#Feature: Audiobooks and me 2023… a year of listening #audiobooks #listening

It’s become rather a post-Christmas tradition now to produce a post to round-up my audiobook listening over the past year. By far the majority of my reading is done on my kindle, and you might already know that I was a rather late convert to the joy (well, most of the time…) of audiobooks. My listening is almost all done while walking – but if it’s a book I’m particularly enjoying, I’ll often keep my earbuds in while preparing breakfast or while surfing the internet afterwards. And no, I still can’t manage to sit and do nothing while listening, losing concentration far too easily (or just dropping off!) – and I did try the housework-while-listening thing, but that wasn’t for me (not the housework or the listening really…!). I’ve tried listening when driving too – the entertainment system in my newish car is just perfect for that – but I do find I get very distracted (both from driving and listening), so I think I must reluctantly accept that’s not for me either!

In my last pair of audiobook posts (you’ll find them here and here, from January 2023) , I shared my story about the (very expensive!) Apple earbuds that kept falling out of my (obviously peculiar…) ears, and how new bluetooth headphones had helped keep my ears warm and improved my walking experience. I couldn’t get past feeling that I looked a bit of a wally though, and I was so delighted when blogger friend Jill (of Jill’s Book Cafe – her posts very much recommended!) told me about another relatively inexpensive alternative. They’re earbuds with a difference – you’ll find them here (aargh, no longer available – but that link will show you some very similar alternatives for around £20) and you wouldn’t believe the difference those ear hooks make!

I will admit that most of the audiobooks I tackle take me absolutely ages to get through – especially when the weather’s rubbish and I’m not out and about as much. You will notice too that the books I listen to are very different from the books I usually review and read on my kindle – there are a few thrillers, some book club choices, and others wild cards that I just wanted to try. And – with no authors tagged, for obvious reasons – I will add that I don’t always enjoy them all as much as I’d hoped to. But it is sometimes (almost always…) more about my audio experience than the book itself, so please don’t be put off reading or listening to it if you find me being less than complimentary in the few lines I’ve shared about some of them!

So first book of 2023, and it was The Whalebone Theatre by Joanna Quinn, narrated by Olivia Vinal – a choice inspired by my holiday in Dorset at the end of 2022…

‘Maudie, why are all the best characters men?’

 

Maudie closes the book with a clllump. ‘We haven’t read all the books yet, Miss Cristabel. I can’t believe that every story is the same.’

 

Cristabel Seagrave has always wanted her life to be a story, but there are no girls in the books in her dusty family library. For an unwanted orphan who grows into an unmarriageable young woman, there is no place at all for her in a traditional English manor.

 

But from the day that a whale washes up on the beach at the Chilcombe estate in Dorset, and 12-year-old Cristabel plants her flag and claims it as her own, she is determined to do things differently.

 

With her step-parents blithely distracted by their endless party guests, Cristabel and her siblings, Flossie and Digby, scratch together an education from the plays they read in their freezing attic, drunken conversations eavesdropped through oak-panelled doors, and the esoteric lessons of Maudie their maid.

 

But as the children grow to adulthood and war approaches, jolting their lives on to very different tracks, it becomes clear that the roles they are expected to play are no longer those they want. As they find themselves drawn into the conflict, they must each find a way to write their own story…

I very much enjoyed the first ten hours or so of this one – the decadent Jazz Age family, the feral children, the whole idea of the theatre. The characters were wonderful, their world became entirely real, and the author’s use of language was so very clever and different – she’s a fantastic storyteller – and the narrator was excellent. But it was very much a book of two halves for me. The second half, when it became a fairly conventional wartime story, did disappoint me a little – it just didn’t feel like the same book, and rather more like so many others I’d read before.

The Passenger by Ulrich Alexander Boschwitz, narrated by Neil Hellegers, came next. I’ll readily admit that this wasn’t one one I’d usually have tried – and that’s what happens when you’re part of a book club and they won’t let you choose every book…

The devastating rediscovered classic written from the horrors of Nazi Germany, as one Jewish man attempts to flee persecution in the wake of Kristallnacht.

 

Berlin, November 1938. With storm troopers battering against his door, Otto Silberman must flee out the back of his own home. He emerges onto streets thrumming with violence: it is Kristallnacht, and synagogues are being burnt, Jews rounded up and their businesses destroyed.

