Narrator Quyen Ngo delivers an emotionally intense performance in this raw YA coming-of-age story about a complex Vietnamese American family. The year is 1999, and Jane Vu is a 17-year-old who is getting ready to leave for college. She's living in San Jose with her 7-year-old brother, Paul, and their abusive father, Phúc. Jane and Paul's mother abandoned them three years earlier. The story alternates perspectives and timelines between Jane in the present day and Phúc in 1975 in war-torn Vietnam. Ngo immerses listeners in Vietnamese culture and experiences with her expressive, fluent delivery. She excels at capturing the story's bleak tone while evoking empathy for the family's intergenerational trauma, immigrant experience, and brutal family dynamics. The result is a difficult yet compelling listen.
(Fiction. 15-adult)Pub Date: 2023
Duration: 10 hrs, 15 mins
DD ISBN: 9780593746752
Publisher: Listening Library
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Golden Voice Ramón de Ocampo, who narrated each of the author's memoirs, delivers this hard-hitting YA novel in verse. De Ocampo guides listeners on its emotional journey, using the genre's rhythms to illuminate the relationship between high school seniors Diego and his best friend, Lawson. De Ocampo's poignant delivery highlights the contrast between anxious, rule-following, academically driven Diego and Lawson, who is close to failing in school and turns to selling hard drugs to support his mother. De Ocampo captures the story's highs and lows--from the teenage bliss of riding in a car with a friend to the reality of confronting a violent drug dealer. De Ocampo's narration balances lyrical writing and a gritty story.
(Verse fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: 2025
Duration: 3 hrs, 30 mins
DD ISBN: 9798896790570
Publisher: Recorded Books Inc.
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Brittany Pressley portrays a character who, at first, seems like an over-the-top heroine. Eleanor, a senior in high school, was abandoned by her father, Hugo, when she was born. Emotionally abused by her mother, she dreams of living with her father and his family. In response to a job ad, she does just that, hiding her identity and becoming a nanny for her toddler half-brother and a friend to her warm stepmother. She even experiences her first love. But Hugo, a rich tech bro whose most recent invention is a questionable AI product, is far different from what Eleanor imagined. Pressley's portrayals invite listeners into Eleanor's conflicted life. In particular, Pressley captures all of Hugo's ruthlessness in business and pleasure in his privileged lifestyle.
(Fiction. 14-18)Pub Date: 2025
Duration: 12 hrs, 15 mins
DD ISBN: 9798217015061
Publisher: Listening Library
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
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