The Last Days of August
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Narrated by:
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Jon Ronson
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By:
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Jon Ronson
About this listen
Jon Ronson, the creator of Audible Original The Butterfly Effect, delves into the pornography industry again as he unravels the never-before-told story of what caused a beloved 23-year-old actress’s untimely death.
In December 2017, famed adult film star August Ames died by suicide in a park in the Conejo Valley. Her death came just a day after she’d been the victim of a social media pile-on by fellow porn professionals—punishment for her tweeting out something deemed homophobic.
A month later, August’s husband and pornography producer Kevin Moore connected with journalist Jon Ronson to tell the story of how cyberbullying via Twitter killed his wife. Neither of them could predict the rumors and secrets that Ronson would soon hear, revelations that hinted at a very different story—something mysterious and unexpected and terrible.
Please note: This audio features sexual content, adult language, and references to suicide and violence that may be upsetting to some listeners. Discretion is advised.
If you or someone you know is struggling with thoughts of suicide, please call the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-8255 or contact the Crisis Text Line by texting TALK to 741-741.
©2018 Audible Originals, LLC (P)2018 Audible Originals, LLC.Listeners also enjoyed...
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Go Behind the Scenes with Jon Ronson
About the Creator and Performer
Not the mystery you might be expecting
The titular "August" here is late adult-film star, August Ames, nee Mercedes Grabowski, who died by apparent suicide around the time she was the subject of a massive Twitter pile-on. Author and audio-storyteller extraordinaire, Jon Ronson, pulls up every corner to get the full picture. He explores questions like: Did her spouse have anything to do with her untimely end? Was social media bullying really to blame, or were other factors at play? The Last Days of August listens like equal parts mystery, thriller, social science exploration, and embedded journalistic undertaking—and it’s ultimately so satisfying in the end (albeit tragically so). And, lucky for Audible members this month, there's no credit required to listen.
Our favorite moments from The Last Days of August
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By: Ben Austen, and others
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Ho Tactics
- How to MindF**k a Man into Spending, Spoiling, and Sponsoring
- By: G. L. Lambert
- Narrated by: Patrick Stevens
- Length: 9 hrs and 12 mins
- Unabridged
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I have discovered a group of women who refuse to be exploited, are immune to manipulation, and who never settle in the name of love. These ladies know what they want and take what they want by beating men at their own game. Utilizing the secrets exposed in this book, these women gain power, money, and status. Men call them gold diggers, women call them hos, but they call themselves winners. This is the book that society doesn't want you to listen to….
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I spent $24,000 in 4 months
- By B.M. on 10-06-18
By: G. L. Lambert
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The Autobiography of Malcolm X
- As Told to Alex Haley
- By: Malcolm X, Alex Haley
- Narrated by: Laurence Fishburne
- Length: 16 hrs and 52 mins
- Unabridged
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Experience a bold take on this classic autobiography as it’s performed by Oscar-nominated Laurence Fishburne. In this searing classic autobiography, originally published in 1965, Malcolm X, the Muslim leader, firebrand, and Black empowerment activist, tells the extraordinary story of his life and the growth of the Human Rights movement. His fascinating perspective on the lies and limitations of the American dream and the inherent racism in a society that denies its non-White citizens the opportunity to dream, gives extraordinary insight into the most urgent issues of our own time.
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it's Nearly perfect
- By Kerry on 09-16-20
By: Malcolm X, and others
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The Philosopher's Toolkit: How to Be the Most Rational Person in Any Room
- By: Patrick Grim, The Great Courses
- Narrated by: Patrick Grim
- Length: 12 hrs and 2 mins
- Original Recording
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Taught by award-winning Professor Patrick Grim of the State University of New York at Stony Brook, The Philosopher’s Toolkit: How to Be the Most Rational Person in Any Room arms you against the perils of bad thinking and supplies you with an arsenal of strategies to help you be more creative, logical, inventive, realistic, and rational in all aspects of your daily life.
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This should NOT be an audio book
- By Brooks Emerson on 03-21-20
By: Patrick Grim, and others
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I Thought It Was Just Me (but it isn’t)
- Telling the Truth about Perfectionism, Inadequacy, and Power
- By: Brené Brown
- Narrated by: Lauren Fortgang
- Length: 10 hrs and 44 mins
- Unabridged
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Based on seven years of ground-breaking research and hundreds of interviews, I Thought It Was Just Me shines a long-overdue light on an important truth: Our imperfections are what connect us to each other and to our humanity. Our vulnerabilities are not weaknesses; they are powerful reminders to keep our hearts and minds open to the reality that we're all in this together.
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I'm sure its great if you are a mother ....
- By Leslie A Hill on 08-09-11
By: Brené Brown
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My Big TOE: Awakening
- Book One of a Trilogy Unifying Philosophy, Physics, and Metaphysics
- By: Thomas Campbell
- Narrated by: Thomas Campbell
- Length: 11 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
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My Big TOE: Awakening, written by a nuclear physicist in the language of contemporary culture, unifies science and philosophy, physics and metaphysics, mind and matter, purpose and meaning, the normal and the paranormal. The entirety of human experience (mind, body, and spirit) including both our objective and subjective worlds is brought together under one seamless scientific understanding.
