Seven talented narrators capture the unsettling and weird nature of this collection of seven stories. The longest story is deftly narrated by Mexican actor Yareli Arizmendi. Lola, an elderly woman who is losing her mind and wants to die, can't manage to make it happen. The talented Daisy Guevara narrates the most nerve-wracking story in which she convincingly voices an 8-year-old girl who is led away from a hospital waiting room by a man whose motives are unclear. Other stories deal with nonsensical, unsettling, borderline demented behavior that will unnerve listeners, prompting them to search for meaning in the thought-provoking collection. Each narrator rises to the challenge of interpreting the arresting--and sometimes even funny--situations the characters find themselves in. A.M. 2022 National Book Award Winner © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine
Pub Date: 2022
Duration: 3 hrs, 30 mins
DD ISBN: 9780593612378
Publisher: Penguin Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
American colleges are favorable locales for ghastly event and hair-tearing circumstance. There is, for instance, a good deal of pleasure to be had out of professor and past-prodigy Grady Tripp's awful life, as portrayed by Michael Chabon in WONDER BOYS. There is a certain amount of slapstick here, but it's balanced by Chabon's superb portrait of a gale-force mid-life crisis, a soul-destroying albatross of an unfinished novel and the mind-numbing inconsequence of writers' conferences. David Colacci sounds a little starved for oxygen in his reading, but that's not exactly out of keeping with Grady Tripp's personal gestalt.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: N/A
Publisher: Brilliance Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
As a group of men bring their own emotional baggage to their football-obsessed reunion, R.C. Bray delivers his usual solid narration. He shifts his tones slightly but enough to put the listener in the motel with the men, revealing their foibles as the story progresses. The narrator's role in this book is a descriptive one, and Bray is a good guide. His narration becomes extra important because this is a rare instance when there almost isn't a protagonist. The author's well-written story--which alternates between serious and laugh-out-loud funny--uses quarterback Joe Theismann's 1985 injury, a broken leg, as a McGuffin.
Pub Date: N/A
Duration: 5 hrs
DD ISBN: 9781681680057
Publisher: HighBridge Audio
Review Posted Online: Jan. 22, 2026
© Copyright 2026 Kirkus Media LLC. All Rights Reserved.
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