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NonfictionAudioMemoir

How Y’all Doing?

Review by Anna Zeitlin

Emmy Award winner Leslie Jordan is making the most of his sudden internet superstardom with his new book, How Y’all Doing? Misadventures and Mischief From a Life Well Lived (4 hours). After decades as an underappreciated character actor on a long list of sitcoms, Jordan is coming to terms with his newfound celebrity status and the opportunities it has presented, including achieving his lifelong dream of recording a duet with Dolly Parton.

In the early days of the COVID-19 quarantine, Jordan began posting very funny videos to his Instagram account, gossiping into the camera, coining memorable catchphrases, telling stories about his Mama and gaining millions of new fans. His knack for storytelling transfers beautifully to this new audiobook. He discusses growing up as a gay child on a Southern horse farm and shares juicy Hollywood gossip, from his experience of working with Lady Gaga to how actor Debbie Reynolds convinced his Mama not to worry so much about what he gets up to in California. 

Jordan’s twangy Tennessee drawl adds so much personality to the audiobook; you can really hear the laughter and joy in his voice as he reads some of his funnier stories.

You can hear the laughter and joy in Leslie Jordan’s voice as he reads the funniest stories in his new audiobook.
NonfictionAudioHistory

Facing the Mountain

Review by G. Robert Frazier

Bestselling author Daniel James Brown’s enthralling new book, Facing the Mountain (17.5 hours), describes the heroism of Japanese Americans who joined the Army to fight for the U.S. after the December 1941 bombing of Pearl Harbor. While nearly 80 years have passed since that infamous day, Brown’s impassioned account of the trials and tribulations that Japanese Americans faced afterward is eerily reflective of the unjust hatred heaped on Asian Americans in the wake of the COVID-19 outbreak.

The audiobook is capably narrated by American actor Louis Ozawa, whose ability to speak both English and Japanese serves him well as he tells the stories of four soldiers and their families who gallantly proved their dedication to their country despite the bigotry they faced. Ozawa’s performance is inspiring and uplifting as he delivers a resounding call for respect after years of hate.

Read our starred review of the print version of Facing the Mountain.

Actor Louis Ozawa’s performance is inspiring and uplifting as he delivers a resounding call for respect after years of hate.
AudioScienceHistory

Empire of Pain

Review by G. Robert Frazier

New Yorker staff writer Patrick Radden Keefe’s exhaustive research for Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty (18 hours) makes him the natural choice to narrate his own audiobook. Keefe knows exactly which points to stress for listeners of this story, which he calls “the taproot of the opioid epidemic” in America—not that added emphasis is really needed, as the book’s content is shocking enough.

In jaw-dropping detail, Keefe recounts the greed, deception and corruption at the heart of the Sackler family’s multigenerational quest for wealth and social status. Renowned for their philanthropy, the Sacklers built their fortune through the pharmaceutical industry in the 1940s and ’50s, making calculated moves in medical advertising and with the Food and Drug Administration. Keefe brilliantly traces the Sacklers’ path toward developing controversial pharmaceutical products such as the anti-anxiety medicine Valium and the highly addictive painkiller OxyContin via their company, Purdue Pharma.

The 18-plus hours that it takes to listen to this mind-blowing history may seem intimidating at first, but Keefe’s masterful storytelling makes it worth every minute.

New Yorker staff writer Patrick Radden Keefe’s exhaustive research for Empire of Pain makes him the natural choice to narrate his own audiobook.
FictionAudioHistorical Fiction

The Rose Code

Review by Deborah Mason

Bletchley Park, the mansion where Oxford dons and crossword puzzlers cracked the German Enigma code, was so shrouded in secrecy that mentioning you worked there could land you in prison. In The Rose Code (15.5 hours), historical novelist Kate Quinn vividly conjures Bletchley through the tale of three unlikely friends from very different backgrounds: socialite Osla, social climber Mab and antisocial Beth. Quinn blends rich characterization, fast pacing and meticulous historical research to tell a story of friendship, tragic betrayal and treason. 

Award-winning narrator Saskia Maarleveld gives life to each of the friends, using realistic accents to underscore the class differences that would have made their friendship impossible in any other scenario. All the other characters, no matter how minor, receive Maarleveld’s full devotion as well, as she taps into the novel’s wide-ranging cast to audibly re-create the complexity and chaos of war-torn Britain. Her deep, husky, mysterious voice is perfect for a story that, after all, centers on an Enigma.

The Rose Code is a terrific story, brilliantly performed. Or as Osla would say, it’s a real corker!

The Rose Code is a terrific story, brilliantly performed by Saskia Maarleveld. Or as Osla would say, it’s a real corker!
NonfictionAudioSelf-Help

Professional Troublemaker

Review by Mari Carlson

Luvvie Ajayi Jones’ Professional Troublemaker: The Fear-Fighter Manual (8 hours) is a candid, can-do guide to making the world a better place by cultivating a better you. Narrated by the bestselling author, three sections—“Be,” “Say” and “Do”—detail steps toward understanding the core of yourself and making decisions based on those crucial personal values. Jones describes her own process and experiences, draws inspiration from her Nigerian heritage and shows what it looks like to live authentically in a judgmental world, with her grandmother as her favorite example.

