Category: Audiobooks

In a fantasy version of Victorian England, Delly is a petty con and partially trained fire witch who’s not quite making ends meet. Then she comes across a listing for a job protecting a young woman in the weeks before her marriage. Seems like a cushy gig with easy money… Ha! Nope! Dellaria learns pretty quickly that her charge is the target of some pretty dangerous assassination attempts using necromantic magic. With the help of a motley crew of her fellow female bodyguards (including one she’s warming up to, if you know what I’m sayin’), Delly will have to find a way to best this elusive adversary and keep her charge (and herself) safe. (historical fantasy)

I read this one in print, so I sampled the audio and I have one hangup with the narration: it’s read in an American accent! Ava Lucas is lovely, this is not a critique of her. The book’s setting makes me wish it was read in an English accent, but the book is so fun that I have to include it here.

I love Amber Ruffin, a hilarious comedian and performer who’s written for Late Night with Seth Meyers since 2014 (a role that made her the first Black woman to write for a late-night network talk show in the US). While Amber lives in New York, Ruffin’s sister Lacey still lives back in Nebraska where they both grew up. This book is a hilarious, if at times downright horrifying, collection of anecdotes of the kinds of comments, behaviors, and general racist BS that Lacey is subjected to on a near daily basis in Omaha. Some examples: strangers touching her hair, being mistaken for a prostitute, being mistaken for Harriet!! Tubman!! Oh, and getting hit on online by a dude with the confederate flag in his profile pic. Whew. The sisters’ banter and delivery injects a whole lot of comedy into what are otherwise some truly cringey stories. (humor, essays)

Read by the authors

Pheby Brown has grown up relatively sheltered on a Charles City, Virginia plantation, shielded by her mother’s position as the plantation’s medicine woman and beloved by the Master’s sister. She’d been promised freedom on her 18th birthday and plans to start a new life with the man she loves. Instead, Pheby is forced to leave the only home she’s ever known and finds herself at Devil’s Half Acre, a notorious jail in Richmond, Virginia where the enslaved are “broken, tortured, and sold every day. There, Pheby is exposed not just to her Jailer’s cruelty but also to his contradictions. To survive, Pheby will have to outwit him, and she soon faces the ultimate sacrifice.” This sounds like a heartbreaking read, but comes highly recommended. (historical fiction)

Read by the wonderful Robin Miles (Caste by Isabel Wilkerson, The City We Became by N.K. Jemisin, The Good House by Tananarive Due, and a million billion other awesome books).

A seamstress leaps from the window of an estate with a cryptic message sown into her skin; after receiving a strange letter warning him of impending danger, a destitute Cambridge student comes to London in search of his uncle—and the woman he once loved; an heiress-via-adoption is trying to make her name as a serious journalist, but her curmudgeon of an editor believes ladies should only report on society events and gossip; and a sharp and committed but volatile detective who deals with cases of an occult nature is assigned to find out what happened to the aforementioned seamstress. Alll of these people (and a whole bunch of others), are connected by a twisty case of missing girls who’ve all disappeared under similar mysterious circumstances. This book is a gothic romp and I loves it! (historical fiction)

Read by Charles Armstrong, the voice behind The Mysterious Affair at Styles and tons of other Agatha Christie novels)

January is a successful romance novelist whose views on love are shattered when she learns her recently deceased father was unfaithful to her mother for years. While staying at her dad’s Lake Michigan beach house for the summer to a) clear the house out, and b) isolate herself into writing an overdue book, she discovers her college rival Gus, a Very Serious literary fiction author, lives in the house next door. Neither of them is particularly jazzed about running into one another, but they can’t seem to stay away from one another either. When they both reveal that they have writer’s block, they come up with a plan: they’ll swap genres for the summer—and try not to fall in love.

I deeply identified with how bristly January is when she was first reunited with Gus. My alter ego’s name is Peppermint Petty (Petty and the Jets album dropping soon!), so I got my whole life from January messiness when she couldn’t figure out how to process her feelings (purse wine!). The book really sits with the ways in which our experiences, specifically grief, color how we interpret other people’s words and behaviors. The miscommunications abound, but they’re all so relatable. We aren’t ourselves when we’re consumed with big, scary feelings.

Perhaps best of all though was the very meta examination of the healing escapism of romance novels. January describes first being drawn into romancelandia when her mother was diagnosed with cancer, and my eyes got a little foggy; I became a romance reader in the last few years and emphatically vouch for the restorative quality of a good HEA when nothing else in your life makes sense. Reading about it from the perspective of a character who loses her love-conquers-all self in the wake of tragedy and then finds her way back again was a wonderful balm to start the year off with, even if things took a ridiculous turn a mere few days later.

