Audiobook Round-Up
I started a new job in August. This job has pretty much quadrupled my commute, which, while unfortunate, has allowed me to take up a new hobby. Audiobooks. I love Podcasts too and I do have a few of them that take priority, but when I catch up on the new episodes for the week, I need something new to listen to. That’s when I decided to check out audiobooks.
A few of my friends listen to audiobooks on their commutes, so I asked for recommendations. I decided to start with Naturally Tan by Tan France. I get all of my audiobooks from my library. Luckily, I have access to Hoopla Digital, CloudLibrary, and Libby through my library, so there pretty much isn’t any audiobook I can’t get for free.
Since I’ve gone through 5 audiobooks over the last 3ish months, I decided to do a short roundup of what I listened to rather than individual reviews. The only exception is going to be Naturally Tan, because I did write a review for that one I do want to post eventually.
If you’ve never found yourself to be an audiobook person, I have a few recommendations. First, if you’re into podcasts and want to get into audiobooks, try memoirs. They’re usually read by the person who wrote them and are most similar in format to podcasts. It’s also nice because you don’t really have to remember a story so it’s easier to put down and pick up. They’re also much shorter than most fiction audiobooks.
My second recommendation is to speed up the book. While I do listen to my podcasts at normal 1x speed, I find that with audiobooks that moves too slowly. I don’t know if it’s because people slow their speech to sound like they’re reading as opposed to having a conversation, but I started off with listening to my audiobooks at 1.2x speed and now I’ve listened to a few at 1.5x speed.
Ok. Time to share about the ones I’ve listened to.
Like I said, I do have a full review planned for this one. I’ve been wanted to read this book for a while, so it seemed like the natural first pick (no pun intended). This book was a lot of fun. It was short and easy to get into and I think it was the perfect first audiobook choice.
Over the Top: A Raw Journey to Self-Love by Jonathan Van Ness
This book was a recommendation from one of my friends and I figured it was perfect to keep on a Queer Eye roll after listening to Tan’s book. This book is a bit darker than Tan’s, but was still very interesting to listen to. It wasn’t exactly what I expected, but it was eye opening. I’d recommend it if you’re a Queer Eye fan. I think it felt more true to the Jonathan you see in the show, whereas Tan at times felt very different.
The Once and Future Witches by Alix E. Harlow
The print copy of this book was a recommendation from the same friend who recommended Jonathan’s book. I decided to tackle it as an audiobook because it was practically October which meant, spooky season! This was also the first fiction audiobook I decided to listen to in a while. Admittedly, I should’ve started with something shorter. This book was a 16 hour listen because it’s a 500+ page book. Oops. I did enjoy the narrator. I found she did a good job changing voices for the sisters and some of the other characters without being too over the top. A good narrator can make or break an audiobook. I enjoyed the story a lot, even if it was a bit long, although I think I would recommend reading this book as opposed to listening to it.
The Rural Diaries by Hilarie Burton Morgan
This was by far my favorite audiobook I’ve listened to so far. The story was fascinating and different from your typical memoir. It’s also one that I think you need to listen to as opposed to read. I’m sure it’s good as a physical book, but the audio brings a magic to it that was undeniable. I didn’t want this one to end and I need to know more about Hilarie’s life on the farm.
If you have any audiobook recommendations please send them my way! I’d love to add them to my list. I also would be curious if there are any fiction recommendations that people have that are shorter. This has been a fun way to refresh my reading and I’ve enjoyed getting to tackle books that have been on my to-read list for a while that I haven’t been able to get to.
This book was actually brought to my attention by my boyfriend’s mom who I thought said it was amazing, but then later learned she hadn’t read it so I think she actually said she heard it was amazing. I didn’t know much about Viola Davis but I’ve always thought she was talented so I thought it could be an interesting listen.
This is probably the heaviest of the audiobooks I listened to. Viola had a very dark and traumatic childhood, so if you think that would be triggering to you, I would not recommend it. I do think it was a well written and interesting book and I’m glad that I picked it up. However, I think because of the heaviness, it wasn’t my favorite of the books I’ve listened to. I did find it took me a little while to get through because of the content. If you’re a fan of Viola though, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed.