Every month, AudioFile Magazine reviewers and editors select the best new audiobooks just for BookTrib’s readers. Get ready for the last beach days of the season, back-to-school preparation and cooler days ahead with these August picks!
This story appears through BookTrib’s partnership with AudioFile and contains material originating from the AudioFile website.
Honey & Spice by Bolu Babalola
Read by Weruche Opia
[Harper Audio | 12 hrs.]
Weruche Opia’s self-confident narration sings with a heady mix of feminine power and vulnerability. Nigerian-British college sophomore Kiki Banjo hopes her radio show, “Brown Sugar,” will secure her a prestigious internship. Opia builds an elegant, charismatic persona for Kiki, who doles out feminist relationship advice to her fellow Afro-Caribbean students in a snappy, unapologetic style. Needing more listeners, Kiki starts a fake relationship with college filmmaker Malakai Korede, who has a deeper pitch and a softly swaying intonation. Opia weaves their interactions into an organic, magical connection that will leave listeners spellbound.
Suspect by Scott Turow
Read by Helen Laser
[Hachette Audio | 11.75 hrs.]
Helen Laser’s unpretentious girl-next-door voice captures the edgy personality of P.I. Clarice “Pinky” Granum in Turow’s 12th Kindle County book. Chief of Police Lucia Gomez is accused of soliciting sex from male officers in exchange for promotions. Gomez hires attorney Rik Dudek, who relies on his tenacious investigator, Pinky. Laser masterfully performs the male and female characters, conveying dispositions of good and evil. Turow provides dramatic courtroom scenes interspersed with romance, police procedures, and tense investigating, which lead to a pulse-pounding ending. A totally engaging experience.
The Daughter of Doctor Moreau by Silvia Moreno-Garcia
Read by Gisela Chìpe
[Random House Audio | 11.5 hrs.]
Gisela Chìpe’s performance of this audiobook is exceptionally touching. She deftly captures the spirit of these richly defined characters and the mood of mounting dread. Set in the Yucatán peninsula during the 1800s, Moreno-Garcia’s audiobook is a recasting of H.G. Wells’s mysterious scientist who builds animal-human hybrids. When the truth behind this disturbing story becomes clear, it threatens to upend the lives of Dr. Moreau’s family. Chìpe’s voice effectively moves between every point of view, and she embodies the theatrical, action-filled story’s combination of science fiction and coming-of-age excitement.
Always Be My Duchess: Taming of the Dukes, Book 1 by Amalie Howard
Read by Mary Jane Wells
[Hachette Audio | 9.75 hrs.]
Mary Jane Wells delights listeners with a lively performance of a new historical romance series that is a treat for your ears. Lysander Blackstone, Duke of Montcroix, needs the appearance of upcoming nuptials to secure a business deal. At the same time, ballerina Geneviève Valery will soon be unable to continue paying for her injured sister’s care. A chance encounter provides a solution to both. Wells’s enthusiastic narration and her ability to project the characters’ personalities will captivate listeners. Wells imbues Geneviève with humor and wit, bringing the dancer to life.
The Swift and the Harrier by Minette Walters
Read by Emma Gregory
[Blackstone Audio | 14.75 hrs.]
Emma Gregory shines as narrator of this historical fiction set during the English Civil War of the 1640s. Jayne Swift trained as a doctor, but gender norms require that she use the title of nurse. When war breaks out, she vows neutrality and helps anyone she can. Throughout the war, she encounters the intriguing William Harrier, and time and again he comes to Jayne’s aid. Gregory skillfully manipulates her voice, giving authenticity and distinction to each character by using various accents and pitches. Gregory’s talent as a narrator is on full display in this stunning performance.
The Pallbearers Club by Paul Tremblay
Read by Graham Halstead, Xe Sands, Elizabeth Wiley
[Harper Audio | 10.75 hrs.]
This psychological thriller gives its narrators the perfect opportunity to exercise their considerable dramatic skills. Graham Halstead portrays high school loner Art Barbara, founder of the Pallbearers Club, in the voice of a 17-year-old. Xe Sands portrays Art’s sultry new friend, Mercy, who has a penchant for taking pictures of the dead in their caskets. These moments foreshadow vampirism to come. Sands also functions as a single-woman Greek chorus as Halstead pieces together this horror story. As Art’s long-suffering mother, Elizabeth Wiley blends perfectly into the production. Together, the three narrators create a crescendo of horror, humor and decadence.
The Scent of Burnt Flowers by Blitz Bazawule
Read by Dion Graham
[Random House Audio | 6.25 hrs.]
Narrator Dion Graham delivers Bazawule’s debut novel about an African American couple who flee the U.S. to avoid prosecution for defending themselves during a confrontation in the 1960s. Melvin and Bernadette board a plane headed to Ghana to seek asylum. Unknown to them, CIA Agent Hughes is hot on their trail. Ever the vocal chameleon, Graham builds tension as Melvin’s options narrow and Bernadette protects a secret. Graham slips in and out of American and Ghanaian accents with seeming ease and pronounces Akan words with precision in this thriller with a touch of fantasy.
Wake: The Hidden History of Women-Led Slave Revolts by Rebecca Hall, Tyler English-Beckwith
Read by DeWanda Wise, Chante Adams, Jerrie Johnson, Bahni Turpin, and a Full Cast
[Podium Audio | 1.75 hrs.]
Opening with the film-like sounds of a gathering storm at sea and a group of captive African women staging a desperate battle for their freedom, this combined memoir/audio play/graphic novel bursts with energy, inspiration and historic facts. The story becomes personal when author Rebecca Hall, portrayed with verve by DeWanda Wise, insists that slavery should be taught as an integral part of American history. She is dismissed from teaching at prestigious law schools and universities until, finally, a high school class, played by the spirited ensemble cast, insists that the truth about Black women must come out. History should always sound this alive.
The Half Life of Valery K by Natasha Pulley
Read by Jot Davies
[Bloomsbury Publishing | 12.75 hrs.]
The warm embrace of Jot Davies’s resonant baritone and his vivid characterizations make Natasha Pulley’s masterful historical novel an addictive and memorable listening experience. Inspired by an actual nuclear explosion and cover-up in 1950s Soviet Russia, the story follows nuclear radiation expert Valery Kolkhanov, who is transferred from imprisonment to study radiation poisoning in an isolated city. As Valery works to uncover the truth in a world built on lies and fear, Davies’s cashmere voice comforts even as it lures listeners deep into the tense plot. When love blooms along with terror, he gentles his voice to an ache that will make you long for more.
The Romance Recipe by Ruby Barrett
Read by Chelsea Stephens, Natalie Naudus
[Harlequin Audio | 8.75 hrs.]
Chelsea Stephens narrates as Chef Sophie Brunet, a former reality show finalist, who wants only to cook out of the spotlight and to explore her newly realized bisexuality. But her boss, Amy Chambers, voiced beautifully by Natalie Naudus, is trying to keep her restaurant alive. The two women learn to work together to save the restaurant and confront their growing feelings. Their dynamic creates many funny moments as well as some tender scenes, and both narrators find a great balance. There is a quiet intensity in both performances that helps listeners understand how much is at stake for both women. A captivating listen for romance fans and foodies alike.