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What a Trip (but to where?)
- By Michael on 11-26-13
By: Thomas Campbell
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Mythology: Mega Collection
- Classic Stories from the Greek, Celtic, Norse, Japanese, Hindu, Chinese, Mesopotamian and Egyptian Mythology
- By: Scott Lewis
- Narrated by: Madison Niederhauser, Oliver Hunt
- Length: 31 hrs and 37 mins
- Unabridged
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Do you know how many wives Zeus had? Or how the famous Trojan War was caused by one beautiful lady? Or how Thor got his hammer? Give your imagination a real treat. This Mega Mythology Collection of eight audiobooks is for you....
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An interesting set of introductions.
- By Kevin Potter on 05-30-19
By: Scott Lewis
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Interesting but not compelling
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FINALLY! In Ronson's own voice!
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The Psychopath Test is a fascinating journey through the minds of madness. Jon Ronson's exploration of a potential hoax being played on the world's top neurologists takes him, unexpectedly, into the heart of the madness industry. An influential psychologist who is convinced that many important CEOs and politicians are, in fact, psychopaths teaches Ronson how to spot these high-flying individuals by looking out for little telltale verbal and nonverbal clues. And so Ronson, armed with his new psychopath-spotting abilities, enters the corridors of power.
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Painfully out of dated
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Set in present-day Los Angeles, Junk explores an epic conspiracy, one at work for thousands of years that involves total takeover of the planet Earth by aliens. In the wild, souped-up vision of Les Bohem - the acclaimed, Emmy-winning writer of the Steven Spielberg miniseries, Taken - the world is at the end stage of long-range plot that involves a gigantic genetic-engineering project. The aliens who have invaded us have no planet. No spaceship is coming. Instead, a small advance force comes, breeds, and dies - thus becoming an anomaly in our DNA that can’t be explained.
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Flat narration on a boring story
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What’s in a label? Are we the product of our upbringing or do we have a natural propensity towards good or evil? The eternal question of nature vs nurture is at the centre of Dr Diane Buckley’s world. A talented freelance forensic psychologist who has never quite found the key to engaging with people on a casual level, she is drafted in to examine a grisly murder – a body found in a children’s playground.
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Deleted it halfway through...
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read it even if it's not your usual genre
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A young married couple, Matt and Gillian, have just bought a gorgeous house located next to a lake in the Catskills. They want to escape the hustle and bustle of the city to raise their baby girl, Hope, in relative peace and quiet. When night falls, however, their dream home becomes a house of nightmares. Matt and Gillian soon learn that darkness takes many forms. And sometimes, darkness is hungry.
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I guess there’s a reason it’s free
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Outstanding
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The Man on the Mountaintop
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The Man on the Mountaintop tells the story of Holy Man Joe, an ageing and unassuming man who lives in a hermitage on top of a mountain. During the summer months, thousands of hopefuls line the path leading to his door, seeking his wisdom. From bombastic, wealthy nobles intent on cheating their way to the top to drunkards who gradually build the physical and mental strength they need to quit their addiction, The Man on the Mountaintop is a rousing tale full of humour, wit and life lessons.
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Great listen!
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Without John C. Houbolt, a mid-level engineer at NASA, Apollo 11 would never have made it to the moon. Top NASA engineers on the project, including Werner Von Braun, strongly advocated for a single, huge spacecraft to travel to the moon, land, and return to Earth. It's the scenario used in 1950s cartoons and horror movies about traveling to outer space. Houbolt had another idea: Lunar Orbit Rendezvous. LOR would link two spacecraft in orbit while the crafts were travelling at 3,600 miles an hour around the moon. His plan was ridiculed and considered unthinkable.
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Caveat Emptor: Bone to Pick
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The Beautiful Thing That Awaits Us All
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Over the course of two award-winning collections and a critically acclaimed novel, The Croning, Laird Barron has arisen as one of the strongest and most original literary voices in modern horror and the dark fantastic. Melding supernatural horror with hardboiled noir, espionage, and a scientific backbone, Barron's stories have garnered critical acclaim and have been reprinted in numerous year's best anthologies and nominated for multiple awards, including the Crawford, International Horror Guild, Shirley Jackson, Theodore Sturgeon, and World Fantasy awards.
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Not happy. Beautiful.
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The Serial Killer's Apprentice
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Elmer Wayne Henley, Jr. was only fourteen when he first became entangled with serial rapist and murderer Dean Corll in 1971. Fellow Houston, Texas, teenager David Brooks had already been ensnared by the charming older man, bribed with cash to help lure boys to Corll's home. Corll baited Henley with the same deal he'd given Brooks: $200 for each boy they could bring him.
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Well done
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By: Katherine Ramsland, and others
What listeners say about The Last Days of August
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
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- Madame Mina
- 01-05-19
Intriguing
That was a quick book!
