A full cast performs this heartfelt audio set in Jim Crow Virginia. Charley Cuffey loves two things best of all: playing baseball and her Nana Kofi's stories of Africa. When Charley and her friends move a meaningful game to the whites-only field across town, the resulting backlash brings the widespread impacts of racism and violence to her door. All the narrators' voices mix prose, free verse, and rhyming poetry. Angel Pean, as Charley, provides the anchor for the story as her cheerful optimism and self-confidence are challenged by the prejudice her family faces daily. Dominic Hoffman's lovingly gruff tones as Charley's grandfather, Nana Kofi, provide balance and a connection between the younger and older generations.
(Verse historical fiction. 10-18)Pub Date: Sept. 24, 2024
Duration: 4 hrs
DD ISBN: 9781668623824
Publisher: Hachette Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
A disappointment.
Narrator JJ Hawkins gives voice to the hurt and anger eighth grader Jasper, an autistic trans boy, feels when his older brother goes off to college while Jasper channels his emotions into digging for fossils in the backyard. It can’t be possible…but then a saber-toothed tiger speaks telepathically to Jasper from beneath the earth. What could be cooler? Unfortunately, Gow’s free verse poems emphasize Jasper’s roiling emotions over plotting and pacing, with the result that listeners spend more time hearing how Jasper feels than they do experiencing the suspense of discovery and the excitement that ensues. Hawkins does his best to lend Jasper some nuance, but his efforts can go only so far with a character who is written as an exposed raw nerve.
A disappointment. (Verse fiction. 11-14)Pub Date: Jan. 27, 2026
Duration: 5 hrs
DD ISBN: 9798349108426
Publisher: Dreamscape
Review Posted Online: April 7, 2026
Ho perfectly captures Mei Mei’s complex emotions as she endures the most difficult and painful experience of her life.
Narrator Catherine Ho creates a determined voice for 12-year-old Mei Mei, a Chinese American girl living in 1880s San Francisco. Her parents send her to live with her aunt and uncle in Eureka, California, so she can attend school. Ho expresses Mei Mei’s anguish when her aunt and uncle force her to work instead of attending school, as promised. When a co-worker offers to teach Mei Mei to read, it gives her a taste of the freedom she longs for. When violence breaks out in the city, forcing Chinese people to leave, Ho’s narration becomes dramatic and fast-paced, reflecting the intense moment.
Ho perfectly captures Mei Mei’s complex emotions as she endures the most difficult and painful experience of her life. (Verse historical fiction. 10-14)Pub Date: Jan. 27, 2026
Duration: 2 hrs, 45 mins
DD ISBN: 9798318537615
Publisher: Tantor Media
Review Posted Online: March 10, 2026
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