[Read by Oliver Wyman] This is a book about the beauty and complexity of the human soul, about God, love, and justice, and yet you can lose yourself in it as if it were a dream. You will be transported to New York of the Belle Epoque, to a city clarified by a siege of unprecedented winters. One night, Peter Lake--orphan, master-mechanic, and master second-story man--attempts to rob a fortress-like mansion on the Upper West Side. Though he thinks the house is empty, the daughter of the house is home. Thus begins the affair between the middle-aged Irish burglar and Beverly Penn, a young girl who is dying. Because of a love that at first he cannot fully understand, Peter, a simple and uneducated man, will be driven ''to stop time and bring back the dead.'' His great struggle, in a city ever alight with its own energy and beset by winter, is a truly beautiful and extraordinary story. "Helprin's book is breathtaking...Helprin is splendid, a major talent...funnier and shrewder than Thomas Wolfe and much more accurate in his poetic exuberance." -- "Los Angeles Times Book Review" "Is it not astonishing that a work so rooted in fantasy, filled with narrative high jinks and comic flights, stands forth centrally as a moral discourse?" -- "New York Times Book Review" "Narrator Oliver Wyman's art transcends this brilliant work with his unflagging spirit, awe, wonder, and range of literally dozens of distinctive voices. His remarkable versatility celebrates vocal depth--in characters who range from Dickensian presences to the airy breathiness of gentle souls. He is the harmonious complement to Helprin's kaleidoscopic imagination, and acknowledges the book's grace and wit with every utterance." -- "AudioFile" "This novel stretches the boundaries of contemporary literature. It is a gifted writer's love affair with the language." -- "Newsday" MARK HELPRIN  was educated at Harvard, Princeton, Columbia, and Oxford. He served in the Israeli Infantry Corps, Israeli Air Force, and British Merchant Navy. He is the acclaimed author of  Winter's Tale, A Soldier of the Great War, Freddy and Fredericka, The Pacific, Ellis Island, Memoir from Antproof Case , and numerous other works. His novels are read around the world, translated into over twenty languages.