I’m a carpenter who works in L.A. but lives at the far North end of the 4-OMYGOD-5. This translates to an hour and a half commute in the morning and the same at night.
I recently had a CD player installed in my work van so I can listen to recorded books on the road. The LA Public Library has vast resources and I can go online and have anything in their catalog sent to my local library for pickup. Here’s the rub - they don’t keep a separate list of their available books on CD. They just mosh everything together under “Browse the Catalog”. So my choice is to grind through the entire several-million books in their collection one-by-one, or assemble a wish list of titles to look up and see if they are available on CD. And that’s where you - my helpful Doper friends - come in.
First, there are some limiting factors. I’m not interested in most non-fiction. I’m a very right-brain kind of a person and even the most brilliant book about, say, the origins of the Middle-East conflict would put me to sleep>>fiery crash>>etc. Same goes for most Classic Fiction. Also, because of frequent interruptions - phone calls, stops at Home Depot - gripping thrillers are out. Just as I can’t stay awake for non-fiction, I can’t put down a white-knuckle thriller. I don’t want to be parked outside a customer’s house for an hour because I can’t bear to turn off the CD player.
I suppose that all that leaves is light comedy. I just finished Bill Braxton’s “Thunderbolt Kid” (hysterical) and I’m in the middle of “Bridget Jones’ Diary” (funny, but an estrogen overdose). Next is “Confederacy of Dunces”.
At the risk of boring everyone, because I recommend this book in every audiobook thread: I Know This Much is True, by Wally Lamb, read by George Guidall.
From my library’s website:
From the Publishers Weekly Review:
I hope that doesn’t sound too dark and dull. I didn’t find it so. George Guidall is one of the best readers you’ll ever hear, and this is a nice long story (about 48 hours worth)!
P.S. I loved The Thunderbolt Kid too!
If you want comedy, but make a lot of stops, I recommend humor columnists. There are several of Dave Barry’s books on audio, done by several performers. If your tastes run to political, there’s Art Buchwald (dated, I admit, but some of his stuff is timeless), Molly Ivins, and P.J. O’Rourke.
I’m a big fan of Mark Twain, and a lot of his stuff is out there, by various performers. You can find Dennis Miller reading his rants, or Lewis Black (Heck, look in the “comedy” section of your music store as well as the audiobooks section in the bookstore)
There’s plenty of “light” , snappy reading/writing in other subjects, too. If you can find James Burke (“Connections”, “The Day the Universe Changed”) on audio, it’s worth it. He talks so fast you feel as if you have twice as much material, and it never lags. Shenkmans’s “Legends Lies, and Cherished Myths of American History” is abridged on audio. You can also get the “Don’t Know Much About…” series on audio.
I don’t read too many mysteries in dead-tree form. I’m too prone to “spoiling” books by looking at the ends of them. This makes recorded books IDEAL for mysteries, for me. There’ve been times where I’ve actually sat in my car for a couple minutes upon arrival, to listen to a bit more
Here’s another thread , with numerous recommendations for audiobooks in general.
I’m currently listening to “Mr. Norrell and Jonathan Strange” which is good, though (at 26 CDs) taking a long time to get through; also a bit slow-moving.
If your van has an audio input (or at least a cassette deck for one of those cheap cassette adapters), there are lots of podcasts out there also, tho most of those would fall into the nonfiction>>sleep>>fiery death category.
I’m on Phillip Pullman’s “The Golden Compass.” It’s like storytime for your car. I look forward to long trips now.
Also, Tom Wolfe’s “A Man in Full” is a rather good story that takes a little while to get into (many characters), but once you’ve got everyone sorted out he brings them all together for some great suspense.
I highly suggest the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy series. Not only are the books amazing, they are read by the author who amongst many career achievments was in radio for some time, and thus has a great voice and sells the characters perfectly. I listen to them over & over, they are so good.
It’s Bill Bryson–I recommend his Walk in the Woods. Or try David Sedaris–Holiday on Ice etc, for very dark humor from a gay guy who lives in France sometimes. I love Sedaris (he’s Amy’s brother).
Robert Parker has some good mysteries on CD–and they’re not so suspenseful etc that you can’t turn it off for a bit and then go back to it.
Suggestion: it matter who the narrator is. Not all audio books are narrated well. I can’t really suggest good narrators because I don’t do audio books much. If your library has an Adult Reader’s Advisor, s/he may be able to recommend a good selection and know about the narrators. Or ask the Reference Librarian. Yes, this is a part of their job and they’d be happy to help.