Unambitious 22-year-old Darren is perfectly content living with his mom and working at Starbucks, but his mom wants him to want more. Then a chance run-in with the smooth-talking CEO of New York’s hottest tech start-up leads to Darren joining his team. Within a week, Darren has transformed into “Buck”, a ruthless salesman unrecognizable to his friends and family (and the only Black person at the mysterious, cult-like, company). “But when things turn tragic at home and Buck feels he’s hit rock bottom, he begins to hatch a plan to help young people of color infiltrate America’s sales force, setting off a chain of events that forever changes the game.” (fiction)

Read by Zeno Robinson (Ali Cross by James Patterson, Hi Five by Joe Ide)

Sixteen-year-old Tessa Johnson has rarely seen herself reflected in the pages of the romance novels she loves (relatable, Tessa!). The only place she gets to be the leading lady is in the love stories she writes. She’s ecstatic when she’s accepted into the creative writing program of a prestigious art school, but gets smacked with a case of writer’s block during her very first workshop. But it’s okay! Her bestie Caroline has a plan! All Tessa needs is a real-life love story for some inspiration via a list of romance novel-inspired steps to a happily ever after. But Tessa finds these steps may actually be pulling her further and further away from herself… (YA romance)

Read by Jordan Cobb (Deathless Divide by Justine Ireland, A Song of Wraiths and Ruin by Roseanne A. Brown, two books I really need to read)

Teen social activist and history buff Kezi Smith is killed under shady circumstances after attending a social-justice rally. Her sister Happi and their family are left reeling and devastated as Kezi becomes yet another victim in the fight against police brutality. Then Happi begins to question the idealized way her sister is remembered. Perfect. Angelic—”one of the good ones.” (contemporary YA)

This narrator trio tho!!! Bahni Turpin, Jordan Cobb, and Carolyn Smith. What?!

For centuries, Zeus has punished the gods with a game called the Agon wherein the gods must walk the earth as mortals and then be hunted for their immortality. Fun! Only a handful of gods remain, the rest replaced by mortals who killed them and ascended. Lore is the lone survivor of a line of god hunters who were brutally murdered by a rival family. With the Agon approaching, Lore sees a chance for revenge against the mortals-turned-gods responsible for her family’s deaths.

Read by Fryda Wolff (Mass Effect Andromeda: Nexus Uprising by Jason M. Hough, K. C. Alexander and Mass Effect: Initiation by N. K. Jemisin, Mac Walters)

Seventeen-year-old Ada is all smiles on her wedding day: she loves her husband and she loves working as an apprentice to her midwife mother. But a year later, she hasn’t been able to get pregnant, which is kind of a big deal when you live in a town where barren women are routinely hanged as witches. That’s when she packs up and joins the notorious Hole in the Wall Gang, a band of outlaws led by a preacher-turned-robber known as the Kid. “Charismatic, grandiose and mercurial, the Kid is determined to create a safe haven for outcast women. But to make this dream a reality, the Gang hatches a treacherous plan that may get them all killed. And Ada must decide whether she’s willing to risk her life for the possibility of a new kind of future for them all.”

Read by Cynthia Farrell (The Unhoneymooners by Christina Lauren, This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone)

TW: eating disorders and body stuff (not quite body horror, but close if you’re squeamish).

Oh my gatos, y’all. The release of this book’s Netflix adaptation reminded me that I’d been meaning to read it for years, it’s so my kind of book (I know, I know: story of my life). I finally read it over the break and wooooooow. It’s like Center Stage meets Black Swan and Fatal Attraction.

The book is primarily told from the perspectives of Gigi, Bette, and June, three young ballerinas at an intensely competitive ballet school in Manhattan. Kind and lighthearted Gigi just wants to dance, but the act could literally kill her. She’s also the only Black girl at the school, so… you can guess how that goes. Privileged New Yorker Bette is… how do I put this? Picture a version of Regina George who pops a lot of pills and has a serious complex from dancing in the shadow of her ballet-star sister. She’ll stop at nothing to end up on top, and I do mean nothing. *shivers* June is a dangerous perfectionist who has to land a lead role this year, otherwise her super-controlling mom will pull her from the school. Everyone’s losing their sh*t because the cast for the school’s Nutracker performance is about to be announced, and an absolute mess of a scandal erupts when the Gigi lands the role of Sugar Plum Fairy. Everyone thought it would be Better. Bette for damn sure thought it’d be Bette. But it’s not, and not everyone is willing to accept that.

This is absolutely one of those books that makes you hold your breath and grip the nearest object with white knuckles. The competitive nature of ballet and all the related pressures, body issues, disordered eating, etc all leap off the page and smack you in the face: it’s tense and uncomfortable and vicious. I loved how the authors also examined the motivations of the less palatable characters (hurt people hurt people, it turns out). If you’re in the mood for an absolute ride of a book full of characters you both love and love to hate with narration that matches the AAAAAAAH-level tension and pace, pick up Tiny Pretty Things (and it’s sequel, Shiny Broken Pieces).

Read by Imani Parks (Saving Ruby King by Catherine Adel West, Monday’s Not Coming my Tiffany D. Jackson), Nora Hunter (You Don’t Know Everything, Jilly P! by lex Gino), Greta Jung (The Last Story of Mina Lee by Nancy Jooyoun Kim, Your House Will Pay by Steph Cha)

This is the second book in the YA fantasy Camelot Rising series, which reimagines, as you may have guessed, Arthurian legend. In The Guinevere Deception, we first meet Guinevere, except she isn’t who we think she is: she’s a changeling come to Camelot to protect the kingdom, her real name and true identity a secret even to herself (not a spoiler). The Camelot Betrayal finds Guinevere trying to find her place in her adopted kingdom as she grapples with the price of progress and her own search for meaning. All the familiar characters make an appearance, but with all sorts of magical twists and unexpected romance. I feel like not enough people talk about this series and I can’t wait to dive back into this world!

