A wonderful guidebook to the ever-changing comic-book universe loved by millions.
Whew! Nobody but comic-book writer Waid could have compressed and analyzed more than 75 years of DC Comics content into one work. Even better, the audiobook adaptation utilizes a who's who cast of performers to bring it to life. The work is daunting: Hundreds of characters featured in the comics are given concise histories, and complex storylines are whittled down to understandable, bite-sized chunks. The full cast manages to give every character their own voice and every storyline a perfect rendering. Perhaps the villain cackle, reminiscent of the Batman TV show of the 1960s, is overused, but that can be overlooked thanks to the wealth of information found here.
A wonderful guidebook to the ever-changing comic-book universe loved by millions.Pub Date: May 19, 2026
Duration: 4 hrs, 22 mins
DD ISBN: 9780593915110
Publisher: Random House Audio
Review Posted Online: May 30, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2026
Ayn Rand's Anthem is a short dystopic novel about a man who escapes a society from which all individuality has been squeezed. Its allegory is crudely transparent, and the ideas have lost their political urgency. (The book was published in 1938, a decade before Orwell's 1984.) But Anthem provides a good introduction to Rand's philosophy of "objectivism," which is built on individuality, freedom, and reason. Paul Meier is an excellent choice for the novel's first-person narrator--he manages to maintain an urgency in his voice, pleading but never whining, mirroring the main character's struggle against his totalitarian world.
Pub Date: Jan. 22, 2002
Duration: 2 hrs, 30 mins
Publisher: HighBridge Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
A cast of performers, including Orson Scott Card's own daughter, Emily, presents the first book in his new manga series. Even with the talent of the full cast and the writing ability of Card, the manga format doesn’t seem well suited to an audio production. The characters lack depth and development, and the sound effects distract from, rather than enhance, the story. Much of the action, which is probably shown through pictures when one is reading the graphic novel, has to be explained to the listener, which makes the development of the plot seem forced. Although Stefan Rudnicki capably narrates much of the story, the production suffers from the inability of manga to make a seamless transition to the audio format.
(Graphic science fiction. 12 & up)Pub Date: Sept. 27, 2011
Duration: 2 hrs
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
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