Narrator Shannon Tyo delivers this audiobook's author's note, briefly describing Seal's real-life struggles with anorexia, clinical depression, suicidal ideation, and skin picking--all of which started during her teen years. Tyo tempers this opening with the author's understanding of and respect for resilient teens who currently face these challenges. Once the story begins, Tyo keeps listeners keenly aware of 14-year-old Evie's physical and emotional struggles. Tyo's narration captures the rhythms of its novel-in-verse structure and gives power to the spare text. Her stresses on poetic images and sensory details create poignancy and painful intensity that allow listeners to fully engage with Evie's denial, hospitalization, and, finally, hope. Tyo's depictions of Evie's fellow patients and family members add to the audio's complexity.
(Verse fiction. 13-18)Pub Date: 2024
Duration: 3 hrs, 30 mins
DD ISBN: 9780593945636
Publisher: Listening Library
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Sophie Jo Wasson transports listeners to Ireland in 1847 with her poignant performance. Like many throughout the country, Nell's family's potato crop is infected with a black rot that makes the potatoes inedible. Farmers are forced to choose between paying their rent from the sale of their oat crops, or feeding their families and facing eviction. Amid those tragedies, Nell and the landlord's nephew develop a quiet friendship that, despite their class differences, grows into more. Wasson's lilting intonation and Irish accent take listeners into Nell's world, capturing the devastation, terror, and dashes of hope experienced by the teenager. Secondary characters are made equally vivid with her expressive delivery. Listeners will be tempted to finish this short novel in verse in one sitting. Simply exquisite.
(Verse historical fiction. 13-18)Pub Date: 2025
Duration: 4 hrs
DD ISBN: 9780063384972
Publisher: Harper Audio
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
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