 

Turned away from establishments he had long patronised, betrayed by friends and colleagues, Otto finds his life as a respected businessman has dissolved overnight. Desperately trying to conceal his Jewish identity, he takes train after train across Germany in a race to escape this homeland that is no longer home.

 

Twenty-three-year-old Ulrich Boschwitz wrote The Passenger at breakneck speed in 1938, fresh in the wake of the Kristallnacht pogroms, and his prose flies at the same pace. Shot through with Hitchcockian tension, The Passenger is a blisteringly immediate story of flight and survival in Nazi Germany…

This one was really an interesting historical curiosity – and if it was written “at breakneck speed”, it was certainly read in the same way (a bit bizarre really – I had to slow the speed down!). Lots of stream of consciousness, a flawed and largely unsympathetic central character who began to irritate, the tension and immediacy spoiled by long passages of introspection, and the most depressing ending ever – I did finish, but I’m afraid this one just wasn’t for me.

The next one was a book club choice, but one where I was able to prevail – The Marriage Act by John Marrs, narrated by Clare Corbett, David Monteith, Dugald Bruce-Lockhart (and three more)…

What if marriage was the law? Dare you disobey?

 

Britain. The near-future. A right-wing government believes it has the answer to society’s ills – the Sanctity of Marriage Act, which actively encourages marriage as the norm, punishing those who choose to remain single.

 

But four couples are about to discover just how impossible relationships can be when the government is monitoring every aspect of our personal lives, tracking every word, every minor disagreement . . . and will use every tool in its arsenal to ensure everyone will love, honour and obey.

 

Black Mirror meets thriller with a dash of Naomi Alderman’s The Power.

I always get a little excited when I see there’s more than one narrator – makes it feel more like the radio dramas I used to like listening to – and I really thoroughly enjoyed this “dark, high-concept thriller”. A really original idea, wonderfully paced with a range of believable characters who all had their own stories, present day references that grounded it nicely, and a chilling look at a very plausible future world (the “audites” made me look askance at my smart speaker – and then there were the influencers, AI, deep fake, wearables…). Perhaps a slightly twee ending, but nicely uplifting – I raced through this one (well, by my standards…) and really enjoyed it.

And another book club choice, one I’d really loved when I read it way back in 2009, and was delighted to revisit in a different format – The House of Special Purpose by John Boyne, narrated by James Wilby…

Russia, 1915: at the age of 16, Georgy Jachmenev steps in front of an assassin’s bullet intended for the heart of a senior member of the Russian imperial family. He is instantly proclaimed a hero. Before the week is out, his life as the son of a peasant farmer is changed forever when he is escorted to St Petersburg to take up his new position – as bodyguard to Alexei Romanov, the only son of Tsar Nicholas II.

 

Sixty-five years later, visiting his wife, Zoya, as she lies dying in a London hospital, memories of the life they have lived together flood his mind. Their marriage, while tender, has been marked by tragedy, the loss of loved ones and experiences of exile that neither can forget.

 

The House of Special Purpose is a novel about a young man ripped from a loving home and thrust into the heart of a dying empire. Privy to the secrets of Nicholas and Alexandra, the machinations of Rasputin and the events which led to the final collapse of the autocracy, Georgy is a witness and participant in a drama which will echo down the century. His is also a story of a marriage in which a husband finds it impossible to live in the present and a wife unable to reconcile herself with the past.

 

Part love story, part historical epic, part tragedy, the novel moves from revolutionary St Petersburg to Paris after the First World War, and from London during the Blitz to the eastern coast of Finland during the 1980s, before returning to a quiet hospital bed where Georgy and Zoya’s story must finally be resolved.

There’s a line at the end of this book – “So this is what it means to be alone…” – that broke my heart when I first read it, and it had exactly the same impact second time around (sob!). The whole story is so cleverly constructed – present day working backwards, the back story running forwards – but well signposted for a listener, and the narrator (Russian accent included…) did a wonderful job. If you share my fascination with Imperial Russia and its excesses, this is one I’d recommend unreservedly – but it’s also the most beautiful and all-consuming love story. Quite glorious.

