Audio book recommendations.

Sundry Chitchat
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I am going to be traveling a lot more for work again and need some good audiobooks to listen to. I generally do not like novels in audio form because I am usually listening on the road driving or in a plane or doing yard work and find myself zoning out in those situations. With non-fiction or short stories, I do not have an issue “rewinding” and hearing the same part more than once if I miss something but it really irritates me to do that with a novel somehow.

Here are some of my favorites from my library.

Short stories:

  1. Half Empty by David Rakoff

https://www.amazon.com/Half-Empty/dp/B0043UTJCI/ref=sr_1_1?crid=3MLYEMH5REXN8&keywords=half+empty&qid=1573429328&s=audible&sprefix=half+em%2Caudible%2C207&sr=1-1&tag=unstuck-user-20

  1. Let’s explore Diabetes with Owls by David Sedaris

https://www.amazon.com/Lets-Explore-Diabetes-with-Owls/dp/B00C6K1BK0/ref=tmm_aud_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=1573429425&sr=1-1&tag=unstuck-user-20
3. Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris

https://www.amazon.com/Me-Talk-Pretty-One-Day/dp/B0000547MZ/ref=pd_sbs_129_2/144-3732878-1477067?_encoding=UTF8&pd_rd_i=B0000547MZ&pd_rd_r=88fa3188-148d-4a5d-a442-9fec331b936e&pd_rd_w=SzCbo&pd_rd_wg=gle4c&pf_rd_p=52b7592c-2dc9-4ac6-84d4-4bda6360045e&pf_rd_r=64WRPH5PC2S4FCTF1F3F&psc=1&refRID=64WRPH5PC2S4FCTF1F3F&tag=unstuck-user-20

These are all hilarious and well-read by the authors.

Self-helpy kinda shit:

  1. The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People by Stephen R. Covey

https://www.amazon.com/Habits-Highly-Effective-People-Powerful/dp/B0006IU4C0/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2GOWNIX6782KJ&keywords=the+seven+habits+of+highly+effective+people+audiobook&qid=1573429483&s=audible&sprefix=the+seven+habits%2Caudible%2C216&sr=1-1&tag=unstuck-user-20

This is a book that I can’t really recommend highly enough. I thought it would be something entirely different than it is, and when it was recommended to me I was a hard no for many years. It’s probably not what you think it is. There are some pretty good concepts in here that actually changed my life for the better.

  1. How To Be a Poker Player: The Philosophy of Poker by Haseeb Qureshi

https://www.amazon.com/How-Be-Poker-Player-Philosophy/dp/B00IJHYGOM/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=hoe+to+be+a+poker+player&qid=1573429509&s=audible&sr=1-1-spell&tag=unstuck-user-20

am sure others here are aware of this author as I found out later he was involved in some kind of scandal. This book is fantastic, though. It is not really about poker but uses poker as the vehicle to discuss building mastery. I found it very engaging.

Business Bullshit

  1. Death by Meeting by Patrick Lencioni

https://www.amazon.com/Death-Meeting-Leadership-Solving-Business/dp/B0001ZYZLO/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=death+by+meeting&qid=1573429545&s=audible&sr=1-1&tag=unstuck-user-20
If you have to run meetings this has some good concepts. Like others from this author, it is set up as a fable which keeps it engaging and a fun, easy listen.

ETA: I added &tag=unstuck-user-20 to each of these links so UP gets credit for any sales. Do the same with your recs if you care to.

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The Areas of my Expertise
and
More Information Than You Require
by John Hodgman

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Year Zero, narrated by John Hodgman is really good too

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The Stand narrated by Grover Gardner is probably the GOAT audiobook in terms of story and performance

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The New Yorker has a fiction podcast where an author comes in to read a short story by another author previously published in the magazine and discuss it.

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A Short History of Nearly Everything

It’s essentially the history of the universe and all the sciences in easily understood language.

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Norse Mythology by Neil Gaiman. Gaiman reads it himself. It really emphasizes how myths are an oral tradition, and hearing them told rather than reading them gives them life that you don’t otherwise get.

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Catch and Kill - Ronan Farrow.
Farrow did a great job in his New Yorker article exposing Weinstein’s crimes and this book tells that tale very well and in much more depth. Lots of lawyers - special mention to Lisa Bloom - doing really scummy things to protect Weinstein. It also goes into great detail about how the upper echelons at NBC did their best to kill the story.

The pace is very fast - more like a thriller really. Farrow narrates the book himself. He’s got a good voice so that’s not a problem. However, much of the book features dialogue with witnesses, both male and female from many different countries. Farrow does all these voices too - female Italian accent, male English accent etc. Some of the accents are atrocious and it’s a little weird hearing Farrow’s bad accents describing serious sexual assaults. This might be a book that really should be read rather than listened to.

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From the Oasthouse: The Alan Partridge Podcast

available on audible as one audiobook split into chapters, each of which is a 20-minute episode of a fictional podcast hosted by fictional character alan partridge. and it’s all that good shit you love from alan. condescendingly explaining to everyone how he’s better than them while subtly revealing he’s a doofus is my favorite bit and he plays it so perfectly it never gets old. well worth the 1 credit

5 bags of popcorn

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I went in a weird order here. First I saw the movie, then I read the book. Now I’m about 2/3 through the audiobook and it’s easily in my top 5 of Stephen King audiobooks. It’s a great sequel to The Shining imo but the usual caveats apply wrt King, love/hate him irl, love/hate this.

Will Patton reads and does a fantastic job. You’ll recognize him as Costner’s antagonist from The Postman and the white football coach who get supplanted by Denzel in Remember the Titans

The publisher’s summary is better than I can do

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Audie Award Nominee, Solo Narration - Male, 2014

Stephen King returns to the characters and territory of one of his most popular novels ever, The Shining , in this instantly riveting novel about the now middle-aged Dan Torrance (the boy protagonist of The Shining ) and the very special 12-year-old girl he must save from a tribe of murderous paranormals.

On highways across America, a tribe of people called The True Knot travel in search of sustenance. They look harmless - mostly old, lots of polyester, and married to their RVs. But as Dan Torrance knows, and spunky 12-year-old Abra Stone learns, The True Knot are quasi-immortal, living off the “steam” that children with the “shining” produce when they are slowly tortured to death.

Haunted by the inhabitants of the Overlook Hotel where he spent one horrific childhood year, Dan has been drifting for decades, desperate to shed his father’s legacy of despair, alcoholism, and violence. Finally, he settles in a New Hampshire town, an AA community that sustains him, and a job at a nursing home where his remnant “shining” power provides the crucial final comfort to the dying. Aided by a prescient cat, he becomes “Doctor Sleep.”

Then Dan meets the evanescent Abra Stone, and it is her spectacular gift, the brightest shining ever seen, that reignites Dan’s own demons and summons him to a battle for Abra’s soul and survival. This is an epic war between good and evil, a gory, glorious story that will thrill the millions of hyper-devoted fans of The Shining and wildly satisfy anyone new to the territory of this icon in the King canon.

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gave it a shot because of the title and cover art. didn’t disappoint. 5 bags

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Brian Cox as Augustus Ceasar in the sandman act 2 was a fantastic get, he crushes it!

Reminded me a lot of Brian Blessed in I, Claudius

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