Author Kaitlyn Greenidge and narrator Channie Waites combine forces in this historical novel to create an immersive tale woven of many threads, including mothers and daughters, nineteenth-century Black life, magic, medicine, and finding one's true path. Greenidge, who won the Whiting Award for her first novel, WE LOVE YOU, CHARLIE FREEMAN, was inspired by the life of the third African-American woman to earn a medical degree in America. What would it be like to be the daughter of such a pioneering woman? Thus, she conjured Libertie. Conjuring is also what Waites does in a performance that brims with rhythm and swagger. Reading with the cadence of an oral storyteller, she invokes character with accent and intonation, peopling listener's ears while captivating them.
Pub Date: March 30, 2021
Duration: 12 hrs, 15 mins
DD ISBN: 9781980075745
Publisher: Recorded Books Inc.
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Ayla, one of the "others," is adopted by a clan of Neanderthal cave people. She struggles to conform to their ways, but her advanced human traits overwhelm and threaten their primitive culture in this initial installment of an immensely popular series. Although the story might benefit from abridgment, Rowena Cooper easily carries out the formidable task of enlivening the mostly silent and stereotypical characters with consistent, diverse personalities and human dimension. Through skillful phrasing and inflection, she maintains the reader's interest and suspense, especially with Ayla and her plight, throughout this rambling and imaginative story.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: 22 hrs
Publisher: BBC Audiobooks America/ Chivers
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
This lyrical, sensual novel of woman's lot in Manchu, China, is as well researched as it is well written. Authentic in tone, it's nonetheless written for Westerners by a Western expert on China. Moreover, Susan Clark performs the demanding text superbly, with only occasional signs of fatigue. For the most part she not only sustains the quaint diction and Asian atmosphere, but also, creates whole worlds with her voice. She acts the book, rather than reads it, and, in so doing, turns a pretty trifle into a stupendous beauty.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: 4 hrs, 30 mins
Publisher: Audio Literature
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
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