The House Is on Fire Audiobook, by Rachel Beanland Play Audiobook Sample

The House Is on Fire Audiobook

The House Is on Fire Audiobook, by Rachel Beanland Play Audiobook Sample
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Read By: Rachel Beanland, Andi Arndt, Michael Crouch, Joniece Abbott-Pratt, Ruffin Prentiss, various narrators Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio Listen Time: at 1.0x Speed 8.33 hours at 1.5x Speed 6.25 hours at 2.0x Speed Release Date: April 2023 Format: Unabridged Audiobook ISBN: 9781797145778

Quick Stats About this Audiobook

Total Audiobook Chapters:

100

Longest Chapter Length:

31:43 minutes

Shortest Chapter Length:

20 seconds

Average Chapter Length:

07:29 minutes

Audiobooks by this Author:

3

Other Audiobooks Written by Rachel Beanland: > View All...

Publisher Description

The author of Florence Adler Swims Forever returns with a masterful work of historical fiction about an incendiary tragedy that shocked a young nation and tore apart a community in a single night—told from the perspectives of four people whose actions during the inferno changed the course of history.

Richmond, Virginia 1811. It’s the height of the winter social season, the General Assembly is in session, and many of Virginia’s gentleman planters, along with their wives and children, have made the long and arduous journey to the capital in hopes of whiling away the darkest days of the year. At the city’s only theater, the Charleston-based Placide & Green Company puts on two plays a night to meet the demand of a populace that’s done looking for enlightenment at the front of a church.

On the night after Christmas, the theater is packed with more than six hundred holiday revelers. In the third-floor boxes, sits newly-widowed Sally Henry Campbell, who is glad for any opportunity to relive the happy times she shared with her husband. One floor away, in the colored gallery, Cecily Patterson doesn’t give a whit about the play but is grateful for a four-hour reprieve from a life that has recently gone from bad to worse. Backstage, young stagehand Jack Gibson hopes that, if he can impress the theater’s managers, he’ll be offered a permanent job with the company. And on the other side of town, blacksmith Gilbert Hunt dreams of one day being able to bring his wife to the theater, but he’ll have to buy her freedom first.

When the theater goes up in flames in the middle of the performance, Sally, Cecily, Jack, and Gilbert make a series of split-second decisions that will not only affect their own lives but those of countless others. And in the days following the fire, as news of the disaster spreads across the United States, the paths of these four people will become forever intertwined.

Based on the true story of Richmond’s theater fire, The House Is on Fire offers proof that sometimes, in the midst of great tragedy, we are offered our most precious—and fleeting—chances at redemption.

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“This is a propulsive, pulse-pounding read—one that grabbed hold of me and didn’t let me go until the very last page.”

— Kathleen Grissom, New York Times bestselling author 

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About Rachel Beanland

Rachel Beanland’s essays have appeared in Creative Nonfiction and Broad Street, among other publications. She is a fiction student in the MFA program at Virginia Commonwealth University and holds bachelor’s degrees in art history and journalism from the University of South Carolina.

About the Narrators

Andi Arndt is a professional voice actor, the winner of a 2017 Audie Award for Best Romance, and winner of two Earphones Awards.

Michael Crouch is an actor based in New York City. His audiobook narration has won the prestigious Audie Award for Best Narration, numerous Earphones Awards from AudioFile magazine, and Best of the Year accolades from Booklist, School Library Journal, and Publishers Weekly. He can also be heard on national commercials, cartoons, video games, and the animé series Pokémon XY and Yu-Gi-Oh! Arc-V.

Joniece Abbott-Pratt has narrated many audiobooks for children, young adults, and adults. She has won several AudioFile Earphones Awards and in 2021 was a finalist for the prestigious Audie Award for Best Fantasy Narration. She earned an MFA degree in acting from the University of Iowa and has performed on regional theater stages across the country, including the Public Theater in New York City. She has also appeared on television shows, including The Good Fight, Law and Order: SVU, Luke Cage, and Orange Is the New Black, and has voiced commercials and projects for US Bank, Johnson & Johnson, and others.

Leon Nixon is a professional actor, playwright, and filmmaker. A Los Angeles native, he has performed in short films, web series, and on stage in dramatic and comedic roles. He is also an improviser and part of the group that appears in the Guinness Book of World Records for Longest Continuous Improv Show.