Discover Best Sellers Audiobooks in Fiction, Contemporary Best Sellers

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Title: Wool

Author: Hugh Howey

Narrator: Susannah Harker

Format: Unabridged

Length: 16 hrs and 30 mins

Language: English

Release date: 01-17-13

Publisher: Random House Audiobooks

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 112 votes

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

An epic story of survival at all odds and one of the most anticipated books of the year. In a ruined and hostile landscape, in a future few have been unlucky enough to survive, a community exists in a giant underground silo. Inside, men and women live an enclosed life full of rules and regulations, of secrets and lies. To live, you must follow the rules. But some don't. These are the dangerous ones; these are the people who dare to hope and dream, and who infect others with their optimism. Their punishment is simple and deadly. They are allowed outside. Jules is one of these people. She may well be the last.

Critic Reviews:

"Exhilarating, intense, addictive. A novel you will never forget." (SJ Watson)

"The characters are well-drawn, and even the villains have a sympathetic side. Secrets unfold with just the right pacing, and I had to set the book down several times and say, Wow, when a major twist was revealed ... If you're looking for a good read, you can't do much better than Wool." (Rick Riordan, #1 New York Times best-selling author)

Members Reviews:

excellence

I bought this title for my teenagers for along car trip, thinking it would be a young adult/dystopian nove that they might both like (1 age 15, the other 18), and not having huge expectations. Turned out that not only they, but my husband and I were completely hooked! Probably the best audio I have heard since I joined Audible.

The story was well paced, with edge of seat suspense, a plausible concept and enough surprises to keep even old hands at the genre intrigued.

Huge kudos to the narrator - the right mix of restraint and emotion, great character range: unlike other narrators, she actually read the story, rather than thinking she had to over-emote to get your attention: the narration was calm but my attention never wavered.

100% satisfied,and wondering if there are sequels!

Stunning

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

This story will stay with me for a long time. The narration is hauntingly beautiful, the characters are well developed and engaging and the story keeps you guessing right until the end. Couldn't recommend this any more highly.

Good story, ok narration

Good story with a fascinating dystopian concept. I'm looking forward to Shift. Unfortunately the narration was competent but not really captivating.

This book is sensational.

Excellent story, post apocalyptic, dystopian society.

Excellent pace, there were hardly any times in this book when it dragged. Every piece of the story was so interesting and intertwined creaitng a wonderful mesh.

The narrator also did a superb job!

This book just kept my attention all the way through and I don't have any real criticism.

Going to order and read the next book immediately!!!

This was a great follow up to Shift

This is another great offering. I would so love this story to continue. Here we really got to know the characters so much better and in my opinion the craft of the author is more mature here. I was surprised by the ending and loved the entire story. If you loved Shift get this one too. Don't make the mistake of listening to/reading this one before Shift as a friend of mine did. That ruined the story for her.

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Title: Charades

Author: Janette Turner Hospital

Narrator: Kate Hosking

Format: Unabridged

Length: 9 hrs and 51 mins

Language: English

Release date: 01-09-13

Publisher: Bolinda Publishing Pty Ltd

Ratings: 3.5 of 5 out of 4 votes

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

This stunning and intoxicating novel speaks of passion and obsession, ranging in setting from an Australian rainforest to Boston and Toronto. A mysterious and elusive love affair haunts the lives of three women in Australia. Twenty years later, on the other side of the world, Charade Ryan sorts through story and counter-story for her father, the legendary Nicholas, and the truth about her origins.

Critic Reviews:

"Is there an authoritative version of one's life, free of faulty memories and misinterpretations? Australian wild child Charade Ryan pursues self-knowledge by seducing a renowned MIT physicist because an aunt once mistook him for Charade's elusive, charismatic father. The personal histories Charade tells her lover rival the intricacies and scope of his cosmic theories. Reader Kate Hosking confidently navigates this metaphysical maze of events and ideas. A listener might easily be lost with a less intrepid guide. Hosking's gift of elucidation blends clarity with enthusiasm. She is particularly enthralling during sporadic moments of dialogue when she suddenly transforms intellectual rhetoric into urgent emotion. It's heady stuff." (AudioFile Magazine)

Members Reviews:

Make Time for Hearing Charades

This is undoubtedly one of the best books ever written in the English language. Somehow I missed Turner Hospital's award winning literary fiction prior to this Audio experience. Charades is a tightly woven character revealed to us in exquisitely visual, scented tangents during her year-long enchantment with and of a brilliant physicist who is twice her age but a few bosons short of a field. The story unfolds in relationship possibilities which impacted me emotionally somewhere between Slaughterhouse Five and The Solitude of Prime Numbers, yet resolves into an elegant solid. If you really love good writing, don't listen to Charades while driving or working with sharp objects.