And unusually for me, my next is another re-read (but in a different format), also chosen by the book club – it’s so long since I read it that I have no record of when I did, but I do know that I’ve often called it one of my all-time favourites. It’s The Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon, narrated by Daniel Weyman…

Hidden in the heart of the old city of Barcelona is the ‘cemetery of lost books’, a labyrinthine library of obscure and forgotten titles that have long gone out of print. To this library, a man brings his 10-year-old son, Daniel, one cold morning in 1945. Daniel is allowed to choose one book from the shelves and pulls out La Sombra del Viento by Julian Carax.

 

But as he grows up, several people seem inordinately interested in his find. Then, one night, as he is wandering the old streets once more, Daniel is approached by a figure who reminds him of a character from La Sombra del Viento, a character who turns out to be the devil. This man is tracking down every last copy of Carax’s work in order to burn them. What begins as a case of literary curiosity turns into a race to find out the truth behind the life and death of Julian Carax and to save those he left behind. An exciting exploration of obsession in literature and love and the places that obsession can lead.

You’ve all read this one before, haven’t you? Gothic and atmospheric, gripping and tense, some of the loveliest light relief (yes, I still loved Fermin…), and a story within a story and a bit of a convoluted plot (which could have made it more difficult as an audiobook, but really didn’t). The Barcelona setting (with the Cemetery of Lost Books) is just wonderful – the world disappeared as I listened. I’m not entirely without criticism though. Perhaps, by today’s standards, some (and one in particular) of the plot devices were a bit of a cop-out – and I did feel it was just a little longer than it needed to be. Still loved it though…

My own choice this time, and I really wanted it to be a thriller I could enjoy while on holiday – and the reviews looked fantastic for In the Blink of an Eye by Jo Callaghan (narrated by Rose Akroyd)…

In the UK, someone is reported missing every 90 seconds.

 

Just gone. Vanished. In the blink of an eye.

 

DCS Kat Frank knows all about loss. A widowed single mother, Kat is a cop who trusts her instincts. Picked to lead a pilot programme that has her paired with AIDE (Artificially Intelligent Detective Entity) Lock, Kat’s instincts come up against Lock’s logic. But when the two missing person’s cold cases they are reviewing suddenly become active, Lock is the only one who can help Kat when the case gets personal.

 

AI versus human experience.

 

Logic versus instinct.

 

With lives on the line can the pair work together before someone else becomes another statistic?

 

In the Blink of an Eye is a dazzling debut from an exciting voice and asks us what we think it means to be human.

My goodness, wasn’t this just wonderful? In so many ways, it was very much classic crime fiction/police procedural, very cleverly plotted, but with that extra dimension through the introduction of the AI elements. The characters (human and otherwise) were wonderfully drawn, the back stories so well told – and I just loved that focus on feelings and what it means to be human. The climax was so gripping that I couldn’t unplug myself for the last couple of hours, and the ending certainly didn’t disappoint. I really loved it.

Another book club choice next, a book I’d spotted and suggested – The Wilderness by Sarah Duguid, narrated by Jane McDowell…

A beautifully observed, wry novel of the dislocation of family life and a marriage, and of loss and love, set on the western coast of Scotland.

 

Once it was a family home. Now they are all at sea….

 

When Anna and David receive a phone call late one evening, their lives are upturned. Within minutes, they are travelling to the west coast of Scotland, preparing to care for two young sisters, tragically and suddenly orphaned.

 

It’s a beautiful place, the heather is in bloom, the birds wheel above the waves, the deer graze peacefully in the distance. But the large granite house is no longer a home for the girls, and Anna knows she can never take the place of their mother. Then David invites his friend to stay, to ‘ease them through’, and Anna finds herself increasingly isolated, with everything she—and the girls—once knew of life discarded and overruled by a man of whom she is deeply suspicious.

Mmm, made a bit of a mistake with this one – it really wasn’t what I was expecting at all. It was more than atmospheric enough – distinctly creepy at times, and a bit sinister too. The setting was well drawn, the relationships were intriguing (to say the least…), and the narrator was engaging – but it all finished in an open-ended way that I found rather disappointing. Suffice to say it wasn’t a personal favourite.

Holidays were coming up again, so another personal choice to accompany me on my travels – Strange Sally Diamond by Liz Nugent, narrated by Jessica Regan, Stephen Hogan and Sara Lynam…

Sally Diamond cannot understand why what she did was so strange. She was only doing what her father told her to do, to put him out with the rubbish when he died.

