Audio Book

Audiobook: When in Rome

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by Sarah Adams
Read by Karissa Vacker & Andrew Eiden
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Content: There is some swearing, but mostly mild (I don’t remember any f-bombs), and while there is talk of sex, it happens off-screen. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Amelia Rose is a famous pop star (stage name: Rae Rose) who has fallen out of love with her career. Her relationship with her mom is shot, she’s being overworked, and so on the precipice of a world tour, she takes a page from Audrey Hepburn in “Roman Holiday” and takes off for Rome. Rome, Kentucky that is. She breaks down on the lawn of local baker Noah Walker, who’s recovering from his own heartbreak – his fiance, who dragged him to New York and cheated on him – and doesn’t want anything to do with women ever again.

Of course, there’s chemistry. But there’s also a quirky small town, Noah’s delightful sisters, and Amelia finding herself again.

It’s a delightful take on the grumpy-sunshine trope, one that is done especially well on audio. Both narrators are fantastic, and capture the essence of the characters as well as making the people in the town around them come alive. It’s charming and fun, and I just had a smile on my face the whole time.

So, of course, I’m going to listen to the next in the series.

Audiobook: Confessions of a Forty-Something F**k Up

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by Alexandra Potter
Read by Sally Phillips
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Content: If you can’t tell from the title, it is a very sweary book. Like, super sweary. There is some off-screen sex as well. It’s in the Adult Fiction section of the bookstore.

Nell’s just moved back to London after years in America because her five-year relationship with her American fiance fell apart. She’s forty-something, unmarried, without children, and by all measures, failing at life. All her friends are married with kids, have husbands who have successful jobs, and homes, and… Nell just moved into a flatshare and is writing obituaries and trying to get a podcast off the ground. But, over the course of the book, as she examines her life and her expectations, she finds that maybe she’s not such a hot mess after all.

I have this work friend (her name is Melissa, too; we call ourselves The Melissas) who has excellent taste in books. If she says it’s good, I know I’ll probably like it. She listened to this one a month back, and I finally got around to listening to it myself. And (of course) she’s right: it’s not only a lot of fun and quite funny to listen to, but it’s also sweet and touching and a good reminder that yes, every woman feels like an eff-up, and like everyone else has everything together. That, and social media really has warped our sense of what is real. It’s a lovely story of friendship and starting over and making peace with where you are in life. The narrator is just delightful (and does an amazing American accent), which made the book that much more enjoyable.

So, yeah, listen to Melissa: this is a good one.

Audiobook: Fourth Wing

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by Rebecca Yarros
Read by Rebecca Soler & Teddy Hamilton
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Content: It’s super sweary, super violent, and lots of on-screen sexytimes. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Violet Sorrengail was supposed to be a scribe. But then her father passed away and her mother – who is the general in charge of the flight battle school – has different plans for her. Violet – frail, sickly Violet – is given no choice: she has to join the battle school. The place where you either graduate or die. The book takes place over the first year, as Violet learns to navigate the cruelties of the school, makes – and loses – friends, and finds an unreasonable attraction to the son of an executed rebel leader, Xaden Riorson.

My first reaction when listening to this? It’s not objectively a good book. Like, the writing is not great. But, it’s a lot of fun. I think it helped that Soler was slightly unhinged reading the book. She was chewing through scenery, which honestly, is what this book needed. It’s not a book to be taken seriously at all. That said, Yarros is a good storyteller. There was a lot of action, the battle scenes were pretty intense, and there were some nice surprises as well. I will probably read the second book in the series, just to see where it goes.

So, do I respect this book? No. Will I recommend it? Depends on the person. Do I understand why it’s the Big Thing that it is? Oh yeah. I get it now.

Audiobook: Midnight at the Houdini

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by Delilah S. Dawson
Read by Saskia Maarleveld
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Release date: September 5, 2023
Content: There are some precarious situations and a creepy guy who wants to hurt a teen girl. It’s in the YA section (grades 6-8) of the bookstore.

Anna has had a perfect life: her dad owns hotels in Las Vegas, so she hasn’t wanted anything. And her best friend, her sister Emily, has always been there for her. But on the night of Emily’s wedding, Anna is trapped in a storm and ends up in the Houdini – a mysterious, magical hotel that she has until midnight to get out of. Or she’ll be stuck there forever.

There’s more to the story, of course: There’s Max, the love interest who has been trapped in the hotel his whole life because his mother, Phoebe trapped them there. Anna’s dad and his friends are trapped there as well and have their own separate plot as we learn about Phoebe and the background of the Houdini.

