Best of the Best: Audio Books to Get You Hooked

So many more to note, but if you start here, you won't stop!

Children's (but so enchanting for adults as well)
Because of Winn Dixie by Kate DiCamillo, performed by Cherry Jones
The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo, performed by Graeme Malcolm
(Why two Kate DiCamillo's?  They're both quite different but equally perfect for audio: beautifully turned phrases and sheer joy in the sound of language abounds.)

Middle Readers/Young Adults
The Harry Potter Series by J.K. Rowling, performed by Jim Dale
Anything But Typical by Nora Raleigh Baskin, performed by Tom Parks
The Life All Around Me by Ellen Foster by Kaye Gibbons, read by Kaye Gibbons
Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher, performed by Joel Johntone and Debra Wiseman

Short Stories
All the Selected Shorts collections from NPR.  Special mentions: Alec Baldwin reading Tim O'Brien's "Speaking of Courage", Joel Grey reading Ha Jin's "Saboteur", and Jane Curtin reading Gail Godwin's "St. George".
Go get any of these from the library and seek your own favorites: They are truly stellar.

Novels
Shalimar the Clown by Salman Rushdie, performed by Aasif Mandvi
Indian Killer by Sherman Alexie, performed by Sherman Alexie

To Kill A Mockingbird by Harper Lee, performed by Sissie Spacek
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer, performed by Jeff Woodman, Barbara Caruso, and Richard Ferrone

Non-Fiction
Made to Stick by Chip and Dan Heath, performed by Charles Kahlenberg
The Millionaire Messenger by Brendon Burchard, performed by Brendon Burchard

MFB, and happy listening!
L

p.s. Now hop on over to Devourer of Books for excellent tips on getting started with audio books!

AudioBook Mid-Week Meme...

Our host Jen at Devourer of Books offers us this quick set of prompts about audio books so we can get to know each other's tastes in audio books, and perhaps find a new title or two.

Current/most recent audiobook: I'm in the middle of Michael Pollan's In Defense of Food, with The Four Hour Work Week by Timothy Ferris soon to follow, and two YA audiobooks in my library queue.

Impressions: I always enjoy Pollan's breezy style and engaging "new journalism", and he often writes about food related matters, notably in his recent The Omnivore's Dilemma.  So far, this one's focused on the history of "nutritionism", pulling the curtain back to reveal how 'nutrition science' isn't very reliable at all.  I'm enjoying it, but I wish Pollan himself were narrating, because I've heard him speak multiple times and I'm sure he'd be quite good.  More on Friday when I hope to post a review.

Current favorite audiobook: Made To Stick by Chip and Dan Heath.  This book's content is useful for anyone: Why some ideas stick and others don't, and how to make your own ideas memorable.  They walk their talk, so the content's interesting from beginning to end, and the narrator, Charles Kahlenberg, conveys it beautifully.  (This book's another of my 'tandem reads' - not only do I listen to the CDs, but I've also reread the text multiple times.)

One narrator who always makes you choose audio over print: Richard Poe.  I don't know what he's been up to lately, but I got hooked when he read Jane Smiley's Good Faith.  What a gorgeous timbre to his voice, plus a wit and intelligence behind it that makes you want to 'read' on.

Genre you most often choose to listen to: YA and children's lit.  Even if I can't bear one of these books as I read it, I can almost always get through it on audio, and while multi-tasking (driving).  As a teacher, I often need to read YA and middle-reader texts that I otherwise would not choose.

If given the choice, you will always choose audio when: It's children's or YA or I want to 'tandem read' a lengthy book - to compress the amount of time it takes by listening in the car, then reading when I get home.

If given the choice, you will always choose print when: It's a complex non-fiction like the one I reviewed part of today.  In that case, I like to mark up the text and flip back and forth.  Also, if I'm reading for book group, I want the hard copy so I can "sticky it" for reference during our discussions.

How about you?  Even if you haven't participated in Audio Book Week, you can still join in this meme, or even write your responses to some of the questions in the comments here. 

MFB,
L

p.s. If you're new to the blogosphere, a "meme" in this context translates to a prompt or set of prompts offered by one blog for a blog hop.  Bloggers respond to the prompt on their own site, then link at the central site to find out what others think and to 'meet' new bloggers.

All Things Shining - Audio Book Week Review

So then: There are some genres that just don't work so well in audio form.  Philosophical argument, even 'dumbed down' for the masses, is apparently one of those genres. 