 

Now Sally is the centre of attention, not only from the hungry media and worried police, but also a sinister voice from a past she has no memory of. As she begins to discover the horrors of her childhood, recluse Sally steps into the world for the first time, making new friends, finding independence, and learning that people don’t always mean what they say.

 

But when messages start arriving from a stranger who knows far more about her past than she knows herself, Sally’s life will be thrown into chaos once again…

I haven’t read a Liz Nugent book since Unravelling Oliver way back in 2014 (you’ll find my review here if you’d like to revisit…), and this wonderful book reminded me forcibly of what I’d been missing (and immediately made me download the audio versions of the three books that passed me by). You’ve probably already read this one, and don’t need me to tell you how wonderful it was – highly original, distinctly uncomfortable at times, a bit disturbing, quite enthralling, entirely unforgettable. The narration was superb too, one of those cast productions that I so enjoy – I raced through it in a couple of days, and really couldn’t recommend it more highly.

My next listen was a book club choice – and I’d heard really good things about Black Butterflies by Priscilla Morris, narrated by Rachel Atkins…

‘A moving, compelling, deeply human novel about love, hope and resilience in a city under siege. Everyone should read it’ Emma Stonex, bestselling author of The Lamplighters

 

Sarajevo, spring 1992. Each night, nationalist gangs erect barricades, splitting the diverse city into ethnic enclaves; each morning, the residents – whether Muslim, Croat or Serb – push the makeshift barriers aside.

 

When violence finally spills over, Zora, an artist and teacher, sends her husband and elderly mother to safety with her daughter in England. Reluctant to believe that hostilities will last more than a handful of weeks, she stays behind while the city falls under siege. As the assault deepens and everything they love is laid to waste, black ashes floating over the rooftops, Zora and her friends are forced to rebuild themselves, over and over. Theirs is a breathtaking story of disintegration, resilience and hope.

Centred on the siege of Sarajevo, this book was simply stunning – one woman’s story at its heart, and such a blisteringly real and detailed account of the hardship, resilience and survival of individuals caught up in a situation not of their making, where no-one is clear who the enemy really is. The drive to create art was really moving, as were the multi-racial friendships, and the imagery sears itself into the memory – and when I was listening, the Ukrainian experience was still in the forefront of everyone’s minds and it was difficult to avoid drawing parallels in the individuals’ experiences. It’s quite beautifully written, so emotionally astute – of course, it was shortlisted for the Women’s Prize – and if it passed you by, I can only urge you to give it a try. And it worked so well as an audiobook – Rachel Atkins’ voice was the perfect choice.

And another book club choice? This time it was The Vanishing of Margaret Small by Neil Alexander, narrated by Annie Adlington and (yes, again…) Rachel Atkins…

Meet Margaret Small: 75, plain spoken, Whitstable native and a Cilla Black super fan. Shortly after the death of her idol, Margaret begins receiving sums of money in the post, signed simply ‘C’.

 

She is convinced it must be Cilla, but how can it be? To solve the mystery of her benefactor Margaret must go back in her memories almost 70 years, to the time when she was ‘vanished’ to a long-stay institution for children with learning disabilities.

 

An absorbing and page-turning mystery with a dual timeline, The Vanishing of Margaret Small takes readers into a fascinating past, and introduces an unforgettable literary heroine.

 

Perfect for fans of Libby Page and Gail Honeyman.

Of all the books I’ve listened to this year, this was perhaps the closest to my usual choice of kindle reading – but I’ll admit it left me a little disappointed. The back story of abuse in the care system should have been shocking and moving, but I found it a little flat in the telling – and I do think that was the writing, rather than the narration. There were some nice touches of humour – the Cilla motif was inspired – but I did think the plot rather lost its way and a different construction might have made a difference to my overall enjoyment. The ending was uplifting and hopeful – but, I’m sorry, it wasn’t for me.

Then another book club choice, but a book I’d really wanted to try – The Island of Missing Trees by Elif Shafak, narrated by Daphne Kouma and Amira Ghazalla…

A rich, magical new novel from the Booker-shortlisted author of 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World.