I read in some promotional material that this was a loose retelling of The Tempest, and once I read that (about a quarter of the way into the book), I could see the similarities. And it made the book much better. I also really liked Maarleveld as a narrator; she kept the book engaging and I delighted in the way she did some of the voices. It was a lot of fun to listen to, and I’m glad I did.

Audiobook: Business or Pleasure

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by Rachel Lynn Solomon
Read by Hathaway Lee
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Content: Oh, there’s sooo much in here. All the f-bombs, all the on-page sex. Very, very spicy. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Chandler is a ghostwriter who is unhappy with her life. So when she meets a guy in a bar after a failed book signing (the author she wrote the book for didn’t even recognize Chandler’s name), she has a one-night stand with him. However, it’s the worst sex she’s ever had. (Or at least had in a long time.) So, when she gets a gig ghostwriting for the C-list actor Finn Walsh, she’s shocked (and a bit embarrassed) that he’s the guy she just slept with. She agrees to take the job, and as they travel from con to con (he’s best known for playing a science nerd on a werewolf show) they get to know each other, and the truth comes out: he’s terrible in bed. He’s a unicorn of a man and wants to know how to get better, so Chandler agrees to give him detailed sex lessons. Practical experience. The problem is: how can she keep her heart out of it?

Oh, this one made me blush! I kept hitting the very detailed, quite graphic sex scenes while at the gym (I’m blushing because I’m exercising, really!). But, honestly? It’s a fun book. It’s super sex-positive, and Chandler stresses in her lessons that communication between partners is vital to having a good experience. I kind of felt like I should be taking notes! But, beyond that, I enjoyed the relationship between Chandler and Finn, and how they pushed each other to become better and more confident people. So, yeah: super spicy, and probably not for everyone. But ultimately, I quite enjoyed it.

Audiobook: All In

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by Billie Jean King, Johnette Howard, and Maryanne Vollers
Read by Billie Jean King
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Content: King talks about difficult subjects including sexism, discrimination, her affair, and eating disorders. It’s in the Sports section of the bookstore.

In this memoir, King writes of how she got into tennis, her struggles for equal treatment in the sport for women, her winning championships and being number one in the world, as well as her winning the infamous “Battle of the Sexes”. She talks about coming to terms with her sexuality as well as broadening her activism. It covers her life up to the present, including her marriage to her long-time partner Ilana Kloss.

I picked this one up not because I had any real affection for King, but because I was looking for something different to listen to and was in the mood for a sports book. I found it interesting – it’s not just a history of King’s life, it’s a history of women in professional sports, of the evolution of tennis in America, of the history of Women’s, Civil, and LGBTQ+ Rights. If I can say anything, it’s this: King has been around for a long time (she was born in 1943) and has seen and done and been involved in a lot. She wasn’t particularly fantastic as a narrator; I sped it up so she’d read at a speed that I could tolerate, but I did appreciate hearing the emotion in her voice when she talked about certain subjects. She was very frank about her life, her mistakes, her evolution, and her path to a very fulfilling life. I did like hearing about the other players on the tennis tour, especially when she got to ones I recognized (say around the 1980s), and I did enjoy hearing her view on her personal and professional battles.

It’s not my usual read, but I liked it well enough.

Audiobook: The Dead Romantics

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by Ashley Poston
Read by Eileen Stevens
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Content: There is death, swearing (including multiple f-bombs), and on-screen sex. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore.

Florence Day has two secrets: she is the ghostwriter for popular romance author Anne Nichols, and she can see ghosts. She also ended a long-term relationship (when he stole her ghost memories and turned them into a best-selling novel) and her father suddenly dies, so she finds herself in her hometown for the first time in 10 years.

So, imagine her surprise when her editor – who she was pretty sure was alive in New York when she left – turns up as a ghost on the doorsteps of her family’s funeral home.

I’ve had this one on my radar since it came out, and a couple of co-workers loved it, but it became more urgent that I read it once I finished The Seven-Year Slip. And, while I don’t think it was as good as that one, I still thoroughly enjoyed it.

I like how Poston weaves in deeper themes than the meet-cute and falling-in-love you get in a typical romance. (She does have that, though. It’s just a bonus!) Florence is dealing with the betrayal by her ex, and the feelings of failure and inability to finish the romance she’s supposed to be writing. She’s dealing with the grief of losing her father, and coming to terms with her siblings who are angry that she abandoned the family. She is also falling in love with a ghost, which ha the potential to be really weird, but actually works, and works well.

The best thing about this one, though, is the narrator. She is fabulous. It kept me entertained and pulled into the story, and I loved listening to it. I think The Seven-Year Slip is the better book, but this one is a lot of fun as well.

