Audible Book Review/Recommendation Thread

[molson]

Originally Posted by QuikSand

FWIW, Audible claims that you can cancel anytime, and your downloaded books and remain in your account and accessible. Worth double checking, but I'm pretty sure that's true if you have a billing date approaching. I'm sitting on something like 20 credits, and probably will cancel (at least temporarily) before my next annual billing.

This is true. I've cycled through audible subscriptions and cancelled/jumped on new sign-ups deals for over 10 years now.

[Pyser]

Originally Posted by QuikSand

I have touted this book on this site before, and it looks like it has gotten a new audio treatment this year:

Replay (Audiobook) by Ken Grimwood | Audible.com

Replay is my favorite of the time-travel genre, I really thought it got at the sort of things that interest me a lot about the whole concept. I recommend it, and will likely get the audible version for a re-read.

great book. did the audiobook a few years ago, and thought it was done fine then, but cool to see it get some more love.

[albionmoonlight]

Based on this thread, I got Replay (the non-audiobook version). I agree that it is really good.

I, like the protagonist, am 43 years old and went to Emory undergrad. So before October, I'm gonna make sure to memorize the Derby winners from 1994 onward.

[cuervo72]

Bump?

So, last year I figured I would start reading so I began to make visits to the library and the local bookstore. When the library took most of its operations online I decided to try some of its digital offerings. I'm no longer driving much of anywhere (outside of college shuttling) but there are times when my mind just doesn't have enough juice to read text but still might like to follow along to a story. That and I noticed that there were a lot more ebook/Audio offerings than actual physical books in our library's system.

It probably isn't as fancy as Audible, but so far I've accessed titles from Hoopla and Overdrive. My wife does...something through Amazon but I've not looked into it yet.

Trying to get a good handle of what kind of titles are right for me for audio vs print. My issue is that I'm easily distracted, so anything with much of a plot I have to go back and re-listen to the last 10-15 minutes if I see something on the news or latch onto an article or start reading forum posts.

I started out with a couple of light mysteries from Dorothy L. Sayers (Lord Peter Whimsey). Found that while they are ok, there is a lot of dialogue which can be tricky to follow, especially if there is only one speaker. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie had some of this, but not quite as much and seemed to work a little bit better.

I gave the unabridged Gulliver's Travels a go. Better in that it really doesn't have any dialogue, but still tricky in that you have to pay attention. I ended up reading along while listening (yay public domain). Seems a little silly but I rather enjoyed it.

Next was Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris. This worked really well, I thought -- almost along the lines of a low-key comedy album (a bit more poignant). I am thinking memoir-type works may be well-suited to the audio format. Probably going to try this with the new Alex Trebek book (read by Alex and K. Jennings).

Lincoln in the Bardo. Essentially an audio play, and a pretty entertaining one (Bill Hader and Megan Mullally especially; Sedaris had a big role in this, too). I don't know how many audio books have a voice cast of 150+ though.

[PilotMan]

So right now I'm listening to

Hateland: A Long, Hard Look at America's Extremist Heart



Talks about a whole list of reasons why extremism on both the right and the left (but mostly by a long, long way on the right) is on the rise and what factors have lead to it. It rolls right into my Psych/Soci background and shows where many of today's "Q" influence stories and conspiracies originated and how normal, well adapted people fall victim to extremist ideology and how the various purveyors of it have utilized social media, mass media, and everything in between to gain attention and legitimacy.

[QuikSand]

My new recommendation is Libby.

While I have some policy reservations about the public sector competing with a seemingly viable private marketplace... at least in my state, my library card is all I need to now get access to a huge universe of free audio content, and I can't imagine rejoining Audible.

I cashed out about 15 credits in 2019, and canceled my membership... fully expecting to rejoin after I worked through the batch of books I got at that time. Instead, I listened through about half of that list, but when I got itchy for a new release, stumbled into this offering through my library, and have since gotten three high priority newer offerings without any wait (for a two week load period), and I'm on a short list for another.

The Libby app seems to function basically just the same as the Audible app, including (most importantly) the ability to modify the playback speed without distortion... I'm generally either a 1.25x or 1.75x listener, depending on the nature of the content.

[QuikSand]

My latest reads/listens:

A Private Cathedral by James Lee Burke

I confess to being a sucker for the stereotypical detective/cop story fueled by a remarkably gifted but tragically flawed hero figure. It's embarrassingly cliche, but it's so for a reason...it works so well. Burke's Dave Robicheaux series is my favorite of the genre, and I lustily pursue them as soon as they come out, and Will Patton doing the reading is a major net positive. In my usual fashion, all the details of each story fade away into a giant blur (Burke is guilty of some cookie cuttering) but I really, really enjoy his writing and the trip through each book is a delight for me. This is 23 in a series... but if you wanted to just dip your toe into the pool a bit, I'd recommend Electric Mist as a "hey is this my thing?" but don't do it unless you're at least open to binging through a pretty long series, as there's a chance you won't pull yourself out of it.

- - - - -

The Silence by Don DeLillo

I just read DeLillo because I think it's possible that anything he writes will actually be great. I think White Noise was, and I do continue to think about stuff from a far less heralded book of his, Zero K. Anyway, this one is less weighty, but also less weight, so nothing much ventured, nothing really lost. He's a great writer, this book doesn't really show it, I don't think. If in a year's time I am still thinking about some of its issues, I may reconsider my eval.