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Title: Flight for Control

Author: Karlene Petitt

Narrator: Dina Pearlman

Format: Unabridged

Length: 10 hrs and 45 mins

Language: English

Release date: 12-24-12

Publisher: Audible Studios

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 39 votes

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

After a ten-year leave, Kathryn Jacobs has been invited back to the N.T.S.B to investigate a series of unexplained airline crashes. But her husband, Captain Bill Jacobs, has his concerns. While her twin daughters are off at camp, and Bill is actively campaigning for the Pilot Union Presidency, Kathryn secretly begins her investigation. What she learns will shock the nation.

Flight For Control is a thriller that reads like a mystery. But to Kathryn, there is no mystery on the condition of the airline industry - its broken. Planes are crashing. Pensions are lost. Pilots are financially and emotionally bankrupt due to fatigue, furloughs, and loss of seniority.

Its time that someone takes control before its too late - unless it already is.

Your life is in your pilots hands. Do you know whos flying your plane

Members Reviews:

Thriller with a Steely Woman Pilot as Gumshoe

Karlene Petitt is a self-published author, and veteran pilot, who I discovered in an airport bookstore and in-flight magazine. She is a total firecracker, and has a great pilot-detective series starting with Flight for Control.

This is fun thriller, and is engaging to listen to. The protagonist, Kathryn Jacobs, has steely resolve and is going to crack the conspiracy she discovers-- if it kills her!

"Your life is in your pilot's hands. Do you know who's flying your plane?"

Great Airline-Centered Thriller

Writer is a longtime airline pilot who knows her stuff, but only gets a little preachy. First rate story with fresh ideas, interesting characters and much suspense.

Can be a little preachy at times, but gets to the bottom of how the decline of the once-great airlines affects the people who work for them. Good melodrama, flow and great cliffhanger.

Narrator's regional accent was, at times, a distraction, but she moved the story along well.

This should absolutely be made into a movie. Story's that good.

This was my second time listening to it.

A Wonderful First Novel!

What did you love best about Flight for Control?

I liked that the author used real aviation issues to fuel a hopefully far fetched story. I also like that there were enough details in the book to satisfy me as an accident investigation and airplane nut while not going over the head the average passenger. If you are afraid to fly this might not help you out. But, if you like gaining some insight into the issues that plague the discussions of those in the pointy end of the plane this is a must read!

What was one of the most memorable moments of Flight for Control?

The cinematic climax was a gut-wrenching. Be prepared to cry. I kid you not!

What does Dina Pearlman bring to the story that you wouldnt experience if you just read the book?

Listening to Miss Pearlman's reading helped me see the characters in way that I couldn't if I were just reading the text. As usual the is an Audible Production and adds a lot of value to the words on the page!

If you could take any character from Flight for Control out to dinner, who would it be and why?

Darby. She is strong, witty and a darn good pilot! Sadly, I don't think she would want anything to do with me

Any additional comments?

Give this book a chance even if you aren't an airplane geek! It's very much worth it! You can tell that this is Mrs Petitt first novel. But, honestly, that works in the books favor more often than not.

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Title: Me and the Devil

Subtitle: A Novel

Author: Nick Tosches

Narrator: Rick Zieff

Format: Unabridged

Length: 13 hrs and 2 mins

Language: English

Release date: 12-04-12

Publisher: Hachette Audio

Ratings: 3 of 5 out of 16 votes

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

An aging New Yorker, a writer named Nick, feels life ebbing out of him. One night, at a dimly lit bar, he meets a tantalizing young woman, and the night that follows is the most extraordinary of his life. Propelled by uncontrollable, primordial desires, he tastes human blood for the first time and is filled with a sexual and spiritual ecstasy.

His revival quickly fades, and soon Nick is yearning for another taste of the elusive rapture. There follows a descent into madness and unimaginable hell, and a pursuit of otherworldly revelation.

With his vast knowledge of ancient wisdom, Nick Tosches has written a raw and blazing story that tracks from our darkest desires to the most sublime quests for beauty and truth. Outrageous, disturbing, and brilliant, Me and the Devil is a novel unlike any other.

Members Reviews:

Brilliantly bizarre

A surreal story composed of uncompromising insights and fantastic madness; at once disconcerting and gripping.

13 Hours of my life I will never get back.

If you enjoy listening to the dry drunk ramblings of an old man, then you will like this book. I'm sure the author thinks he is being philosophical but it is painfully boring and tedious. Do not waste your time.

Horrible

I have no clue what this book was suppose to be about, it was the worst audio book I have ever listened to.

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Title: Chaperoned

Author: Dora Heldt, Jamie Lee Searle (Translator)

Narrator: Teri Clark Linden

Format: Unabridged

Length: 10 hrs and 46 mins

Language: English

Release date: 07-18-12

Publisher: Brilliance Audio

Ratings: 3.5 of 5 out of 10 votes

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

Thirty years have passed since Christine and her father, Heinz, vacationed together. It was such a disaster - an exasperated Heinz left the moody teenager at a gas station to teach her a lesson - that Christine vowed never to travel with him again. But now her mother is insisting that Christine and her best friend, Dorothea, take Heinz along on what is supposed to be a relaxing girls trip to the beach. And shes not taking no for an answer. Suddenly Christine and Dorothea have a chaperone, though high school is long since over.

