"Almost" - A Novel by Stefan Molyneux
by Stefan Molyneux, MA
A powerful novel by philosopher Stefan Molyneux, the host of Freedomain, the largest and most popular philosophy show on the internet, with over 700 million views and downloads.Two families - one German, and one English - find love, friendship and combat from the trenches of World War One to the skies of World War Two.
Episodes
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"Almost" Part 33: Book 3, Part 4
Chapter 99 The siren jolted Tom from sleep. His body twisted on his little cot. His brain was scalded with exhaustion. He flew ten, twelve, fourteen hours a day. He closed his eyes at night, and saw his trembling windshield, felt the shaking of his seat as he opened fire, jerked his head...
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"Almost" Part 32: Book 3, Part 3
Chapter 92 Ruth was not by nature a confrontational person, and she agonized over her decision to confront her husband for over a week. It was, for her – and quite literally – the worst thing in the world. Something about demanding something from him – enforcing her will – made her feel as if she...
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"Almost" Part 31: Book 3, Part 2
Chapter 84 Ruth vomited, the precious scrap of paper clutched in her fist. She did not keep quiet. She did not hold her hair back. Her customary terror of germs was gone. She was an animal trying to purge a poison. When she had returned with Catherine from Uxbridge’s little room, she had been...
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"Almost" Part 30: Book 3, Part 1
BOOK THREE Chapter 81 Runciman was almost too much for Reginald to bear. Cuthbert had had his faults, but had been able to rouse himself to some sort of passion about British interests and international affairs. Runciman was almost to urbane to draw breath. He smoked endlessly, through a long…
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"Almost" Part 29: Book 2, Part 19
Chapter 75 Tom had never seen such joy, and it was a terrible thing to behold. Even the German troops were taken aback. Crowds of men, women and children lined the streets, screaming themselves hoarse. Shimmering clouds of flower petals rained down on the armed columns, like unicoloured...
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"Almost" Part 28: Book 2, Part 18
Chapter 70 A child can go down, into the depths of parental numbness. It doesn’t matter how old the child is, or the parent. The umbilical is sometimes a lifeline, thrown to the future, with which a mother can hope to haul herself up the well of her own dying. And children can so rarely tear...
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"Almost" Part 27: Book 2, Part 17
Chapter 68 Klaus was astounded at the amount of human energy that can be released by pushing all conflicts into the unconscious. He was an educated man; he knew that the Nazis represented a radical break with European traditions – but then, Germany had never really been a part of Europe anyway....
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"Almost" Part 26: Book 2, Part 16
Chapter 63 In October 1935, Mussolini’s Grand Army crossed the border into Abyssinia. This land had been independent since the days of King Solomon. It was the only African country to successfully resist European invasion in the nineteenth century. The Italians had modern aeroplanes, tanks and...
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"Almost" Part 25: Book 2, Part 15
Tom Returns The size of the crowd was completely unbelievable. Tom had never seen even a tenth of the number in any single place. Tens of thousands of people milled, surged, boiled and cascaded down streets like broken rivers. They changed directions madly, contradictorily, but in strangely...
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"Almost" Part 24: Book 2, Part 14
Tom Convinces Hart Tom thought long and hard about going to the continent again. He felt a great excitement in his belly at the very prospect. No, he thought, not ‘going’ to the continent – flying to the continent! All thoughts of Jacqueline vanished from his mind for the next two days – except…
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"Almost" Part 23: Book 2, Part 13
Wendy Finds Out She Is Pregnant Again The feeling hit Wendy with a dull, cavernous shock. She thought that, if a railway carriage were sentient, it would feel this way, when coupled with a locomotive. She was on the toilet. Her period was late. She knew. She felt nothing but that shock. A man…
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"Almost" Part 22: Book 2, Part 12
Tom Wakes Up With Jacqueline Tom stared at Jacqueline as she slept. I have always been a blubberer, he thought. So, why on earth am I not crying now? The answer was not long in coming. Because you have been weak, Tommy… He nodded slowly. He could barely see her face in the dim, pre-dawn light.…
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"Almost" Part 21: Book 2, Part 11
The Night of the Long Knives After Tom left Germany, Klaus fell into a depression. He felt as if he were at the bottom of a deep pit, and his friend had just levitated to safety and light. And around him, large pincers were sliding out of a crumbling wall. Tom had wondered about Klaus’s...
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"Almost" Part 20: Book 2, Part 10
Tom’s Flying School Within six months, Tom had to hire a secretary. He did not have a natural head for figures or schedules, but had found an activity he loved so much that his natural charisma – already strong – flowed even faster and deeper. He loved to fly. He had graduated from gliders quite...
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"Almost" Part 19: Book 2, Part 9
Tom’s Rage It was some months before Tom and Reginald saw each other again. Both were tempted to write letters to each other, to luxuriate in the bitter monomania of delivered and unanswerable absolutes. Reginald started one such letter many times, hoping to achieve a regal tone of magnanimous...