To sum up: In the first half of All Things Shining, professors Hubert Dreyfus of Berkeley and Sean Dorrance Kelly of Harvard attempt to assemble a case:
     1.  We live in a nihilistic age in which nobody knows how to create meaning in a lastingly satisfying way, and thus life seems quite bleak.  People get depressed. 
     2. There is no way to find deeply satisfying meaning in daily life without some sort of moment to moment transcendence.  But even the occasional "shining" moments in day to day life do not provide enough lasting joy or meaning to help us transcend our nihilistic ennui.
     3. However, if we could live the meaning-filled lives of the Ancient Greeks, in which belief in gods supported their conception of every moment as imbued with passionate intensity (a whole lotta 'shine'), then we could find truly satisfying meaning and not have to stumble around depressed and rudderless, shallowly grasping at distractions or addictions or power or money to take our minds off our ennui.

These two authors are Western philosophy experts, and thus one anticipates quite credible and lively analysis.  And they reference works as various as Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert (seriously? and they borrow the content of her TED talk too), Infinite Jest and The Pale King by David Foster Wallace, Macbeth & Hamlet, The Iliad, and Moby Dick (to name just a high-profile handful of the works sampled here) as they attempt to support their case.  Promising, no?  One hopes to receive both the promised tour of the major works of Western literature and philosophy and a quickened understanding of how one might connect them productively if not transformationally to one's own life.  But...

Opinion: 
I found the tone (and perhaps this is partly the writers and partly the style of the performance) overly light and a tad patronizing, and some of their analysis unconvincingly shallow or skewed; if you're a listener who's already familiar with the texts they reference, the writers' case actually breaks down a bit as they seem to stretch interpretations and under-support some claims in order to touch on such a wide variety of examples.

And listening (rather than reading) makes returning to sentences or ideas one questions a bit of a hurdle:  This sort of complex and extended analysis would bear much flipping of pages if one were reading the text version, so the more temporally linear form of audio book doesn't seem to work quite as well here as it does for straight narrative or relatively straightforward non-fiction.

So here's the truth, in fairness to the authors: I need to give this book a chance. And that means I need to get the text and mark it up, argue in the margins, and take notes so that I can thoroughly examine the writers' ideas and analysis.  I'm going to shelve the latter half of the audio book until I can listen to it in tandem with reading the text.

If you're contemplating the audio of All Things Shining, I say:  Do the tandem read.  You'll be better off.

MFB,
L

Who'd Enjoy This Especially:
Perhaps those only vaguely familiar with the great works of literature and philosophy in the Western world would find this book a welcome refresher w/opinionated commentary about how they pertain to modern life.  In fact, I suspect that's the authors' primary intended audience.
In addition, if you use the text form along with the audio for a tandem read, I think that folks who know these works reasonably well and love a good argument will like it too, because they'll be arguing with the authors all the way along!

Action: Go out and get the book from the library, then persist.

FYI, all you feminists: Few female writers are included here, at least in the first half of the book, I suppose because not all that many are included in the traditional "dead white male" canon of the West.  Sigh.

Okay for Now by Gary D. Schmidt : Audio Book Week Review

Have you ever 'read tandem'? 

You know:  You listened to an audio while you read the text version of a book, alternating between the text and the audio?  My first 'tandem read' was Rohinton Mistry's A Fine Balance, and I've used the tandem read strategy as a regular practice ever since, especially when devouring young adult books.  However you might have answered this question though, I suggest it's time to try the audio/text strategy (again?) with Okay For Now by Gary D. Schmidt, performed by Lincoln Hoppe.

This new novel from Newbery and Printz honor winner Gary Schmidt balances intense pathos with light, easygoing humor, sympathetic and original characters, important and serious issues, and well-integrated symbolism to produce what, in the end, is an exceptional YA/middle-reader fiction.

To sum up:  We follow the beleaguered almost-eighth-grader Doug Swieteck as his abusive father packs him up, along with his bullying older brother Christopher and their passive, long-suffering mom, and moves them from populous Long Island to small-town "Marysville" in upstate New York.  To find out how Doug - a minor character in Schmidt's award-winning The Wednesday Wars - copes imperfectly but admirably with the effects of his dad's abuse (and I've rarely felt the sort of rage Schmidt evokes through this adult antagonist's habitual sociopathic verbal abuse and horrible misuses of parental authority, not to mention his "quick hands") and the trials of weaving a new web of relationships in a small town summer, all without the aid of his idol, baseball great Joe Pepitone, is the reason we take this journey.  And a rewarding one it is.  (And what an wonderfully sonorous name to provoke a smile every time you say it:  Joe Pepitone.  Go ahead: give it a go; you'll see.  I actually had to check that he was a real Yankee and is a real person!)