Read by Elizabeth Knowelden (The Book of Dreams by Nina George, The Apprentice Witch by James Nicol, The Twelve Dates of Christmas by Jenny Bayliss)

This is a book I’m reading with Book Riot staff and one whose message I hope to internalize and put into practice more in 2021. Reshma Saujani is the founder and CEO of Girls Who Code and starts off by telling us about the time she quit her stable and lucrative career for a disastrous run for political office. She not only lost, she lost hard. That moment acted as a turning point in Saujani’s life and an epiphany: women are taught to chase perfection since childhood, and that pattern ends up holding us back in adulthood. Through a combo of personal anecdotes and some in-your-face statistics and studies, Saujani challenges readers, especially women, to embrace imperfection and live a bolder life.

Read by the author

I am high-key obsessed with spy stories and I love Bahni Turpin, so this audiobooks is kind of a no brainer for me. The fact that it comes highly recommended by several Rioters only made the decision that much easier! Marie is a young Black woman working as an FBI agent in the 1980s. She’s in a career rut when she’s approached by the CIA to spy on the president of Burkina Faso; she has her reservations, but figures she may be able to leverage some information of her own if she takes the gig. But as any spy novel aficionado worth their salt knows, that spy life is hashtag complicated: she finds herself sympathizing with her target and thus questioning her loyalties.

Read by Bahni Turpin (The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas, Cinderella is Dead by Kalynn Bayron, Dread Nation and Deathless Divide by Justina Ireland, The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead…all of the things!)

I’ve been in the mood for a cozy mystery set during the holidays, and it just so happens that the second book in the Gethsemane Brown series takes place over Christmas. Gethsemane Brown is a Black American classical musician who expatriated to an Irish village for a job when she was down on her luck in Murder in G Major. Then as one does, she made friends with a snarky ghost who helped her solve a string of murders and led a school orchestra to victory in a major competition. Now our whisky-drinking, music-playing sleuth in preparing for a little rest over the Christmas break—or not! Her ghost buddy has disappeared, her landlord’s wants to sell her cottage to a skeezy hotel developer, and the brother-in-law who’s shown up to visit unexpectedly has been accused of stealing a valuable antique. It’s up to Gethsemane to go undercover and solve the case.

Read by Helen Duff who also read most of the books in this series as well as a ton of work by Lisa Jewell (Then She Was Gone, I Found You, The Family Upstairs)

contemporary romance

PhD candidate Dani Brown is in a serious sexy times slump, so she asks the goddess Oshun for a no-strings-attached partner with whom to get it on and poppin’. Enter Zafir, a sexy security guard at her university, who rescues Dani in a fire drill gone wrong. A video of the rescue goes viral and a hashtag is born (#DrRugbae- did I mention Zaf is a former pro rugby player?) as the internet assumes the two are a couple. Rather than quell the rumors, Dani and Zaf enter into a fakelationship so Zaf can parlay this newfound publicity to benefit the charity he runs. But wouldn’t you know it? Real feelings make their way into this fake—and steamy–arrangement.

What I love about it: Dani is so driven, confident, and unapologetically bisexual. Zaf ain’t here for that toxic masculinity BS: he reads romance novels and goes to therapy. The communication between Zaf and Dani is #goals.

Read by Ione Butler (who will also read the next book in the Brown Sisters series, Act Your Age, Eve Brown, out on 3/9/21!)

YA fiction

Lila Reyes has just graduated from high school and is supposed to take over the family panadería with her sister, move in with her bestie, and live happily ever after with her boo. Instead, her best friend bails on her, her boyfriend dumps her, and her abuela passes away suddenly. Concerned for her mental health after an alarming episode, her parents send her to England to stay with family and hopefully clear her head. Lila goes kicking and screaming, immediately finding ways to be annoyed by the people, the weather, and the quaint countryside setting that’s very unlike Miami. Just when she’s decided England isn’t her cup of tea (heh), she meets Orion, a teashop clerk who shows her all that she’s been missing.

What I love about it: All the Spanish and all of the pastry talk (mmm pastelitos and Chelsea buns) plus a real depiction of the struggles of dealing with grief. Lila’s relationship with her sister leaps off the page and made me want to call my cousin/BFF immediately. I will say Frankie Corzo’s take on a make English accent was… not my favorite, but I’m willing to overlook it for the rest of the positives.

Read by Frankie Corzo, who I think I’m calling my 2020 Narrator of the Year (Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Incendiary by Zoraida Cordova)

thriller

I stand by this statement: go into this knowing as little as possible and prepare to be wowed. All I will tell you is that it’s a thriller and there’s gentrification involved. That’s it. Go!

What I love about it: HA! Did you think I’d give up the secrets now? Wrong! Let’s just say Alyssa Cole made me redefine what I find terrifying.

