This 1970 novel depicts historical attitudes about race relations that may surprise young listeners today. Eleven-year-old Winnie loses her best friend when Iggie moves to Tokyo. Winnie remembers playing in the tree house and the fun of being welcomed into Iggie’s cosmopolitan family. As Winnie eagerly waits for a new family to move in, she has no idea she’s about to lose her innocence. The new family—the Garbers—is black, an anomaly in her community. Emily Janice Card evokes a time of life, an era, and Winnie’s transformation from naiveté to social awareness to activism. Blume depicts common attitudes of the period through the characters Winnie encounters—the righteousness and racism of an adult bully, her mother’s subtle prejudice, and the sarcasm of young Herbie Garber, who challenges Winnie’s narrow life. Card portrays them all credibly.
Ages 8+Pub Date: Jan. 11, 2011
Duration: 2 hrs, 45 mins
DD ISBN: 9780307747655
Publisher: Listening Library
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
While narrator Liam Aiken evokes the wistful, dolorous tone of Snicket’s second mystery in his All the Wrong Questions series, he fails to deliver Snicket’s signature snark with appropriate vigor. In this episode, the main character, 12-year-old Lemony Snicket, continues the investigations that began in STAIN’D BY THE SEA with the case of the missing chemist, Cleo Knight. As Aiken delivers Snicket’s declarative sentences in a deadpan voice, his remote reading keeps listeners distant from the story. Furthermore, Aiken does not always play up the quirks of the town’s eccentric characters. When he does use individualized voicings, the story shakes off its languidness to some degree. Aiken’s melancholy narration echoes Snicket’s loneliness but doesn’t enliven the recording for young listeners. An attached PDF file includes the character Seth’s illustrations.
(Mystery. 8-14)Pub Date: Oct. 15, 2013
Duration: 4 hrs
DD ISBN: 9781478924845
Publisher: Hachette Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Jeff Harding voices the many impactful moments of 1919 in this engaging nonfiction audiobook. From women activists fighting for the right to vote to the Red Scare and civil rights riots, Sandler draws parallels to today's social issues. Harding matches 1919's cadence with a forward-moving pace. He uses different accents for quotations, though the women and people of color might have been better served with a diverse cast. The asides and timelines that appear in the text also are in the audio. Full of fascinating stories put into a modern context, this audiobook offers much to learn about an eventful year and ponders the big questions of our current time.
(Nonfiction. 11-16)Pub Date: Jan. 22, 2020
Duration: 5 hrs, 30 mins
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
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