous mood: the same gun club from the moon adventure buys the North Pole and plans to tilt the Earth's axis with one colossal cannon shot, and nobody stops to ask if they should. Short, dry, and funnier than his reputation suggests, though heavy on arithmetic.

4 books read for LibriVox

filter sort genre era audiobooks

Facing the Flag Jules Verne, translated by F. Tennyson Neely
Lesser-known Verne, but fun: a half-mad inventor with a doomsday weapon gets kidnapped to a pirate's hideout inside a hollow island, and you watch it all through his keeper's secret diary. Pulpy and a bit stiff in places, though the villain's lair alone earns its keep.
The Child of the Cavern Jules Verne, translated by Vincent Parke and Company
You’re here for Jules Verne’s fascination with machinery, mines, and whole communities hidden underground, with engineer James Starr and the mysterious Nell giving the adventure some human warmth. The suspense is old-fashioned and occasionally creaky, but the coal-lit setting stays wonderfully strange.
The Social Contract Jean-Jacques Rousseau, translated by G. D. H. Cole non-fiction
You get a bracing argument about political freedom, especially in Rousseau’s insistence that obeying laws you help make is different from submitting to a ruler. The prose can feel abstract and combative, but his questions about inequality, citizenship, and the general will keep needling you afterward.
Topsy-Turvy Jules Verne, translated by J. G. Ogilvie
Verne in a mischievous mood: the same gun club from the moon adventure buys the North Pole and plans to tilt the Earth's axis with one colossal cannon shot, and nobody stops to ask if they should. Short, dry, and funnier than his reputation suggests, though heavy on arithmetic.