 

Two teenagers, a Greek Cypriot and a Turkish Cypriot, meet at a taverna on the island they both call home. The taverna is the only place that Kostas and Defne can meet in secret, hidden beneath the blackened beams from which hang garlands of garlic and chilli peppers, creeping honeysuckle, and in the centre, growing through a cavity in the roof, a fig tree. The fig tree witnesses their hushed, happy meetings; their silent, surreptitious departures. The fig tree is there, too, when war breaks out, when the capital is reduced to ashes and rubble, when the teenagers vanish. Decades later, Kostas returns—a botanist, looking for native species—looking, really, for Defne. The two lovers return to the taverna to take a clipping from the fig tree and smuggle it into their suitcase, bound for London. Years later, the fig tree in the garden is their daughter Ada’s only knowledge of a home she has never visited, as she seeks to untangle years of secrets and silence, and find her place in the world.

 

The Island of Missing Trees is a rich, magical tale of belonging and identity, love and trauma, nature and renewal, from the Booker-shortlisted author of 10 Minutes 38 Seconds in this Strange World.

And, I’m sorry to tell you, this one wasn’t for me either – I kind of liked the structure and the story it told (and, of course, the fig tree herself), but I did find my listening time dragged a bit. Given the way others have loved this book, I think it was just an audio fail for me – maybe I should try it again, on my kindle.

And yes, it was then holiday time again, so my own choice – and I was really looking forward to None of This Is True by Lisa Jewell (narrator details below)…

Read by Nicola Walker (Unforgotten, The Split, Last Tango in Halifax) and Louise Brealey (Sherlock, Lockwood & Co.), alongside a full cast, this breath-taking audiobook includes original music and a gripping soundscape, which immerses you in the production and leaves your spine tingling.

 

Celebrating her 45th birthday at her local pub, popular podcaster Alix Summers crosses paths with an unassuming woman called Josie Fair. Josie, it turns out, is also celebrating her 45th birthday. They are, in fact, birthday twins.

 

A few days later, Alix and Josie bump into each other again, this time outside Alix’s children’s school. Josie has been listening to Alix’s podcasts and thinks she might be an interesting subject for her series. She is, she tells Alix, on the cusp of great changes in her life.

 

Josie’s life appears to be strange and complicated, and although Alix finds her unsettling, she can’t quite resist the temptation to keep making the podcast, which you’ll hear, fully produced, throughout this audiobook.

 

Slowly Alix starts to realise that Josie has been hiding some very dark secrets, and before she knows it Josie has inveigled her way into Alix’s life – and into her home.

 

But, as quickly as she arrived, Josie disappears. Only then does Alix discover that Josie has left a terrible and terrifying legacy in her wake, and that Alix has become the subject of her own true crime podcast, her life and her family’s lives under mortal threat.

 

Who is Josie Fair? And what has she done?

 

This audiobook includes additional performances from: Jenny Walser, Kristin Atherton, Tom Judd, Ayesha Antoine, Elliot Fitzpatrick, Alix Dunmore, Dominic Thorburn, and Lisa Jewell herself.

Another full cast production (and what a cast!), and I thought this book was quite wonderful – tense, chilling, uncomfortable and unpredictable, with the most fantastic characters, filled with twists and turns and with a pace that left me breathless. If you’d like me to be just a little bit critical, I wasn’t entirely sure about the ending – but I’d enjoyed the whole experience so much it really didn’t matter one bit. Another audiobook I raced through in a couple of days, and would thoroughly recommend to all.

And back to the book club choices, but I really liked the look of this one – Perfectly Ordinary People by Nick Alexander, narrated by Mary Jane Wells, David de Vries and three more…

In occupied France, two people sacrificed everything. Now their granddaughter has come looking for the truth…

 

Ruth’s childhood was a happy one, and her family—on her mother’s side—large and loving. But her father’s French origins have always remained a mystery. Now, with aged relatives beginning to die, Ruth decides to research her father’s family before it’s too late.

 

When she discovers a series of long-lost cassettes, everything she thought she knew about them shatters. The tapes expose an unimaginable truth–an epic wartime story of hidden love and sacrifice, stretching back to occupied France.

 

These long-buried confessions will rock Ruth’s family—and finally piece together the puzzle of her father’s heritage. But are any of them ready for the truth?

I really liked the structure of this one – the present day story, the taped interviews for the wartime back story (perfect for an audiobook), and the slow reveal as the stories converged. It’s an excellent story, beautifully told, encompassing the gay perspective, moving from persecution to acceptance – and covering a wide canvas of race and religious issues over a substantial time frame. The characterisation is excellent, there are some lovely touches of humour, the multiple narration worked really well – and I really enjoyed the listening experience. Again though, I do have one small criticism – I thought both the present day and wartime stories lost a little pace at times (I think you notice it more with audio, when you’ve listened for half an hour and the story hasn’t moved forward), and a little tightening up would have made it even better. One I’d most definitely recommend.

