Result narrated by "Forrest Maready" in All categories

A fascinating account of the world’s most famous disease - polio - told as you have never heard it before. Epidemics of paralysis began to rage in the early 1900s, seemingly out of nowhere. Doctors, parents, and health officials were at a loss to explain why this formerly unheard-of disease began paralyzing so many children. Why did this disease start to become such a horrible problem during the late 1800s? Why did it affect children more often than adults? Why was it originally called teething paralysis by mothers and their doctors?

Why do babies have lopsided smiles? Why are so many people's eyes misaligned? What started as a simple search to understand this phenomenon turned into a two-year quest that uncovered hidden links between our crooked faces and some of the most puzzling diseases of our time. Crooked methodically goes through the most recent scientific research and connects the dots from the outbreak of metallic medicine in 1800s England to the eruption of neurological and autoimmune disorders so many are suffering from today.

In the late 1800s, a new disease arrived in North America from Europe and began to claim the lives of children everywhere. Though most today have never even heard of this illness, it would routinely kill over 10,000 children in a single year - more than the polio might take in an entire decade. After much trial and tribulation, a shot was developed that helped both those already afflicted with the illness, and those who might one day become infected. But the shot was dangerous, and many parents refused it for their children.

A mother kisses her child's scraped knee. A father embraces his long-lost son. A dog greets its owner with desperate joy. Every culture, every species, every corner of the living world engages in these intimate acts of connection. We've been told these are merely displays of affection. But what if there’s something more? WHAT IF A KISS IS MORE THAN JUST A KISS? For the first time in human history, we are starting to see the hidden force that builds life through connection—not because we discovered something new, but because we have broken something ancient.

From the author of The Moth in the Iron Lung comes a riveting exploration of how science, technology, and fear transformed our relationship with one of humanity's most ancient foods. Once revered as nature's perfect nourishment, milk became public enemy number one as germ theory unleashed collective panic about the invisible world within our food. Forrest Maready uncovers the fascinating, forgotten story of how this fear—epitomized by the notorious "swill milk" scandal—reshaped our food landscape forever.

There is a group of people who believe what Jesus and his disciples understood to be true is very different than the modern church’s interpretation of the Christian faith. These people are also concerned about rising persecution, violence, and political instability—particularly for Christians with a strict interpretation of the Bible. Because of that, they’re working together to ensure a stable future for their families. Like the Amish or Mennonites, they have a distinctive Christian faith and way of life. This group of people calls themselves Protarians.

Hiraeth is a Welsh word for which there is no English equivalent. Hiraeth is a feeling of homesickness for a home to which you cannot return. Many Christians feel an acute sense of hiraeth because they have no tribe. They have no people. No place. No sense of belonging. The Tribal Instinct explains what exactly tribes are and why they have disappeared. More importantly, it explores the Biblical case for tribe and what Christians might do to recover what has been lost.

"You shall have no other gods before me." Does the First Commandment serve any purpose for Christians today? What if the first commandment was meant to serve against a much bigger danger to Christianity than just the gods of Egypt and Rome? What if it was considered paramount because of a very specific threat that still torments the Christian faith today? Sorrow of the Godmakers proposes that superstition—specifically human conjecture about the nature of God—has always presented the greater peril. What God put simply, humans would complicate.

Why are more parents choosing natural immunity for their children? When I first heard that people were purposefully not vaccinating their children, I was shocked. Vaccines have been described as the most incredible medical invention of all time - a miracle of science and technology that has saved the lives of untold millions.

What if the Christianity we were taught was similarly misrepresented? Within a few hundred years after the resurrection of Jesus, distortions began to creep into Christianity from the pagan belief systems which surrounded it. Over the course of hundreds of years, man-made doctrines have accumulated and warped the Christian faith so drastically many of its early believers would scarcely recognize it. The world’s most popular religion is a far cry from the message Jesus preached through villages and towns during his ministry.