Read by Susan Dalian (the voice of Haku in the first season of Naruto and Storm in Wolverine and the X-Men) and Jay Aeseng (writer/actor/producer who you may know from the Twin Peaks TV series).

romantic comedy

Leena Cotton is dealing with a ton of unprocessed grief. When her job sends her on a mandatory paid holiday for two months, she leaves London and escapes to Yorkshire to visit her grandmother Eileen. Eileen is newly divorced and in the mood for adventure, so Leena helps her set up a dating app profile. When they discover the dating pool in the countryside is a bit limited, they come up with a plan to switch places for two months. Leena will live in Eileen’s home in the country and assume her grandmother’s daily duties, and Eileen will stay at Leena’s flat in London and dive headfirst into London’s dating scene. Both are way out of their element and it’s a bumpy ride at first, but they slowly come around to each of their new surroundings, meeting a love interest or two along the way.

What I love about it: the rare portrayal of an older woman in the dating scene. Breaking news: women in their 50s and beyond have sex lives!

Read by Alison Steadman and Daisy Edgar-Jones (Several reviews for this delightful book are critical of Alison Steadman’s performance for excessive mouth/smacking sounds, and I am here to defend my adopted English grandma. Yes, some of those noises are present; they never bothered me once, the performance felt authentic).

historical mystery

You know Lady Sherlock is my favorite Sherlock! Charlotte Holmes is back to investigate a murder case that implicates Scotland Yard inspector Robert Treadles. I inhaled this book in two days and wish I’d savored it longer!

What I love about it: I’m a sucker in general for mysteries set in Victorian England, but this one is so special because of the gender-flipped Sherlock element. The protagonist is an empowered woman living on her terms, including an insistence on sexual agency, and is very vocal about her appreciation for cake.

Read by Kate Reading (A Study in Scarlet Women and the rest of the book in the Lady Sherlock series, The Witching Hour by Anne Rice)

romance

Luc O’Donnell is the son of rockstar parents who split up when he was a kid. His in-and-out-of-rehab dad is planning a comeback which means Luc is put in the public eye, and a compromising photo lands Luc in hot water at the charity where he works. Fearing that Luc’s “particular variety of queer” will hurt the charity’s image, his boss orders him to find a nice, normal, fake boyfriend to clean up his image. Luc decides straight-laced, squeaky-clean barrister Oliver is the perfect partner to fake date, and Oliver agrees to the arrangement for work-related image issues of his own. They appear to have tragically little in common, but the more time they spend together… *raises and lowers eyebrows knowingly*

What I love about it: Luc is just a charming mess, and it’s so satisfying to watch him work through his issues even when he gets it wrong (#relatable). Oliver seems uptight, but he’s actually a total cinnamon roll beneath that polished exterior.

Read by Joe Jameson (The Third Wife by Lisa Jewell, and may I just say that every time he said “Lucien” with that gorgeous accent, I was reminded of the human capacity to feel attraction for a person you’ve never met or seen).

poetry

My favorite description of this book used to be one from this interview at Them calling it a book “hellbent on envisioning a world where queer Black joy exists not as a release but as a constant reality, while still recognizing the current state of affairs.” I do believe my new favorite is this one in Smith’s own words: “Homie is a book that says it’s about friendship and intimacy just like that guy that sent you 13 d*ck pics just now. But at the end of the day, it is really about so much more…. it’s about depression, it’s about suicidal ideation, it’s about men who f*cking suck. It’s about everything that a life can be about, and just about how friendship is that net that can catch you.” (Watch that and a reading here; just FYI, it’s a link to Grindr’s YouTube page. Do not at me with any clutching of pearls).

What I love about it: It’s a powerful, hilarious, heart-wrenching love letter to Black queer friendship on its own, but Smith reading their poetry aloud like it was intended takes it to a whole new level of slap-you-across-the-face impactful.

Read by the author.

historical fiction

I only just read Practical Magic last year and wondered what the hell took me so long, but on second thought, I played that pretty cool: unlike the folks who had to wait literal decades for The Rules of Magic, I got the read all three of the books about the Owens sisters almost back to back. In Magic Lessons, we go way way back and learn the story of the OG Owens witch Maria, and find out what the deal really is with the Owens curse. I am so in love with these books, I grieve their ending.

What I love about it: Put witches in any book and I’m already one foot in. Make those witches powerful, kind, bold, self-assured, headstrong, and fiercely protective of one another? I melt.

Read by Sutton Foster, who’s the star of the Younger TV adaptation, and reads the audiobook it’s based on, Older: A Younger Novel by Pamela Redmond.

nonfiction

Have you ever noticed that the villains in popular fairly tales are disfigured in some way or that disability is their punishment for being evil? Or that the princesses and princes who find love aren’t ever disabled, or if they are, they only find love only after their hideous disfigurement has been shaken off? Yikes. I thought I kinda already knew that the fairy tales of the West have major ableist tones, but reading this book really just circles all that’s wrong with those depictions in bright red ink. Able-bodied privilege has kept many of us from thinking critically about the implications of ableist messaging in these beloved stories, from Brothers Grimm to Hans Christian Andersen to the Disney machine. This #ownvoices book is a must read.