Audiobook: Remarkably Bright Creatures

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by Shelby Van Pelt
Read by Marin Ireland & Michael Urie
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Content: There are some swear words, including a few f-bombs, and talk of suicide. It’s in the Fiction section of the bookstore.

Soon after her husband’s death, Tova Sullivan takes a night job cleaning at an aquarium on Puget Sound. The same body of water where her son, Erik, mysteriously disappeared 30 years ago. She’s a kind, quiet woman, who talks to the animals, and soon makes a connection with Marcellus, a rescued Giant Pacific Octopus.

Cameron is a bit of a dead-beat 30-year-old, one who is not able to keep a steady job and who still has dreams of “making it” as the lead guitarist in a band. When his girlfriend finally gets fed up and kicks him out and his aunt finds a bag of his mother’s stuff (a mother who abandoned him at age 9), Cameron heads up to the same small Puget Sound town, looking for the person he believes to be his father.

What he finds, and what Tova comes to realize, is a community that supports one another, and that sometimes, there are remarkably bright creatures in your midst.

This one was remarkable, particularly on audio. Urie, who voices the Marcellus chapters – yes, there are chapters written from an octopus’s point of view and they are incredible – is an absolute delight as a narrator. I adored the world-weariness that he infused in Marcellus’ narration; it often made me laugh aloud. And Ireland, who voiced the rest of the book, was also incredible. It was a book that I didn’t want to stop listening to, one of the those that you sit listening to in the car, even after you arrive at your destination. But even more than the narration, I liked how Van Pelt wove the stories together. I cared about the characters (even the ocotpus!) and the way their lives wove together. I wanted them all to be happy, to find resolution. And I was supremely satisfied, in the end.

A truly excellent little novel, defintely worth the hype it got.

Audiobook: One Italian Summer

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by Rebecca Serle
Read by Lauren Graham
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Content: There is an off-screen(ish) sex scene and some swearing, including some f-bombs. It’s in the Romance section of the bookstore, though I disagree with that.

Katy’s mother has just died of cancer, and her life is spinning out of control. She feels unmoored (she’s an only child), and she is not sure she wants to stay in the life she (well, honestly: her mother) has built for herself. She and her mom had planned to go spend a couple of weeks in Positano, Italy and so Katy is encouraged by her dad and her husband to go take the trip anyway. It might help with the grief. What she finds, when she gets there is something magical: her mother, age 30, in the summer she spent in Italy. (There’s also a hot American guy she hooks up with, but that’s not really the point.) Over the course of the weeks, Katy finds herself unwinding, and when the Big Reveal comes, she is in a better place to accept it and move on. 

I’ve had this on my TBR (or actually, it was the audiobook to-listen to list) for ages since it first came out. But it seemed like this summer was the time. It’s good on the Italy detail – I got that Katy was having a gorgeous time in a gorgeous place, eating so much yummy food. But, I was annoyed with her relationship with her mother: she let her mother do everything.  She was married! She was an adult! It can’t be healthy. I guess that’s part of her growth arc? I don’t know I didn’t hate it; I loved Graham as the narrator, and I thought it dealt with grief and death extremely well. I guess I was just expecting something, well, fluffier than I got. In the end, though, I was charmed by the Italian landscape. And I liked Katy’s growth. So it wasn’t half-bad.

Audiobook: Kiss Her Once for Me

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by Alison Cochrun
Read by: Natalie Naudus
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Content: It’s a romance, so there are sexytimes. And lots and lots of kissing. Plus swearing, including f-bombs. It’s in the romance section of the bookstore.

Ellie Oliver had one perfect day. It was Christmas Eve, and she was sad that her mother (again) wouldn’t visit her in Portland. She was about to start her dream job. Then, during a snowstorm, she met the perfect woman and spent the perfect day. A year later, though, Ellie’s life is a mess: she was fired from the perfect job, she’s working as a barista in a dive of a coffee shop, and worst of all: she had her heart broken by the perfect woman. So when the landlord of the coffee shop suggests a fake engagement so he can inherit $2 million (and give her 10%) she jumps at the chance. The catch? His sister is said perfect woman who broke Ellie’s heart. In a crazy, event-filled week at the family’s winter cabin, Ellie has to make a choice: the safe, fake marriage and money for true love.

(You can guess which one she chooses.)

The thing about romance books is that it’s the characters that pull you in and keep you interested. Readers basically know how the plot is going to go. And this one, my friends, has some excellent characters. From Ellie herself to the fantastic love interest, Jack, to the high and/or stoned grandmothers. It’s all a lot of fun. And the narrator is just sublime. So, even though I read a Christmas book in July, it was totally worth it. Such fun, such delight, such adorableness.