Famous for her blog posts, podcast and TED Talks, Jones will hype up even the most fearful listener with her commanding, cheerful voice. She recommends that professional-troublemakers-in-the-making find friends or aunties to “gas [them] up” and cheer them on in their journey, and for the length of this audiobook, she is that friend. With special audio-only features such as a recording of Jones’ aunt speaking in Yoruba, it is impossible not to be won over by Professional Troublemaker’s empowering message that fighting fear is finding freedom.

 

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read our review of the print version of Professional Troublemaker.

Luvvie Ajayi Jones’ commanding, cheerful voice will hype up even the most fearful listener.
NonfictionAudioEssays

Leaving Isn’t the Hardest Thing

Review by Tami Orendain

In her collection of intensely personal essays, Leaving Isn’t the Hardest Thing (9 hours), Lauren Hough explores her identities—lesbian, Air Force airman, blue-collar worker and cult survivor—and uses them to critique systemic issues in contemporary American culture.

The audiobook’s narration is shared by Hough and actor-producer Cate Blanchett, who reads the two essays that bookend the collection. Blanchett’s clear, sharp tone allows the wit of Hough’s writing to shine, while Hough’s narration is deadpan, her steady voice capturing each essay’s unabashed honesty. Together, Hough and Blanchett create a heartbreaking and intimate experience for listeners, inviting them to reflect on the possibility and value of genuine human connection.

Leaving Isn’t the Hardest Thing is for audiences who are unafraid to face suffering, loss and vulnerability. Despite its challenging content, it offers a safe place for listeners to discover that they are not alone.

Read our review of the print version of Leaving Isn’t the Hardest Thing.

Author Lauren Hough and actor-producer Cate Blanchett create a heartbreaking and intimate experience for listeners.
NonfictionAudioEssays

Festival Days

Review by Tami Orendain

Essayist Jo Ann Beard explores life, death and the craft of writing in Festival Days (7.5 hours). Actor Suehyla El-Attar, known for her roles in Ant-Man and the Wasp and Green Book, reads in a calm, steady voice that emphasizes the collection’s sweeping gravitas, but she also gives personality to each unique piece. In “Werner,” a story about a man escaping an apartment fire, she creates a flowing contrast between firm descriptions of pain and the wistfulness of memory. She narrates “Maybe It Happened” in a lilting, sing-song tone, giving it a nursery-rhyme quality. And in “Close,” a discussion of craft, she is animated and personal, making the listener feel like they are learning from the author herself.

El-Attar’s narration pulls listeners in, highlighting the way a well-constructed sentence can bring an emotion, a scene or an idea to life.

 

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read our starred review of the print version of Festival Days.

Actor Suehyla El-Attar reads in a calm, steady voice that emphasizes the sweeping gravitas of Jo Ann Beard’s collection.
NonfictionAudio

Dusk, Night, Dawn

Review by Mari Carlson

From the veteran author of such uplifting books as Help, Thanks, Wow and Hallelujah Anyway comes Dusk, Night, Dawn: On Revival and Courage (4 hours), a collection of essays addressing hope in a time of unrest. Touching on topics that range from climate change and political divisiveness to the COVID-19 pandemic and her own recent marriage, Anne Lamott concerns herself less with offering solutions than with pointing to the earth’s dependable rhythms for signs of hope.

Lamott narrates the audiobook, and her gently warbling voice pairs well with the vibrant words she uses, such as sag, plop and love, to create a comforting aural atmosphere. She describes reaching out to friends during times of trouble, and her voice is like that of a friend, warm and supportive and slightly melancholic. Her essays are humorous, with metaphors of Life Saver candies and junk food, as well as profound, as when she reaches into biblical narratives and her own experiences to cull ageless wisdom and provide sage encouragement for future generations. This audiobook is the soundtrack for feeling better in the midst of a troubled landscape.

 

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Anne Lamott shares some ideas for how to get by when the world seems especially dark.

Anne Lamott’s narration of Dusk, Night, Dawn is the soundtrack for feeling better in the midst of a troubled landscape.
RomanceAudioContemporary Romance

Act Your Age, Eve Brown

Review by Anna Zeitlin

The delightful third installment in romance author Talia Hibbert’s Brown Sisters trilogy, Act Your Age, Eve Brown begins with Eve Brown failing at her latest attempt at a career and getting cut off from her trust fund. She leaves London and heads to the countryside, where she comes across a cute bed-and-breakfast that happens to be hiring a chef, a job she could probably pull off. Eve botches the interview and runs over B&B owner Jacob with her car, but she winds up working for him while his broken arm heals. He’s stubborn and stuck in his ways, and she’s fun and carefree, so of course they can’t resist each other.

Prolific voice-over actor Ione Butler effortlessly switches between Eve’s cool London accent and Jacob’s grumpy country tones. She delivers both comedy and romance, going straight for the heart but never losing the humor.

 

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Talia Hibbert explains why she thinks Jacob and Eve are so perfect for each other.