What I love about it: It’s no one’s job to make able-bodied people feel more comfortable about learning all that we get wrong about disability, but this book manages to feel like a call-in. Again, Amanda Leduc doesn’t owe anybody that, but this audiobook felt like a respected friend was telling me to have a seat and learn,

Read by the author

romance

This is the first in a new series about three women who become instant BFFs after the live tweeting of a terrible date leads them to an unfortunate discovery: they’ve all been catfished by the same loser! In the wake of their newfound viral fame, Samiah, London, and Taylor bond over Moscow mules and make a no-dating pact: for the next six months, they’ll take a break from men and dating to focus on themselves. Of course, this is precisely when a new hottie starts at Samiah’s office, making her seriously reconsider the pact.

What I love about it: Where do I start!? There’s the exploration of the role of race and gender in workplace dynamics, specifically Black women’s experience in STEM; a friendship between self-assured and empowered women who know their worth (and when to say no to catfishing f*ck boys); a fun, sexy, and satisfying romance.

Read by Je Nie Fleming (And Now She’s Gone by Rachel Howzell Hall, How Long ’til Black Future Month? by N. K. Jemisin)

Your girl’s podcast obligations for the year are put to bed and that means it’s 100% pleasure reading for me right now! I knew I had to finally pick up this highly recommended book because hello, Latinas in England + tea is the most my jam.

When we first meet Lila Reyes, she’s super grumps. She was supposed to take over the family panadería with her sister, move into her first apartment with her bestie, and live happily ever after with her boo thang, pero… Instead, her best friend bailed on her, her boyfriend dumped her right before prom (rude!), and she’s still grieving the sudden loss of her abuela pretty hard. Concerned for her mental health, her parents ship her off to England to stay with family against her will in the hopes that the trip will clear her head. Lila agrees to go but she sure isn’t happy about it, landing at Heathrow with a scowl, a stank attitude, and not a single sweater packed in protest. Our girl is pure Cubana, Miami born and raised; she not used to or prepared for the people, the weather, and the quaint countryside setting she’s to call home for the next three months. But then!!! Just when she’s decided England isn’t her cup of tea (wink wink), she meets Orion, a teashop clerk who appoints himself her personal tour guide and shows her all that she’s been missing.

I was low-key annoyed with Lila at first for being so salty about the trip while I’m stuck inside praying for a vaccine. Pobrecita Lila, so burdened with this all-expenses-paid trip to one of my favorite places in the world! But I found my frigid heart melting right along with Lila’s as she began to let loose and find herself, especially when she got to flex in the kitchen and show off those finely tuned baking skills. There’s a lot to love in this cinnamon roll of a book; the romance is sweet and faith-restoring; the idyllic country setting made me long for strolls down cobblestone lanes, lunch at a local pub, and a proper afternoon tea; all the pastry talk made my mouth water for scones, buns, pan Cubano, and pastelitos with guava and cheese. But what really set this book apart for me was Lila’s relationship to her family, especially with her sister and abuela. Those dynamics made me long for my own hometown with all it’s sunshine, Latin flavors, and the people in it. Do yourself a favor and treat yourself to this book; it’ll make you want to call a person you love, whip up a sweet, buttery treat, and perhaps even dare you to bet on yourself.

Read by Frankie Corzo (Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Next Year in Havana by Chanel Cleeton, Incendiary by Zoraida Cordova, Each of Us a Desert by Mark Oshiro)

“What does it mean to be Black and alive right now?” This collection of essays, memes, recipes, tweets, conversations, poetry, and more paints a layered portrait of the Black experience, “to tell the story of the radical, imaginative, provocative, and gorgeous world that Black creators are bringing forth today.”

Ready for this narrator list? Read by Kimberly Drew, Kevin R. Free, Dominic Hoffman, Robin Miles, Adenrele Ojo, Bahni Turpin, and Jenna Wortham. Whew!

When out-of-work math teacher Ethan McCloud is sent a mysterious box, a sequence of Da Vinci Code-esque events ensues. As he and his ex-girlfriend unravel a mystery (and a conspiracy) 10,000 years in the making, they’re chased down by both the Six-Fingered Man and the Council of David (sound like upstanding citizens to me!). Ethan must find a way to evade his pursuers if he’s going to find the truth.

Yeah… I really did pick this one because of the Da Vinci Code comp. I like what l like, don’t at me!

Read by Kevin R. Free (All Systems Red by Martha Wells, The Ballad of Black Tom by Victor LaValle) making his second appearance in this newsletter today!

Alyssa Cole is back with a brand new book and a brand new series. If you loved her Reluctant Royals books, get ready for Runaway Royals! In this first installment, Shanti Mohapi weds King Sanyu of Njaza in an arranged marriage. She’s shrewd, savvy, and seems to have the answers to the country’s problems, but her new subjects see her as an outsider. By day, the two lead separate lives; by night, Shanti wears the crown and Sanyu defers to her both in politics and passion (insert body roll here). When turmoil erupts and Shan’t goes on the run, “Sanyu must learn whether he has what it takes both to lead his people and to catch his queen.”