- - - - -

A Beautifully Foolish Endeavor by Hank Green

Okay, it's fluff, I guess, but I'm still eagerly into it as we speak. When it comes to sci-fi or speculative fiction, I lean toward stuff that is pretty anchored in the here and now, like this book (2nd in a series, must read the first one first). This second book massively opens up the frontier of the whole story's premise, which was actually fairly narrow in book one... and thus far it's engaging. I really like reading books set in a "world" that I want to know more about, and he's done that for me here, so that's good. It feels possible that this will end up just being book two in a never-ending series, and... I'm not sure how I'd feel about that. Incomplete for now, but if a book three were already out, I'd very likely be in the queue to get it right after this one.

[cuervo72]

Originally Posted by QuikSand

My new recommendation is Libby.

While I have some policy reservations about the public sector competing with a seemingly viable private marketplace... at least in my state, my library card is all I need to now get access to a huge universe of free audio content, and I can't imagine rejoining Audible.

I cashed out about 15 credits in 2019, and canceled my membership... fully expecting to rejoin after I worked through the batch of books I got at that time. Instead, I listened through about half of that list, but when I got itchy for a new release, stumbled into this offering through my library, and have since gotten three high priority newer offerings without any wait (for a two week load period), and I'm on a short list for another.

The Libby app seems to function basically just the same as the Audible app, including (most importantly) the ability to modify the playback speed without distortion... I'm generally either a 1.25x or 1.75x listener, depending on the nature of the content.

Yes to Libby, of course then I am in the same state. It's not had everything I've wanted to look for*, but I have such a backlog of things to read/listen to that it's not really been an issue. If I really wanted to I could add a paid card from another library.


* I've yet to completely figure out the Libby/Overdrive vs Hoopla collections. They don't seem to be the same -- I will find something one one and not the other both ways -- even though I access them both with my FCPL card.

[Lathum]

I just finished Boys in the Boat. I am embarrassed it took me this long. I am an alum of Washington and almost immediately I felt a connection. By the end I was legitimately emotional and full of pride for my school. An amazing story and amazingly well told.

[QuikSand]

Originally Posted by QuikSand

So, from the "Eat this, not that" category:

Let's just say you (like many of us) are interested in the awesomely-powerful relentlessly-ingenious hero who can work his way out of any situation and land on his feet. cf. Bond, James Bond, and countless others.

Here are two choices that, by their book jackets, would seem to be basically the same book (both following that pattern quite nicely):

Ghostman

The Gray Man

Okay, even eerily similar titles.

Read the four sentence setup text, and both will sound perfectly compelling and right up your alley.

Here's where you need your old buddy QuikSand to help you out.

Ghostman - yes.
The Gray Man - no.

Both of these authors are seemingly capable of coming up with a general plotline that works for their Batman-esque characters. But the execution... if you're into that sort of thing... is really different.

I found the Ghostman book to be a pretty solid bad guy procedural, and liked it a lot. I'm halfway through the Gray Man now, and wish I had bamboo shoots to jam up my fingernails to find something else to do other than finish it.


The Ghostman sequel is not as good as the original (natch) but from where I sit (halfway through book one) I just cannot see how the Gray Man character is worth reviving for book after book. It's crap.



I will now report to the drunk guy thread.

Randomly went looking to see if the author of Ghostman had anything new…

Roger Hobbs - Wikipedia

…guess not, he died of a drug overdose at 28. Ugh.

[Galaril]

The Bomber Mafia from Malcolm Gladwell is a good as is his previous one Talking with Strangers.

[JAG]

Thanks for the suggestions to read Replay. That book really hit the spot for me.

[QuikSand]

Originally Posted by QuikSand

So, from the "Eat this, not that" category:

Let's just say you (like many of us) are interested in the awesomely-powerful relentlessly-ingenious hero who can work his way out of any situation and land on his feet. cf. Bond, James Bond, and countless others.

Here are two choices that, by their book jackets, would seem to be basically the same book (both following that pattern quite nicely):

Ghostman

The Gray Man

Okay, even eerily similar titles.

Read the four sentence setup text, and both will sound perfectly compelling and right up your alley.

Here's where you need your old buddy QuikSand to help you out.

Ghostman - yes.
The Gray Man - no.

Both of these authors are seemingly capable of coming up with a general plotline that works for their Batman-esque characters. But the execution... if you're into that sort of thing... is really different.

I found the Ghostman book to be a pretty solid bad guy procedural, and liked it a lot. I'm halfway through the Gray Man now, and wish I had bamboo shoots to jam up my fingernails to find something else to do other than finish it.


The Ghostman sequel is not as good as the original (natch) but from where I sit (halfway through book one) I just cannot see how the Gray Man character is worth reviving for book after book. It's crap.



I will now report to the drunk guy thread.

I see that “The Gray Man” is being released as a major action film. And “The Ghostman” won’t have a third book since the author overdosed and died. This timeline royally sucks.

[kingnebwsu]

I'm not a reader at all. But Audible is helping with the long commute.

Discovered "All About Me!" which is the Mel Brooks autobiography. He's the narrator!

It is unreal the number of people he's crossed paths with over the years. I'm down to the final hour & will be sad when it's over.