This excellent collection of 10 short stories is insightful, smart, and funny, laying bare the petty concerns, inner thoughts, and vulnerabilities of their high-achieving protagonists. The two narrators, Emily Rankin and Mark Deakins, are a credit to the audiobook as they incorporate humorous touches where appropriate, even amid some of the more negative emotions on display. Rankin's youthful delivery is straightforward and no-nonsense, striking a tone that emphasizes the intelligence of the protagonists. Mark Deakins, for his part, also captures the sardonic intelligence and introspective nature of the stories in his well-paced delivery. Both narrators capture the timely, relevant, and humorous nature of these darkly observant stories.
Pub Date: 2018
Duration: 7 hrs
DD ISBN: 9780525527787
Publisher: Random House Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
American colleges are favorable locales for ghastly event and hair-tearing circumstance. There is, for instance, a good deal of pleasure to be had out of professor and past-prodigy Grady Tripp's awful life, as portrayed by Michael Chabon in WONDER BOYS. There is a certain amount of slapstick here, but it's balanced by Chabon's superb portrait of a gale-force mid-life crisis, a soul-destroying albatross of an unfinished novel and the mind-numbing inconsequence of writers' conferences. David Colacci sounds a little starved for oxygen in his reading, but that's not exactly out of keeping with Grady Tripp's personal gestalt.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: N/A
Publisher: Brilliance Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
As a group of men bring their own emotional baggage to their football-obsessed reunion, R.C. Bray delivers his usual solid narration. He shifts his tones slightly but enough to put the listener in the motel with the men, revealing their foibles as the story progresses. The narrator's role in this book is a descriptive one, and Bray is a good guide. His narration becomes extra important because this is a rare instance when there almost isn't a protagonist. The author's well-written story--which alternates between serious and laugh-out-loud funny--uses quarterback Joe Theismann's 1985 injury, a broken leg, as a McGuffin.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: 5 hrs
DD ISBN: 9781681680057
Publisher: HighBridge Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
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