Read by Karen Chilton (The New Jim Crow by Michelle Alexander, A Princess in Theory and the rest of the books in the Reluctant Royals series)

In ultra-orthodox Brooklyn, lonely teen Ari Eden’s entire life is consumed by intense study and religious rituals. Then his family announces that they’re packing up and moving to a glitzy Miami suburb, and Ari sees an opportunity for reinvention. He enrolls at an opulent Jewish academy, a place ruled by dizzying wealth, ruthless ambition, and hedonism. When the school’s golden boy takes Ari under his wing, Ari gets pulled into the school’s most exclusive and wayward clique as they begin testing their religion in… interesting ways. This is Liberty Hardy’s favorite book of the year!

Read by Micky Shiloah (Lot Six by David Adjmi)

Everyone I know who’s read the Poppy War series has recommended it enthusiastically with something the tune of, “Ah! Brutal! Gird your loins! SO GOOD!” The Burning God is the conclusion to this award-winning epic fantasy trilogy that combines the history of 20th-century China with a banana-pants world of gods and monsters.

Read by Emily Woo Zeller (a Book Riot favorite who also reads White Ivy by Susie Yang, which I’m SO excited to read!)

This is the sequel to War Girls, a book I admit I didn’t know much about until recently because I was caught up in all the buzz around Riot Baby (read that too, it’s phenomenal). In War Girls, it’s 2172 and the earth is largely uninhabitable due to climate change and nuclear disasters. In a futuristic, Black Panther-inspired Nigeria, these conditions have forced many to move to space colonies while those left behind suffer through civil war and radiation poisoning. Sisters Onyii and Ify’s lives have been marked by violence and political unrest, but they dream of peace. They’re willing to fight for that peace, and that’s exactly what they do. In this sequel, “the battles are over, but the fight for justice has just begun.”

Read by Nkeki Obi-Melekwe (Ties That Tether by Jane Igharo)

My body is ready for 30 hours of soothing narration from dad. I’m not crying, YOU’RE crying!

Read by dad

This Victorian gothic horror-comedy story-within-a-story revolves around the Brookhants School for Girls, a cursed New England boarding because of course it is. The lives of two sets of girls who lived over a century apart are entwined in mysterious ways; in 1902, Clara and Flo died under suspicious circumstances on school grounds, and Harper and Audrey are playing Flo and Clara in a modern horror film about their gruesome deaths. As past and present melt into one another with each distortion of reality and revelation of long-buried truths, a low (and literal) hum of dread sets in and makes itself at home. It’s full of Hollywood satire, sapphic romance, and some deliciously dark humor. If you like your horror spooky but not scary, creepy as shit but not bloody or violent, this wonderful book strikes that perfect balance of atmospheric and unsettling that’s just made for fall reading.

Now: how to describe Xe Sands’ narration style? She sort of sounds like I imagine a specter come from the beyond to send me on a dangerous quest would sound, or like I do when I’ve had too much wine and I’m trying to persuade someone to go get me some french fries: it’s a little slow, a little raspy, and you just get the sense that she’s withholding vital information. This sounds like shade, but I promise it’s not! She’s won all of the awards and her work is beloved by many, but I’ve spent enough time interacting with the most critical parts of the internet to know that she’s probs not everyone’s cup of tea. I personally think that languid, almost hoarse, bordering-on-vocal-fry thing is an entire mood, one perfectly suited to this haunted tale.

In conclusion: I loooooved this book!

Backlist bump: The Miseducation of Cameron Post

Here’s how I know 2020 did a number on me: I didn’t know that Anthony Horowitz was releasing a follow-up to Magpie Murders! Susan Ryeland has retired from the publishing game and is living that Mamma Mia life running a boutique hotel in Crete—but all that rest and relaxation is starting to bore her. Then the Trehernes come to the hotel and ask Susan for help them solve a murder case and find their daughter Cecily. During Cecily’s disastrous wedding weekend, a guest was murdered at her parents’ Suffolk hotel. The handyman was swiftly convicted, and Cecily went missing days after telling her parents she thought he was innocent. So where does Susan come in? It so happens that late author Alan Conway knew the murder victim, and he based the third book in his Atticus Pund detective series on this very crime. This is another book within a book situation (gimme!) where Susan will have to read between the lines (heyyoooo!) to solve the case.

Read by Lesley Manville (The Thursday Murder Club by Richard Osman), Allan Corduner (Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz, The Book Thief by Markus Zusak)

Latina + tea + England!?! You already know I’m obsessed. Lila Reyes has a three-step post-graduation plan: 1) take over for her abuela as head baker at their panadería, 2) move in with her bestie, and 3) live happily ever after with her boo. Then it all falls apart! Concerned for her mental health, her parents send her to England for the summer to stay with friends. Dreary England is a far cry from sun-drenched Miami though, and Lila isn’t sure it’s her cup of tea (you were warned!). Then she meets Orion, a teashop clerk who appoints himself her personal tour guide and shows her all that she’s been missing. Tap this book right into my veins!

Read by Frankie Corzo (Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, Next Year in Havana by Chanel Cleeton, Incendiary by Zoraida Cordova—like I keep saying: Frankie Corzo is out here working!!)

1969 was a year for the whole world and Harvard specifically: it was the height of counterculture; campuses everywhere were trying to “curb the unruly spectacle of student protest;” Harvard began the very un-smooth process of merging with Radcliffe, its all-female sister school; and it was the year that 23-year-old graduate student Jane Britton, daughter of Radcliffe Vice President J. Boyd Britton, was found bludgeoned to death in her Cambridge apartment.

Then 40 years later, curious grad student Becky Cooper first heard whispers of this story. It’s one she would ultimately follow for 10 years, uncovering “a tale of gender inequality in academia, a ‘cowboy culture’ among empowered male elites, the silencing effect of institutions, and our compulsion to rewrite the stories of female victims.” I think I may be ready to dive back into books like this again, the story sounds so compelling!

Read by the author.

This book isn’t a new release, but the audiobook version specifically is… and it’s read by the one and only Blue Ivy Carter! Given how much the internet bullies of the world have had to say about this little girl’s hair all her life, this makes me really happy. Use your voice, little Blue!

For reasons, I did almost zero reading last week. What I did instead was watch a bunch of TV, including the documentary The Vow on HBO. Have you all seen this?! After episode one, I thought NXIVM sounded a little like that episode of The Golden Girls where Rose joins that positive thinking group—a little corny, a little cheesy, but harmless, and maybe even kind of nice if it helped folks find a sense of purpose and community. Pero ay, dios mio! It got WILD from there. Am I the only one who didn’t know the blonde from Smallville was in a sex cult that branded women’s pelvic regions with her and her “master’s” initials and that she’s been sentenced to 120 years in prison for sex trafficking??

It was hard not to draw comparisons between some the structures and schemes of this cult to good ol’ Scientology. That reminded me how much I enjoyed the audiobook of Troublemaker by Leah Remini, which she narrates herself. If you’re in the mood for a juicy read, have ever wondered that the deal is with Scientology and Tom Cruise, or enjoy pretending that Stacy Carosi (who gets that reference??) is spilling tea to you personally, this audiobook delivers.

I love me some David Sedaris, and goodness knows I could use a laugh. This is a collection of the best stories and essays from his remarkable 25-year career, all selected by Sedaris himself. While I’m a little bummed that “Santaland Diaries” didn’t make the cut, I am overjoyed to see that ‘You Can’t Kill the Rooster” did along with several other favorites.

Read by the author, because who else could do David Sedaris better than David Sedaris??

Lucy and Jake are happily married, and Lucy has set her career aside to devote her life to their kids and a finely tuned domestic routine. Then one afternoon, she gets a call that will forever alter the course of their lives: the caller claims his wife has been having an affair with Lucy’s husband. Lucy and Jake decide to stay together, but on one condition – Lucy gets to hurt Jake three times. I’m scared. Are you scared? I feel like we should be scared.

Read by Clare Corbett (The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins, The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley)

Raised outside of Boston, Ivy was taught by her grandmother to use her mild appearance for cover in her thievery of yard sales and secondhand shops. But the jig is up when Ivy’s mother finds out about these schemes and Ivy is swiftly sent packing to China.

Years later, now back in Boston, Ivy runs into the sister of Gideon Speyer, the golden boy from a wealthy political family that was once the object of Ivy’s obsession. It feels like fate, and before she knows it, she’s reeling Gideon in at lavish parties and island getaways. “But just as Ivy is about to have everything she’s ever wanted, a ghost from her past resurfaces, threatening the nearly perfect life she’s worked so hard to build.”

Read by the prolific Emily Woo Zeller (The Bride Test by Helen Hoang, The Poppy War series by R. F. Kuang)

For our most recent episode of the Read Harder podcast, Tirzah and I talked about plays written by an author of color and/or a queer author. I found one of my picks on audio, so I’m sharing that with you today.

In 1846, Dr. George Barry has recently come to Alabama. Philomena is his wife’s 19-year-old servant and also an assistant to Dr. Barry in his quest to cure vaginal fistulas. As such, she tends to his patients, other enslaved Black pregnant women. Philomena is herself is pregnant with Dr. Barry’s child; when she becomes the patient, her disastrous childbirth changes her life and the doctor’s life forever.

Now for some background: this is a historical drama inspired by the life and experiments of Dr. J Marion Sims and the lives of three of the many enslaved black women he worked on (Lucy, Anarcha, and Betsey are the only names we know of today). Who is Dr. J Marion Sims, you ask? He’s the dude credited as the “father of modern gynecology,” a 19th-century physician and plantation owner who invented the vaginal speculum (“yay”). He pioneered the surgical technique to repair vaginal fistula, a very common 19th-century childbirth complication. Sounds great, right? Well, to quote the folks who host the Queens Podcast (unrelated, but interesting, funny, and super sweary): “history is a bag of d*cks.”

The research behind Dr. Sims’ pioneering technique was done on enslaved women, both ones that he personally owned and others he “ordered” from other plantations. If you aren’t already throwing up in your mouth, brace yourself: he conducted all of his experiments on these women—some of whom had up to 30 procedures performed on them—WITHOUT ANESTHESIA. While contemporary physicians, historians, ethicists, etc condemn Sims’ methods, there are those who continue to defend him; he was “simply a man of his time,” don’tcha know! Those enslaved women with fistulas probably wanted the treatment rull bad and would have consented to the treatment! The problem is that back then, their consent wouldn’t have been any kind of a factor; all that was needed was consent from their owners, who were of course invested in these women’s recovery for purely selfish when-can-she-get-back-to-work reasons.

Behind the Sheet is a fictional exploration of the untold stories of these women, a slim but impactful play that reminded me so much of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot and Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad. Like Henrietta Lacks, the women “treated” by Dr. Sims were violated and robbed of their agency in the name of science. As with Colson Whitehead, Charly Evon Simpson manages to write with impossible restraint about a sequence of horrifying events, conveying their brutality with sparse language that still manages to bowl you over.

While this isn’t exactly the kind of audiobook I’d pick up this week when I’m all in my feels, it is worth spending time with whenever you have the brain space to do so. It was my first time listening to a play on audio, and I’ll admit it took some getting used to: with no narrator to guide you along the way, you really have to concentrate on each character. Don’t let that dissuade you though, it’s not a bad thing! It’s ultimately so immersive, a different way to take in the format of a play.

Read by an ensemble cast: Monica McSwain, Matthew Floyd Miller, Dominique Morisseau, Larry Powell, Devon Sorvari, Josh Stamberg, Jasmine St. Clair, Danielle Truitt, Inger Tudor, Karen Malina White.

If you thought I wasn’t going to sneak in at least one more witch book, HA! This one is about Emilia and Victoria, twin sisters who are also both strega! That’s right: outwardly, they’re living a normal life, working in their family’s Sicilian restaurant; secretly, they’re witches. When Victoria misses dinner service one night, Emilia goes looking for her and finds her badly desecrated body. Emilia will stop at nothing to avenge her beloved twin, even if that means using that old forbidden magic.

Read by Marisa Calin (A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder by Holly Jackson, The Left-Handed Booksellers of London by Garth Nix, Spellbook of the Lost and Found by Moïra Fowley-Doyle)

John Harvey was a neurosurgeon a decade into retirement when a sheriff showed up at his door with a summons. It was a malpractice suit, it did not go well, and Dr. Harvey never got over it. In this memoir, his son Brian Harvey shares the story of a boating adventure he took with his wife, his dog, and a box of documents that surfaced after his father’s death. That box turns out to contain every nurse’s record, doctor’s report, trial transcript, and testimony related to the malpractice case. Only Brian’s father had read it all – until now. Brian finally finds out what happened in the OR on that crucial night and why Dr. Harvey fought the excruciating accusations.

Read by Jason Gray

Tabitha has just returned to her hometown in England when a body is found and she’s blamed for the murder. She attempts to solve her own case from prison as her entire life and past are picked apart. As she attempts to unravel the truth, she realizes her memory of the day in question is a blur. She can’t be guilty. She knows she’s not guilty! She.. thinks she’s not guilty?

Read by Michelle Ford (The Last Wife by Karen Hamilton)

Mike and Benson are a Japanese American chef at a Mexican restaurant and a Black day care teacher living together in Houston. While the years they’ve been together have been good ones—good food, good sex, and, ya know, love—they’re not quite sure why it is they’re still together. When Mike finds out his estranged dad is dying in Osaka, he picks up and flies across the world to say goodbye. There he undergoes an extraordinary transformation as he discovers the truth about his family and his past. Pick this up if you’re in the mood for a “funny and profound story about family in all its strange forms, joyful and hard-won vulnerability, becoming who you’re supposed to be, and the limits of love.”

Read by Akie Kotabe (Inheritors by Asako Serizawa) and Bryan Washington ( Lot: Stories)

I did not do much non-work reading last week, in part because I took a week off to relax and celebrate my 36th turn around the sun, and mainly because November 3rd is just around the corner and I have apparently just now reached peak Can’t Deal. My focus is non-existent.

So for what I’m sure are obvious reasons, I’m going to go with a throwback hit and reminding everyone about Everything’s Trash, but It’s Okay. I recommended this book waaaaaaay back when I first took over the Audiobooks newsletter! Phoebe Robinson is a hilarious comedian, actress, writer, and one half of the Two Dope Queens podcast and HBO special (I wish both were still going!) Her first book, You Can’t Touch My Hair: And Other Things I Still Have to Explain had me hollering in public and this second effort did not disappoint. No one does excessive hashtags, silliness, and Bono thirst (and I do mean thirst, so much thirst) with an injection of thoughtful social commentary quite like Phoebe does. Phoebe’s narration of personal anecdotes had me cry-laughing and cringing at the same time. Really though, it’s her cultural criticism and musings on feminism, politics, body image, workplace parity, and dating that really set it off. This book is the essence of Phoebe: smart, funny, and a little (a lotta) extra.

If you, like me, are hyper aware that everything’s trash and aren’t feeling all that okay, pick up this audiobook. Permit yourself some laughter and hope.