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"Almost" Part 18: Book 2, Part 8
Tom’s Last Night at the Heppners It was going to be impossible to sleep. There could be no doubt of that. Tom lay in his little room. It was neither hot nor cold. One thought seemed unalterable, inescapable, and depressing beyond words. I can never return to England. Oh, he could go back. He…
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"Almost" Part 17: Book 2, Part 7
Reginald’s Interview with Cuthbert When Reginald first entered Cuthbert’s office, at eight-thirty a.m. sharp, he blinked. At first almost inconspicuously, and then far more violently. It seemed, to him, that either his own eyes had melted somewhat, or that the office was made of a kind of wax…
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"Almost" Part 16: Book 2, Part 6
Reginald Decides to Join the Foreign Office It was almost as if Reginald had been conscripted into childbirth. He had lived a fairly irresponsible life throughout his early twenties. His sudden marriage had been more about infatuation, lust and impulsiveness than any kind of considered choice....
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"Almost" Part 15: Book 2, Part 5
Breakfast with Martin: Klaus Fights Back It was bread and sausages the next morning. Martin had come back from a long, brisk walk, glowing with irritating, ruddy health. His voice boomed around the house, commanding and cajoling. He had a list of chores Tom could hear him assigning to the…
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"Almost" Part 14: Book 2, Part 4
Reginald And Wendy Talk About Being Pregnant Reginald and Wendy drove in silence. Reginald felt a strange calm, overlying a deep terror. “I think that…” started Wendy, then stopped. She bit her lip and felt a rising bubble of tears. Her brain was repeating the inevitable mantra of all addicted to...
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"Almost" Part 13: Book 2, Part 3
Uxbridge Returns One evening, an unexpected visitor came to Quentin’s office. He was a thin, stoop-shouldered man, who looked as if he had stolen his suit from a rather random set of clotheslines. “I’m sorry,” said Quentin, rising, “but I am no longer taking appointments today. If you speak to my...
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"Almost" Part 12: Book 2, Part 2
Tom in Germany Tom arrived in Germany on November 30, 1932. Klaus met him at the airport in Berlin, and they drove to a small hotel right in the heart of the city. They were going to see the sights in Berlin before taking a bus out to the small town where his family lived. Berlin was magnificent....
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"Almost" Part 11: Book 2, Part 1
BOOK TWO Tom Prepares to Go to Germany It is odd, thought Tom, that I have so few people to tell that I am going away for two months. He had to tell his family, of course, because he was going to be away from the end of November to the end of January, and so would miss the holidays. The truth was...
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"Almost" Part 10: Chapters 27-28
Ruth liked having a headache when she was going over her correspondence; it made her feel like she had a real job. As the wife of an MP, she received the kinds of letters which, it was imagined, men would never be able to understand. Over the past year, she had grown used to a number of...
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"Almost" Part 9: Chapter 26
Quentin was elected on Tuesday 27 October 1931, with a fairly narrow margin. His opponent, from the Labour party, kept hammering at him on the issue of unilateral disarmament. Quentin opposed this, because it would cause even more unemployment. Ever since his son had been attacked in London,...
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"Almost" Part 8: Chapters 24-25
Chapter Twenty Four Reginald had caused a great academic sensation at All Souls. His language skills were so extraordinary that arguing with him was almost impossible. His abilities were centered in two main areas: the first was scorn, and the second was agility. His scorn was a force of nature,...
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"Almost" Part 7: Chapters 21-23
Chapter Twenty One Martin was a priest of the old school, which meant that for him – as for millions of men, women and children across Germany – that God was alive. God was alive, and God was everywhere. Hell was as real as a car crash; heaven as possible as a good night’s sleep. And not just God...
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"Almost" Part 6: Chapters 17-20
Chapter Seventeen Reginald had a broken nose, two cracked ribs, a split chin, a bruised spine, a cracked forearm, two chipped molars and a nasty bite on his tongue. There was little to do but set his nose, bind him from head to toe and dull him with morphine. But, Tom felt, there was always...
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"Almost" Part 5: Chapters 14-16
Chapter Fourteen Tom and Reginald went to school within two years of each other, and this produced an unexpected Renaissance within the Spencer household. It was not immediate, but it was unmistakable. Two weeks after Tom went away to All Souls, Ruth came down for breakfast. Quentin glanced up…
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"Almost" Part 4: Chapters 10-13
Chapter Ten Quentin enjoyed taking Reginald to his study for an after-dinner drink. Tom was sometimes invited, but knew from experience that he would not be drawn into the conversation. The last one he had attended was in 1925, when Reginald was 17, and Tom 15. “So, my boy,” said Quentin, pouring…
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"Almost" Part 3: Chapters 7-9
Chapter Seven Reginald had all the attributes of a successful school boy, highly respected prefect, and future scion of the intellectual empire of the West. He had almost no inner life, and so no hesitations, no conflicts, no doubts. Everything was unconscious, everything assumed; he had all the...
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"Almost" Part 2: Chapters 4-6
Chapter 4 In the confusion and horror of her war years, Ruth found herself unable to educate her children about right and wrong. Every word she imagined speaking seemed hollow in her own ears. The evil of the Great War, the ghastly effect it had had on her own family, own marriage, own soul –…
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"Almost" Part 1: Chapters 1-3
Chapter One During the first months of the Great War, Reginald loved to run to the edge of the white cliffs of Dover and lie panting on the grass, staring out over the English Channel. He loved listening to the rumble of guns and the flashes of light from France, where there were always ashen...
About this show
A powerful novel by philosopher Stefan Molyneux, the host of Freedomain, the largest and most popular philosophy show on the internet, with over 700 million views and downloads.Two families - one German, and one English - find love, friendship and combat from the trenches of World War One to the skies of World War Two.
Hosted by
Stefan Molyneux, MA