Using multiple narrators to perform this disturbing audiobook was a masterful decision. The voices carry several different accents, tempos, tones, and even attitudes that reflect the diversity of those incarcerated or working on Rikers Island, a hellhole that is New York's largest and best-known jail. The narrators are all first-rate as they recount stories of arrest, casual cruelty, simple kindness, extraordinary brutality, exploitation, and fear. The accounts are told in short pieces, some of them only a paragraph long. The multiple narrators allow the stories to move along, flowing into each other while still separating both the characters and their experiences. This is an engrossing look at the carceral state and the people within it.
Pub Date: Jan. 17, 2023
Duration: 15 hrs, 30 mins
DD ISBN: 9780593416181
Publisher: Random House Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Kristin Atherton is the absolute right choice to narrate this riveting and complex history of the rise of global terrorism. The research provided here is ambitious, providing a clear-eyed, deeply considered history of the nature of terrorist acts, the motivations for which were hard for news broadcasts of the 1970s to fully capture. Atherton's narration never wavers as Burke covers the well-known events of airplane hijackings, the Munich Olympic attacks, and the Beirut bombings of 1983, "the bloodiest year." The result is an insightful history that gives context to events that may have seemed disparate to casual observers. Atherton maintains a comprehensive, consistent voice throughout this long, gripping audiobook.
Pub Date: Jan. 13, 2026
Duration: 25 hrs, 15 mins
DD ISBN: 9798217018796
Publisher: Random House Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Erin Bennett narrates this unknown story of World War II intrigue that could be straight out of Ripley's Believe It Or Not! Listeners hear how a half-Jewish woman from a prominent Berlin family, Ruth Kuehn, had an affair with Joseph Goebbels. Rather than having her murdered, he sent her and her entire family to live in Honolulu. There the family established a spy network and passed all sorts of information to the Germans and the Japanese, which the latter used in planning the attack on Pearl Harbor. Bennett's enunciation is clear and precise, and she credibly affects various accents for people of different nationalities, as well as male and female voices. Bennett's alto pitch and calm presentation are splendid for this amazing true story.
Pub Date: Nov. 25, 2025
Duration: 8 hrs, 30 mins
DD ISBN: 9781250415585
Publisher: Macmillan Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
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