I don't want to give away too much more of the plot in this period piece (set in the Vietnam War era) and coming-of-age tale, except to say that Doug's development as he becomes an artist and a young adult while earning the respect of this small community is both heartening and richly rewarding.  And did I mention that a series of Audubon prints focus both the narrative and much of its symbolic/thematic resonance?  Schmidt's work here is ambitious for a middle-reader/young adult novel, and - in my opinion - he succeeds in crafting a novel well out of the ordinary.

But I'll say this:  After reading about a third of the book, I considered putting it down.  And then the audio CDs came in at the library, and once I could hear the rhythms of Doug's language through the adult performer Lincoln Hoppe's interpretation, I got inspired to keep reading.  In this case, it's vital to have the text in hand though, as each chapter is focused by an Audubon print that's pivotal to understanding some of the content and certainly the thematic resonances of the chapter.

MFB,
L

Who'd Enjoy This Especially:
Coming of Age novel fans, baseball lovers, folks who enjoy a strong, unique voice in first person protagonists, bird lovers, visual artists, middle- and high- school teachers looking for 'the next great book' for struggling readers and/or boys who just aren't that into reading, and young people wondering about what it's like to grow up with an abusive parent or to grow up in the Vietnam War era.

Action: I'm following in Dougie's footsteps by copying an Audubon print (way, way imperfectly, I'm sure).  Shout out to all the Action Readers getting their creative on this month!  Join us if you wanna at actionreaders.com!

And a moment of gratitude: I want to thank the poet and children's book writer Irene Latham for recommending this book.  When I saw  her rave review, I immediately put both text and CDs on hold at the library.  She's a fine writer in her own right (review of Leaving Gee's Bend here) and I trust her judgement.  In this case, I'm so glad that I did.

In which I introduce myself as an audiobook aficionado and offer my faves of the year.

For our first post on Audio Book Week 2011, Devourer of Books asks us:

Are you new to audiobooks in the last year? Have you been listening to them forever but discovered something new this year? Favorite titles? New times/places to listen? This is your chance to introduce yourself and your general listening experience.

I've been listening to audiobooks since they were cassette tapes; our kitchen counter always sported a "boom box" with some tape or another offering a novel or non-fiction read to keep us company while cooking dinner or doing dishes, and I can't really recall a time when listening to books wasn't a part of my life.

I can't say that I invented new occasions or techniques for book-listening this year: in fact, I stopped listening to audiobooks at the gym in favor of reading them.  But perhaps for next year I will try to enhance variety and extend my skills with audio books:  Listening while standing on my head?  Reading one book while listening to another?  Listening "backwards" - first CD last & last first?  Start figuring out how to sync my iTouch up with the ever-changing Apple software and then get a kit for my car?  What say ye?  Time to get creative!

But I will allow that I'm a near-constant car listener, and in fact wax quite bereft when I lack a strong performance to enliven my daily commutes.  Sure, I enjoy listening to the radio or to music while driving, but when I consider how much there is to read, and that I teach ninth grade English so I need to keep current on both Y.A. and adult titles, well, audiobooks are primo NET (No Extra Time) sources of both personal enrichment and professional development.  So I am rarely without a set of CDs in my little white Golf.  And somebody shoulda brought a camera the morning I woke up to find that my car stereo had been stolen.  Egads!  Hyperventilation-ville!  I feel certain it wasn't pretty.  But three hours and one trip to Best Buy later, I was back in business with a new Blaupunkt.  And I've been locking my car doors ever since.

I've quite recently begun to blog about audiobooks; you'll find the posts at the bottom of the "This Year's Books, Ratings" page tab above as well as under "what she read - audio books" in the postings by category at right.  I'm trying for one per week now, with at least three in the queue for this week's special celebration.

My favorite of 2011 so far would have to be Ron Silver narrating Philip Roth's The Plot Against America, simply because Silver was such an astonishing actor and his voice is so distinctive.  It ranks right up there with my favorite audiobook performance of all time: Aasif Mandvi (yes, he of The Daily Show fame) reading Salman Rushdie's Shalimar the Clown.  And then there's Sherman Alexie reading his own Indian Killer and Kaye Gibbons reading her own The Life All Around Me by Ellen Foster... But I'm getting ahead of myself as our ultimate faves are to be shared on Thursday...

My Y.A. favorite this year is definitely Jay Asher's Thirteen Reasons Why, dually narrated by Debra Wiseman and Joel Johnstone.  Although I'm not always a fan of multiple readers on audio books, their performances illuminate and engross, elevating the novel itself and deepening its impact.  If you have a teen friend in your life, they're pretty likely to read this, so why not give it a listen? 

What's your favorite audio book of the year?  (And as above, it doesn't have to be released this year, just "read" by you.)  I'm looking to build me a list of TBL's!

MFB,
L              

p.s.  Go check out the Audio Book Week bloggers at Devourer of Books for more ideas...

Weekend "Poem In Your Post" Blog Hop

You Can't Write A Poem About McDonalds

Noon. Hunger the only thing
singing in my belly.
I walk through the blossoming cherry trees
on the library mall,
past the young couples coupling,
by the crazy fanatic
screaming doom and salvation
at a sensation-hungry crowd,
to the Lake Street McDonald's.
It is crowded, the lines long and sluggish.
I wait in the greasy air.
All around me people are eating—
the sizzle of conversation,
the salty odor of sweat,
the warm flesh pressing out of
hip huggers and halter tops.
When I finally reach the cash register,
the counter girl is crisp as a pickle,
her fingers thin as french fries,
her face brown as a bun.
Suddenly I understand cannibalism.
As I reach for her,
she breaks into pieces
wrapped neat and packaged for take-out.
I'm thinking, how amazing it is
to live in this country, how easy
it is to be filled.
We leave together, her warm aroma

close at my side.
I walk back through the cherry trees
blossoming up into pies,
the young couples frying in
the hot, oily sun,
the crowd eating up the fanatic,
singing, my ear, eye, and tongue
fat with the wonder
of this hungry world.  
                 
                            - Ronald Wallace

What else can't you write a poem about?  Brainstorm a list.  Then write a few poems... :-)

If you're just joining us for the first time, you can post a poem about anything at all (yours or someone else's) then link your post back to this one so those who visit your blog can find us and in turn visit the poem-rich bloggers contributing here.   (Just like any other meme, really.)

Stuck for a focus?  How about posting a poem on an unlikely topic?  One of my favorites is Mary Oliver's poem about a toad.  And then there's the Wallace one above.  And the one I wrote about hobo spiders that works pretty well, if I do say so myself.  So, you get the picture...



As always, please support the poets who change us - and our perception of our world - with their art.

MFB,
L

p.s.  For more information about Ronald Wallace and for more of his poems, try: http://mendota.english.wisc.edu/~WALLACE/poems.html#top

'Get Creative' Book Club & 100 Follower GiveAway!



Get it through Indiebound.org.

Get creative and take action with us!

It's our first ActionReaders book club, featuring
The Creative Habit by internationally renowned choreographer Twyla Tharp.  This book's one of the most popular on the subject, so we've got high hopes for a great conversations that blossom into more creative lives for all of us!

Discussions, contests, challenges, and a free tree:  All waiting for you over at Actionreaders.com this month in addition to our reading group. It costs nothing to become a member or to join our book club, and the book is widely available in libraries and at book sellers both local and web-based. 

When?  We'll start chatting about The Creative Habit and sharing our own action ideas on June 19 and keep discussing through July 9, so you've got plenty of time to jump in!

Plus, count on quick creativity tips for your personal life in our Action Reader News section and ideas for using your creativity to spark social change too.

So come join us as we 'get our creative on' for the summer!

Oh, and then there's this: 

My 20/20 100th Follower Give-Away...

I'm oh so close, so here's what I'm planning for y'all to mark the milestone and express my gratitude toward those who offer their time and attention to my humble musings:

Once we hit 100 followers, I'll randomize all of them and the lucky winner will get

The 20/20 special:

The book of their choice (up to $20) AND a $20 donation to the charity of their choice!

So if you've been visiting lately but on the fence about following, now's the time!


MFB, in a pre-celebratory vein,
L

FYI:
I admired Ms. Crowe's approach to her 100th follower celebration over at As the Crowe Flies and Reads, and I happened to benefit from it as the lucky winner, so I decided to "pay it forward", with a twist!