I was engaged from the first sentence to the conclusion. Although I am satisfied that her husband didn't actually put the noose around her neck, he didn't help her in the least.
I know what it's like to have an "absent" husband. It makes a girl feel disconnected. I also have a "roommate" relationship with my husband. I hope this speaks to the absent husbands, and makes them either appreciate their wives or release them. Then they can bloom into what they should be instead of their internalizing all the wrong in their lives.
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8 people found this helpful
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- J. Noah Wiley
- 01-07-19
it's alright
Was kinda hoping for a deeper dive into a situation like what Ronson covers in "Publicy Shamed" but instead of going into the twitter shaming that preceded Ames's death, he focuses a lot of time on whether or not she was in a good relationship (*spoiler* probably not) and a lot of the book is about the character of her husband. but he comes off no worse than the other of the people interviewed (spoiler *thery're all a bit awful and a bit broken*).
The author eliminates all the questions raised one by one and gets to no real conclusion. Was she murdered by her husband? no. Was she abused on a porn set? kinda, not really. Did other porn stars bully her on social media? kinda, not really. Was she troubled? definitely. Did twitter drive her to suicide? inconclusive, but it certainly didn't help.
There's a lot of reverence for the dead, which makes sense, it's a sad story and nobody wants to hear about the character flaws of the tragically dead-- but without acknowledging her shortcomings the book communicates quite early on there are avenues the author is not willing to go down. Which was probably wise because it's probably really hard to do without coming off sounding disrespectful of a tragedy.
Perhaps the author felt he had already covered a lot of social media angle in his previous books but there's interesting angles I was hoping to learn more about like the trend in porn of older men having relationships with younger women. or how it even works being in a relationship with someone who has sex with other people for a living and how that reflects on the relationship that the book dances around making the center of.
I was kinda hoping for something where i'd walk away having learned something and gained a bit more compassion for my fellow human but instead I just feel kinda guilty for being entertained for 3+ hours digging around Ms.Ames's life. It's not really a deep look into the porn industry or at social media. It's mostly just a sad story about broken people.
But all in all not a bad listen.
Curious to see what he does next.
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6 people found this helpful
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- jeremy
- 01-06-19
Riveting story; distracting narrator
Fascinating story, but the narrator’s voice is unpolished and distracting. I also felt like he was also too personally invested in the interviews - i.e. making suggestions about her boyfriend’s statement. The story and interview subjects make it worth a listen, but a different narrator and narrative tone would have been a big improvement.
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3 people found this helpful
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- Catherine
- 01-05-19
Classic Ronson
He navigates ambiguity thoughtfully. Ronson makes people’s foibles acceptable and sometimes beautiful. Carefully, Ronson provides a non-salacious story of the porn world. Well done.
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2 people found this helpful
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Young Porn Star Suicides. Why?
Narration: Sometimes a bit hard to understand the different speech patterns. The interviewees are sometimes well spoke but usually not. Not a fault of the producer. This is simply the reality of interviewing principals in real time.
Content: An interesting investigation into why a particular young porno star suicided. The story is less interesting for what is discovered about the details of this particular story, than it is for illustrating tactics investigative journalists use to clarify of a complicated story (e.g., vetting particulars, checking and cross checking assertions, maintaining a professional relationship with principals). This audio would be useful adjunct to a class focusing on investigative journalism. Certainly the topic would hold students' interests.
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2 people found this helpful
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- Julie Green
- 01-05-19
last days of August
very informative. loved it. kept changing. great interviews. very interesting. keeps you guessing the whole time
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1 person found this helpful
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- Anthony
- 01-05-19
psychological journey into sad lives
Sad, interesting, different, thought provoking. Hard to pause to do something else. Makes you ponder what is reality and what is layer upon layer of illusion.
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1 person found this helpful
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- Victoria
- 01-08-19
A Truly Sad but Refreshing Case
My regards to August, her family and Kevin. I’d say this was a great piece of journalism that presented seemingly all sides of a story.
It would be nice to hear more about cases, in this manner. A way that presents all sides of the story. Media has so much influence in todays society and people are mostly going with the flow. Nobody knows what the truth is anymore because people either don’t truly care about the topic or don’t bother to fact check. It’s refreshing to hear people hearing as many sides as possible, fact checking and progressing with leads as needed.
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- Veronica
- 01-12-19
Ronson never lets me down
I’ve listened to a lot of Jon Robson’s books and enjoyed all of them. I was excited to see he had a podcast and binged that. This book stands alone but it’s especially insightful after hearing the podcast. The thing I love about him most is his genuine sense of curiosity and respect for his story and the people involved. The care he takes in handling sensitive and controversial subjects never fails to make me think deeply long after I’ve listened. I can’t recommend him enough.
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Overall
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Performance
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Story
- andrew
- 01-08-19
Jon Ronson, about anything. Anytime.
longer than I expected the freebie to be, but that's a bonus. It is all, as usual, well portrayed, researched (as much as I can tell from mere listening), and it's captivating to follow the story.
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