Narrator Adriana Sananes's beautiful tone and accent artfully capture the true story of Millo Castro Zaldarriaga, a Chinese-African-Cuban girl. In 1930s Cuba—the island of music—playing drums was taboo for girls. Sananes portrays the spirited sounds of Zaldarriaga's brave quest to play the drums. Listeners will feel they’re privy to the girl's secret playing—until her father relents and hires a tutor. Sananes’s lively pronunciation of adjectives adds to the richly descriptive story. Marvelous sound effects of pounding on tall congas and tapping on small bongos as well as the clucking of chickens who make up Zaldarriaga's audience provide authenticity. Most gratifying is hearing the historical notes, which reveal that she gained critical acclaim as a drummer, even playing for President Franklin Roosevelt's birthday.
(Picture book. 3-8)Pub Date: May 24, 2016
Duration: 11 mins
Publisher: Dreamscape
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
Ken Coleman's expertise as a baseball announcer enriches this history of the Boston Red Sox since the sale of Babe Ruth to the N.Y. Yankees. He leads off with a grim account of this transaction, which started the curse that has plagued the Red Sox ever since. The sermon-like tone will amuse non-believers and comfort listeners who are certain the team is cursed. Like the ups and downs of Boston's play through the years, the narrator's voice fluctuates--exuberant and then despondent--in tone and tempo accurately reflecting the mood of any given baseball season. The narrator is very successful at conveying the emotional roller coaster ride Red Sox fans have endured as a result of the curse of the Bambino.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: 3 hrs
Publisher: HighBridge Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
A perfect portrayal.
Nickel reads her imaginative picture-book biography of Hans Christian Andersen in a fairy-tale tone. She weaves the facts of the famous storyteller’s life together with a sense of whimsy, stressing rhythms and repetitions that captivate. It’s as if she embodies the storytelling spirit of the poor shoemaker’s son who possessed a nose “two times as long” and a heart “two times as tender” as everyone else around him. Nickel’s narration and writing are as inventive as Andersen, who, when rejected by theaters, dance studios, and choirs, created cut-paper characters while he told children his tales. The man who saw himself as an ugly duckling is finally admired as “the most beautiful swan of all.”
A perfect portrayal. (Picture-book biography. 5-7)Pub Date: March 3, 2026
Duration: 6 mins
DD ISBN: 9798898851132
Publisher: Recorded Books Inc.
Review Posted Online: April 21, 2026
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