This history of Anne Frank’s extended family and the spread of her work is based on family documents and recollections and is told mostly in family stories. Sherry Foster’s reading of narrative sections is subdued, engaging, and sensitive. When people speak or write, she gives them a range of accented voices, some more convincing than others. The text sometimes overdoes both European quaintness and the coyness of children, and Foster, mirroring it, is too quaint and twinkly, qualities that are disturbing in this awful context. Her children’s voices are especially saccharine, if uncannily well done. But except for some wince-worthy mispronunciations of foreign words, this is a skilled performance, careful and imaginative, and essentially true to the text.
Pub Date: April 19, 2011
Duration: 12 hrs
DD ISBN: 9781441883032
Publisher: Brilliance Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
GENERAL HISTORY | WORLD | HOLOCAUST | HISTORY
This engrossing audiobook is enhanced by its author’s gifted and masterly narration.
This is only historian Rogoyska’s second audiobook, after Surviving Katyń (2021). But as a narrator, she is as assured, as nuanced, and as captivating as any seasoned professional. Her history of Paris’ luxurious Hotel Lutetia before and during the WWII German occupation is a model of historical reconstruction and reimagining. Refugee artists and intellectuals, Gestapo officers, and returning French detainees all passed through this hotel’s revolving doors, and their histories run the spectrum from tragedy to bitter comedy. Rogoyska’s chronicle is compelling and richly detailed, and her narration is simply sublime. Her beautifully accented, finely nuanced voice is a pleasure in itself, fluent, supple, and perfectly attuned to her narrative.
This engrossing audiobook is enhanced by its author’s gifted and masterly narration.Pub Date: July 7, 2026
Duration: 11 hrs
DD ISBN: 9798318572203
Publisher: Tantor Media
Review Posted Online: July 7, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 2026
A beautifully written and narrated work.
Brangan narrates her own history of the Magdalene Laundries in Ireland with great empathy. The laundries were in operation all over Ireland from 1922 until 1996—and were in fact locked institutions run by the Catholic Church to ostensibly save “fallen” unwed pregnant women from ruin. In her lovely Irish brogue, Brangan follows several women throughout their experiences in the laundries. Her tone becomes subtly harsher when recounting the stories of those who looked the other way while the Church continued to imprison women and girls in plain sight. The story of the laundries has been told frequently in recent years, but never quite so thoroughly and compassionately.
A beautifully written and narrated work.Pub Date: May 5, 2026
Duration: 9 hrs, 14 mins
DD ISBN: 9781668121375
Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
Review Posted Online: June 23, 2026
Kirkus Reviews Issue: tomorrow
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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