Recommend books on CD

I’ve recently begun listening to books on CD while at work, and I’ve found it surprisingly easy to concentrate (well, then again, a well-trained monkey could do my job, but I digress…).

Unfortunately, most of the books on my book list are not available on CD at my library. I am chalking this up to my bizarre taste in books.

So I am opening the floor to any and all suggestions - they can be suspense, murder, romance, detective, funny, historical fiction, anything. But they must be well-written and good.

I listened to Little Scarlett by Walter Mosely the other day (ok, I listened to it Thursday and Saturday–it was 7.5 hours, and I drove almost twice that).

I have been told that the books by Mosely with colors in their titles are mysteries that feature Ezekiel “Easy” Rawlins and are a reasonably accurate depiction of life for black people in the 1960’s, in LA. (Important notes: I am not black, and I am was not alive during the 1960’s. So, I’m not saying it isn’t–I’m just letting you know that this is secondhand information.) This one is set just after the LA Race Riots in 1965. It isn’t a feel-good, cozy mystery, but I found the world of Easy Rawlins to be an interesting one, worth investigating more.

I have an audible.com account, so I have the benefit of having a list of all the audiobooks I have listed to in the last 2 years at my disposal. I am going to recommend books that are not just good books, but that I think work well on audiobook. I listened to Kerouac’s the Dharma Bums for example, and you would really think that Kerouac was one of those authors that was just begging to be turned into audiobook…not so much.

Lets see…

**Ender’s Game ** by Orson Scott Card was a good one. This is one of my favorite books ever, but I read it for the first time when I was 14, so I might be a bit unrealistically biased. Still, its very entertaining, and I like the production of it as an audio book.

Doublestar by Robert Heinlein. It’s not a great book, but a fan-freakin-tastic audiobook. Look for the version read by Lloyd James. One of the only instances I can think of where the audiobook experience was *better * than reading the book myself.
Anything by David Sedaris. Me Talk Pretty One Day is a common one. It’s a collection of comedic essay’s about his life.

Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman was also a fantastic audiobook. I don’t know how to describe what Gaiman writes without unfairly stereotyping him by placing him into a category like “Fantasy”. This book has more Elmore Leonard in it than it does Robert Jordan. But it is technically a fantasy novel, I guess.

I just finished The Devils Teeth by Susan Casey. It’s a first person nonfiction book about a journalist who goes to the Farallone islands off the coast of San Francisco to write about the Great White Shark Research Project out there. Fascinating book, and if you get the unabridged version the reader is fairly good.

There are others, but those are my universal recommendations. Books that I think are well produced as audiobooks and that everyone will love.

You didn’t say it had to be a novel, so if you’re interested in classical music, I’d recommmend the lecture series How to Listen To and Understand Great Music by Robert Greenberg, by The Teaching Company. It combines lectures with musical excerpts, so it’s well-suited to the format.

Also I recently listened to The Andersonville Diary which is the diary of a real POW from the Civil War. I don’t listen to many audio novels.

I ave an our and a alf long drive to and from work. I ate music so I listen to books on tape (and cd) all the time. I can recommend some great books but what I think is more important is the reader.

Anthony Head – yes of Buffy fame, is by far one of the best readers I have encountered
Frank Muller – has a vocabulary of about 100,000 voices and top on my lists of greats. I would listen to him read the phone book
Roy Dotrice – An English stage actor who gives so much life to his books it’s scary
Now for my book suggestions

The gunslinger by *Steven King * – 7 books: an alternate world, magic, science fiction kinda thing

A song of Fire and Ice by George RR Martin – 7 books: set in a midevil world, lots of sword play and back stabbing.

The Eugenics Wars by Greg Cox – 2 books: It’s a star trek thing. Detailing the life of Kahn in the Eugenics wars on earth.

Let me know if you listen to any of them I would like to know what you think.

What the…

Where did my H’s go???

So obviously they should be
Have
Hour
Half
Hate

if any finds 4 H’s laying around please let me know. :smack:

I haven’t heard it yet, but the audio book of Sarah Vowell’s Assassination Vacation is supposed to be excellent. I read the book, which rules. It’s about Sarah Vowell’s trips to the sites of the first three American presidents who were assissinated. It’s an actual travelogue, with plenty of reflection on the author’s part.

As a bonus, The Daily Show’s Jon Stewart does the voice of President James A. Garfield. (I guess they went with him, because Lorenzo Music is dead!)

Check the language settings on your computer. You might be set for Cockney.

I’ve never listened to an audio-book, but if I do, I’ll try to get one that’s done by Frank Muller. I’ve heard so many people praise his readings. I don’t have a CD player in my car, or I’d probably make use of this wonderful new invention. :slight_smile:

I love anything read by Frank Muller. Unfortunately he was recently in a motorcycle accident and will probably never again read for an audio book. It’s to bad because the man was a geniuses.

Almost all the audio books I have (or ave if you prefer:)) are on cassette. So you don’t need to worry about buying one of those new fangled CD players. It’s actually easer to find books on cassette than on CD.

I’m a fan of the Aubrey/Maturin books by Patrick O’Brien, but I’ve never read one.

I heard them all on tape.

This is the 20-book series about a Royal Navy captain (Aubrey) and his “particular friend” (as well as surgeon and spy) Maturin. Remember the movie “Far Side of the World”? It’s based on two of the books, somewhat smooshed together.

Get the ones read by Patrick Tull. He pegs all the main characters’ traits, and it makes understanding the nautical terms much easier.

Just one warning: O’Brien wrote long cadences of sentences, as if he was a distant cousin of Jane Austen, and it can be difficult to get into. And while he has described his share of sea battles and cutting-out expeditions, he’s not nearly as into blood and thunder as Alexander Kent.

If you’re at all interested in sea stories, however, he’ll well worth the effort.

absolutely second the above.

Michael Prichard does a great job reading Nero Wolfe mysteries. They are also relatively short. The problem with Nero Wolfe is all the titles sound alike, so I have to keep a list to avoid checking out the same thing twice.

Daniel Pinkwater reads his own work and is wonderful.

David Sedaris is a howl–might not be good for the office, but would be good for commuting in a better mood.

I like the Sue Grafton alphabet Kinsey Millhone detective novels better on tape than on the printed page. Judy Kaye has a great delivery.

Really? Okay, I gotta check that out. Sedaris, too, but that’s a no-brainer. I’ve been a Pinkwater fan since I was seven. Thanks for the tip!

Anything narrated by Barbara Rosenblat - she seems to mostly read “women’s mysteries” (the Mrs. Pollifax series by Dorothy Gilman, the Goldy Shultz mysteries by Diane Mott Davidson, the Amelia Peabody/Egypt series by Elizabeth Peters) but she does a terrific job of it. Look out for alternate forms of the Peabody series, I’ve heard there are abridged versions read by someone else. And the later Shultz mysteries are narrated by someone else also.

Tom Clancy recorded books - I can’t slog through reading an entire full novel, but if you go for the abridged versions on tape/CD, they’re entertaining enough.

Is it possible you meant Anthony Heald? He’s done quite a few audiobooks. Nope :::checks amazon.com::: looks like both of these guys have done audiobooks. Must make for some confusion in the publishers’ offices :slight_smile: