Audiobooks: Fiction, Poetry, & Drama
I am a believer in the beauty and utility of audiobooks. (It helps that I drive about an hour a day.) Humans spoke and told stories before they wrote. Homer sang or chanted. Your experience of a story may be enhanced or transformed by listening to a skilled artist bring to life. I cannot imagine reading Alexander McCall Smith's wonderful No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency novels, because the amazing Lisette Lecat, a South African actress, has given them life inside my head with her singular readings. If you love the experience of being read to, here are some of our carefully chosen titles. If you want books to be delivered in an old and an always new way, try an audiobook soon. (Success and technological parameters have driven me to divide our audiobooks into two pages. Be sure to browse our audiobook-nonfiction as well.)
Wonder
Wonder
August (Auggie) Pullman was born with a facial deformity that prevented him from going to a mainstream school—until now. He’s about to enter fifth grade at Beecher Prep, and if you’ve ever been the new kid, then you know how hard that can be. The thing is Auggie’s just an ordinary kid, with an extraordinary face. But can he convince his new classmates that he’s just like them, despite appearances? R. J. Palacio has crafted an uplifting novel full of wonderfully realistic family interactions, lively school scenes, and writing that shines with spare emotional power. “Wonder is a book with such a big, wide heart— it shows how we are all fragile, imperfect, and perfectly beautiful creatures. A wonderful novel by a wonder of a writer!” — Julia Alvarez, author of Return to Sender, Before We Were Free, Finding Miracles, and the Tía Lola Stories
Read by Diana Steele, Nick Podehl, and Kate Rudd. 7 cds, 8.25 hours, unabridged.