History, on the surface, doesn't seem like a great subject for audiobooks. Getting through almost any serious work of history involves some speed reading, as it's not unusual for award-winning books like Mary Fulbrook's Reckonings, the winner of the 2019 Wolfson Prize, to stretch to 500+ pages. (And if you're working your way through a tome by the Annales school of historians, you'd be getting off lightly with 500 pages).
Below is a list of all the most recommended titles in our history book section, specially selected so they are also manageable as audiobooks.
The Only Plane in the Sky: An Oral History of September 11, 2001
by Garrett Graff
The Only Plane in the Sky is nothing less than the first comprehensive oral history of 9/11, told by the voices of ordinary people grappling with unimaginable events. Using never-before-published transcripts, newly declassified documents, and heart wrenching interviews from nearly five hundred people, historian Garrett Graff sets out the story of the day as it was lived.
The book begins on the day prior to September 11th 2001, and then continues into the weeks and months following the harrowing tragedy.
Ordinary Men
by Christopher Browning
How was it that a group of middle-aged men from Hamburg, most not even members of the Nazi party, led by a 53-year-old career policeman, carried out some of the worst atrocities of the Holocaust? Ordinary Men by American historian Christopher Browning, first published in 1992, sifts through their testimony to try and find some answers. In doing so, it reveals some unsettling truths for any human being reading its pages.
Narrator: Kevin Gallagher
Length: 10 hours
The Spy and the Traitor
by Ben Macintyre
The Spy and the Traitor by British journalist Ben MacIntyre is a true story which reads like a thriller. It’s the story of Oleg Gordievsky, a Soviet KGB officer who became a double agent and worked for Britain’s CIA equivalent, MI6. He’s also the only double agent Britain ever managed to get out of the Soviet Union alive. John le Carré called The Spy and the Traitor the “best true spy story” he had ever read, and it was shortlisted for the prestigious Baillie Gifford Prize as one of the best nonfiction books of 2018. If that’s not enough of a reason to start listening, Five Books CEO Juliet Frost says it’s the best audiobook she’s listened to all year.
Narrator: Ben MacIntryre
Length: 14 hours and 32 minutes
Clausewitz's on War: A Biography
by Hew Strachan
Clausewitz’s On War is one of our most recommended history books and clearly a vital book to read if you take history seriously. It’s quite hard to listen to as an audiobook, however. As a result, we recommend listening, instead, to the audiobook of Clausewitz’s on War: A Biography by military historian Sir Hew Strachan. It’s part of a series called ‘books that changed the world’ published by Grove Atlantic. It’s fascinating—not least to see how the reputation of an important book evolves over time.
Narrator: Simon Vance
Length: 5 hours and 28 minutes
The Return of Martin Guerre
by Natalie Zemon Davis
A perfect history short listen. “This book tells the fascinating story of Martin Guerre: a mysterious tale of imposture, love, and honour among sixteenth-century French peasants. It is a brilliant bit of historical detective work and a captivating read that plunges the reader deep into the world of the past.” says Suzannah Lipscomb.
Narrator: Sarah Mollo-Christensen
Length: 3 hours and 35 minutes
First Light
by Geoffrey Wellum
This is the memoir of one of the youngest British fighter pilots to take part in World War II about his experiences. It explains exactly what it was like: the camaraderie, the fear, the emotions, how he was recruited, what it’s like to fly a Spitfire. The audiobook is convincingly narrated in an understated, stiff upper lip, British way.
Narrator: Andrew Brooke
Length: 11 hours and 29 minutes
The Histories
by Herodotus
A great history listen of the earliest continuous Greek text in prose to survive.
Narrator: David Timson
Length: 27 hours and 28 minutes
Life and Fate
by Vasily Grossman and translated by Robert Chandler
Life and Fate, the masterpiece by Soviet writer Vasily Grossman, is one of our most recommended books (even in history book interviews—even though it's a novel). Modeled on Tolstoy's War and Peace, it bore witness to the horrors of both the Soviet experience of World War II and the Holocaust. Sadly for Grossman, it was considered too harmful to be published in his lifetime.
If you want to listen to Life and Fate as an audiobook, there's no unabridged version, BUT there is a dramatised version, starring Kenneth Branagh and David Tennant, that lasts a manageable 8 hours.
(Stalingrad is the precursor to Life and Fate, newly translated into English.)
The Things They Carried
by Tim O’ Brien
The Things They Carried is a semi-fictional collection of short stories about an American platoon in the Vietnam War.
Narrator: Bryan Cranston
Length: 7 hours and 47 minutes
“White House Diary is interesting. It’s a focused part of the time that he was in the White House. It’s shorter than some of the other books we’ve been discussing, it’s not an exhaustive look at his presidency.” Read more...
“Much as I’m not a big fan of George W. Bush for his politics, it was an important time in history, and his take on it is important too, and hearing him talk about it.” Read more...
“He has a very good presentational style…My Life follows very much the form of mixing personal and political life, which, of course, is completely intertwined for all of them. But I think that intersection of the personal and political in the Clinton memoir was a particularly interesting aspect of it, as he tells it.” Read more...
A Promised Land
by Barack Obama
Even before he became the 44th president of the United States, Barack Obama had already won a Grammy award for his narration of the audiobook of his 1995 memoir, Dreams from my Father, recommended a number of times in Five Books reviews, including for his insights into Africa from his contact with his father’s family, who come from Kenya.
A Promised Land is the first volume of his presidential memoirs, to be published November 17th, 2020, in 25 languages. It’s 768 pages long but, yet again, Obama has narrated it himself. Obama is a thoughtful man, and the book/audiobook is likely to be illuminative, both of his presidency and what has happened in its wake.
The Annotated Memoirs of Ulysses S. Grant
by Ulysses S Grant and Elizabeth Samet (editor), Mark Bramhall (narrator)
“The audiobook of the memoir is read by a professional narrator, Mark Bramhall. This is again very long, nearly 30 hours. Particularly for this long form, you have to engage your listeners and the narrator needs to be engaged with the material. In order to sustain your listeners, you have to keep a pace. What I really liked about Mark’s narration is that he was able to do that.” Read more...
“He published Promise Me, Dad in 2017 and it’s more or less a memoir about his time as vice president at the time of his son Beau’s death. It’s a moving, personal story delivered with empathy.” Read more...
Presidential memoirs (and biographies) as audiobooks, recommended by Robin Whitten
When you listen to presidential memoirs as audiobooks, you can hear an American president telling you their own story—at least when it comes to recent presidents. Going further back in time, biographies may be more useful. Veteran audiobook reviewer Robin Whitten, editor of Audiofile magazine, recommends the best audiobooks about US presidents, and explains the crucial role of professional narrators in bringing big books to life.