Narrator Ione Butler goes straight for the heart—but never loses the humor—in her rendition of Talia Hibbert's latest rom-com.
FictionAudioFamily Drama

The Removed

Review by Anna Zeitlin

In The Removed (7 hours) by Brandon Hobson, a Cherokee family grapples with the death of their teenage son and brother, Ray-Ray, 15 years after his murder. Father Ernest is losing his memory, younger son Edgar is dealing with drug addiction, daughter Sonja flits between unavailable men, and mother Maria tries to hold everything together while caring for their new foster son, who may be the reincarnation of Ray-Ray. Each chapter is told from a different character’s perspective, moving among family members as well as an elder named Tsala.

The large cast of Indigenous narrators (Gary Farmer, Shaun Taylor-Corbett, DeLanna Studi, Katie Rich and Christopher Salazar) brings great depth and dimensionality to this world. In particular, Farmer’s voice imbues Tsala’s sections with a real sense of history, his narration recalling spoken word traditions. Each actor does a magnificent job portraying the complicated emotions and layered personality of their character, making The Removed feel more like a recorded play than a straightforward reading.

 

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read our review of the print version of The Removed.

The tremendous skill of the Indigenous cast makes The Removed feel more like a recorded play than a straightforward reading.
FictionAudioLiterary Fiction

The Final Revival of Opal & Nev

Review by G. Robert Frazier

Some stories are meant to be told out loud. Such is the case with Dawnie Walton’s heralded debut novel, The Final Revival of Opal & Nev (13.5 hours), which comes to life through a full cast of incredible voice talents, including Janina Edwards, Bahni Turpin, James Langton and 15 others.

In a series of first-person interviews conducted by journalist S. Sunny Shelton, the fictional oral history recounts the story of an 1970s rock collaboration between glam Black American singer Opal Jewel and white British singer-songwriter Nev Charles. Walton skillfully blends in real-life events such as Vietnam War protests to firmly establish the narrative’s tone and time period, layering the duo’s rise to rock stardom with social, economic, racial and sexual undercurrents.

But it is the impressive array of characters, from the titular rock pair to Nev’s first piano teacher to the head of their iconic record label, that lends authenticity and rhythm to the story like nothing else. You’ll wish you could rush out to scour your local music store for Opal & Nev’s long-lost albums.

 

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Debut novelist Dawnie Walton discusses the legacy of Black women in rock and the strange ways that music moves us—just a few of her pieces of inspiration for The Final Revival of Opal & Nev.

After listening to this incredible audiobook, if you didn’t know better, you’d rush out to scour your local music store for Opal & Nev’s long-lost albums.
FictionAudioShort Stories

Big Time

Review by Norah Piehl

As soon as you press play on the new collection of stories by former “Late Show” writer Jen Spyra and hear the familiar voice of Stephen Colbert reading the introduction (which he also wrote), you’ll quickly realize that you shouldn’t listen to this audiobook anywhere it’s not socially acceptable to laugh out loud. The stories in Big Time (8.5 hours) follow a somewhat predictable—but never tiresome—formula, starting with a familiar trope (a locked-room murder mystery, a bridal boot camp) and quickly veering off into absurdity, satire or both.

The star-studded cast of narrators adds to the enjoyment: The author is joined by Dan Stevens of “Downton Abbey” fame and actor-comedians Lauren Lapkus, Matt Rogers and Thomas Whittington. Stevens is particularly effective, as his posh British accent heightens the comedic effect of, for example, a satire of Raymond Briggs’ The Snowman, in which the little boy narrator gradually discovers that his magical companion is actually a foul-mouthed drunk. Spyra reads the title novella, a hilarious sendup of contemporary American culture as seen through the decidedly un-woke eyes of a time-traveling 1940s-era Hollywood starlet. If you’re desperately in search of a healthy dose of laughter, Big Time will do the trick.

Don’t listen to the audiobook of Jen Spyra’s story collection anywhere it’s not socially acceptable to laugh out loud.
FictionAudioLiterary Fiction

How Beautiful We Were

Review by Autumn Allen

The powerful audiobook production of Imbolo Mbue’s haunting second novel, How Beautiful We Were (14 hours), is a rare display of superior casting and direction. This story about a clash between an American oil company and a fictional African village is read by a cast of six actors: Lisa Renee Pitts, Prentice Onayemi, Janina Edwards, Dion Graham, J.D. Jackson and Allyson Johnson. Throughout flawlessly distinct sections, multiple characters tell the tale of the village’s resistance to the company’s poisoning of their children. Each actor’s voice and tone heighten the distinct styles of the narrators, which include different members of the Nangi family as well as a chorus called “the Children.”

Given Mbue’s skillful use of suspense, narrative distance, physicality and interiority, this is not an audiobook for multitasking or to provide background noise. The intense readings will lure listeners into the strangely palpable world of the novel. Exquisite.

 

ALSO IN BOOKPAGE: Read our starred review of the print version of How Beautiful We Were.

The audiobook of Imbolo Mbue’s second novel is not for multitasking or to provide background noise. It’s palpable, intense and exquisite.

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