I really loved Clare Mackintosh’s The Last Party, her first DC Ffion Morgan thriller (you’ll find my review here) – and with no book club read waiting, I was dying to listen to A Game of Lies (narrated by Chloe Angharad Davies)…

They say the camera never lies.

 

But on this show, you can’t trust anything you see.

 

Stranded in the Welsh mountains, seven reality show contestants have no idea what they’ve signed up for.

 

Each of these strangers has a secret. If another player can guess the truth, they won’t just be eliminated – they’ll be exposed live on air. The stakes are higher than they’d ever imagined, and they’re trapped.

 

The disappearance of a contestant wasn’t supposed to be part of the drama. Detective Ffion Morgan has to put aside what she’s watched on screen, and find out who these people really are – knowing she can’t trust any of them.

 

And when a murderer strikes, Ffion knows every one of her suspects has an alibi . . . and a secret worth killing for.

The perfect choice of narrator for this one – she voiced Ffion (her Welshness and her wry humour) quite perfectly, but did a really good job with Leo’s Scouse lilt too! I’d thought the reality show format might just be a little tired, but the character development is wonderful as the back stories of all the contestants are explored, and the pace of the investigation with its moments of real drama had me entirely hooked throughout. Lovely touches of humour with Dave the dog, a really well-drawn setting, a nice continuation of the simmering attraction between Ffion and Leo, and a plot and outcome that had me on the edge of my seat (or would have, if I hadn’t been walking…). I’ll look forward to the next in series…

Despite my predilection for the lighter end of romance, I’ve always been rather a Maggie O’Farrell superfan – and I was so thrilled be able to end the year listening to  The Marriage Portrait,  narrated by Genevieve Gaunt…

The woman in the portrait is perfect. So why does she feel so terrified, so alone?

 

Florence, the 1560s. Lucrezia, third daughter of Cosimo de’ Medici, is free to wander the palazzo at will, wondering at its treasures and observing its clandestine workings. But when her older sister dies on the eve of marriage to Alfonso d’Este, ruler of Ferrara, Modena and Reggio, Lucrezia is thrust unwittingly into the limelight: the duke is quick to request her hand in marriage and her father to accept on her behalf.

 

Having barely left girlhood, Lucrezia must now make her way in a troubled court whose customs are opaque and where her arrival is not universally welcomed. Perhaps most mystifying of all is her husband himself, Alfonso. Is he the playful sophisticate he appears to be before their wedding, the aesthete happiest in the company of artists and musicians, or the ruthless politician before whom even his formidable sisters seem to tremble?

 

As Lucrezia sits in uncomfortable finery for the painting that is to preserve her image for centuries to come, one thing becomes worryingly clear. In the court’s eyes, she has one duty: to provide the heir who will shore up the future of the Ferrarese dynasty. Until then, for all of her rank and nobility, her future hangs entirely in the balance.

Yes, of course, it was wonderful – but I’m sure I’m rather late to the party to tell you anything you won’t know. The world building is stunning, the characterisation sublime, the book’s construction so very clever, the emotional content beautifully handled – but I do wish I’d read it rather than listened, because the whole experience left me strangely flat. Perhaps it was the narrator – or my mood in listening to it over the Christmas period?

So that’s it for 2023! I’ve moved into the New Year listening to the latest Richard Osman – The Last Devil To Die, narrated by Fiona Shaw – and, as it finally stopped raining for a while today, did a quick five mile circuit chuckling away to myself. It’s funny, I thought I really didn’t like this series when I read the first book, but it’s quite perfect for audio – and I’ve now decided too that I enjoy Fiona Shaw’s narration as much as Lesley Manville’s before her. Just between us, I really should be listening to William Boyd’s The Romantic for next week’s book club, but the narrator was sending me to sleep, and this one’s much more fun! The book club reads do tend to take over a bit, but I have to say that crime and thrillers are definitely my favourite as far as listening goes – if there are any you’ve particularly enjoyed in audio (especially with several narrators or voices) do let me know. I won’t promise a mid-year audiobook catch up this year, because I never manage it – but expect a similar post for me again at this time next year! Happy listening…