From commandeering a friends business renovation to joining the islanders hunt for an escaped con artist to sabotaging his daughters budding romance with a handsome stranger, Heinzs father knows best routine quickly wears thin. But when an unexpected turn of events shows him in a different light, Christine realizes she may not be too grown up to need her father after all.

Members Reviews:

Working vacation with dad turn detective and a very patience daughter

Good father daughter story fun to read. Hines the father that knows everything, his friends that turn detectives and a daughter that loves her father enough to keep him from getting into trouble. Love it

Not funny to me

I think this is supposed to be a romantic comedy, but I just couldn't appreciate the humor in a self-centered 70-something father treating his 40-something daughter like a teenager. Maybe if the daughter ever told him off I'd have been happier. In all, it's a light read. Okay for the beach.

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Title: Salvage the Bones

Author: Jesmyn Ward

Narrator: Cherise Boothe

Format: Unabridged

Length: 9 hrs and 53 mins

Language: English

Release date: 06-06-12

Publisher: Whole Story Audiobooks

Ratings: 3 of 5 out of 4 votes

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

National Book Award, Fiction, 2011

A hurricane is building, threatening the coastal town of Bois Sauvage, Mississippi, and Esch's father is growing concerned. He's a hard drinker, and it isn't often he worries about the family. As the 12 days that make up the novel's framework yield to a dramatic conclusion, this unforgettable family - a clan of motherless children sacrificing for one another as they can, protecting and nurturing where love is scarce - pulls itself up to face another day.

Members Reviews:

A good read. As one review stated the characters in ...

A good read. As one review stated the characters in the book become very real to you. You feel their deep hurts.

You will not want to put the book down once you start it.

Very good

This is a really good, readable and thought-provoking book. Each chapter is better than the one before it as the story leads up to the epic storm.

Wonderful

A beautifully written story about family and love. Ward draws you in, creating stories about characters you wonât soon forget.

Gut wrenching

I loved this book. Each character seemed clearly drawn such that you felt you knew them. The terror and confusion of the hurricane was perfectly described. Loved it.

Enjoyed

Good read!

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Title: The Book of Lost Fragrances

Subtitle: Reincarnationist, Book 4

Author: M. J. Rose

Narrator: Phil Gigante

Format: Unabridged

Length: 11 hrs and 24 mins

Language: English

Release date: 03-13-12

Publisher: Brilliance Audio

Ratings: 4 of 5 out of 36 votes

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

Jac LEtoile has always been haunted by visions of the past, her earliest memories infused with the exotic scents that she grew up with as the heir to a storied French perfume company. These worsened after her mothers suicide until she finally found a doctor who helped her, teaching her to explore the mythological symbolism in her visions and thus lessen their painful impact. This ability led Jac to a wildly successful career as a mythologist, television personality and author.

When her brother, Robbie - whos taken over the House of LEtoile from their father - contacts Jac about a remarkable discovery in the family archives, shes skeptical. But when Robbie goes missing before he can share the secret - leaving a dead body in his wake - Jac is plunged into a world she thought shed left behind.

Traveling back to Paris to investigate Robbies disappearance, Jac discovers that the secret is a mysterious scent developed in Cleopatras time. Could the rumors swirling be true? Can this ancient perfume hold the power to unlock the ability to remember past lives and conclusively prove reincarnation? If this possession has the power to change the world, then its not only worth living for.... Its worth killing for, too.

The Book of Lost Fragrances fuses history, passion, and suspense in an intoxicating web that moves from Cleopatras Egypt and the terrors of revolutionary France to Tibets battle with China and the glamour of modern-day Paris. This marvelous, spellbinding novel mixes the sensory allure of Perfume with the heartbreaking beauty of The Time Travelers Wife, coming to life as richly as our most wildly imagined dreams.

Members Reviews:

Pretty much of a dud.

Phil Gigante did a fine job as usual, but this book was not worth listening to. I put it on double time but had a hard time staying with it. If I'd had the book, I would have flipped to the back to find out what happened.

C'est dommage!

How could the performance have been better?

A lovely and interesting book. However, the French pronunciation is absolutely hideous, if you have even a speck of high school French lingering in the back of your brain I'm sure you will agree!

Nice suspense but over-the-top melodrama

M.J. Rose is a good writer with an admirable flair for narrative and description, a believable knowledge of geography and history, and the ability to weave a suspenseful tale that keeps you interested. The story, involving "proof" of reincarnation by being able to access past lives (and particularly, past lovers) through mystical fragrances, was intriguing enough to buy and listen to the entire audiobook. That said, the story throughout has exaggerated human response and by the end, a simply hokey and nauseating amount of melodrama. The big sex scene may appeal to romance aficianados but to me was so extreme that it was more like the birth of a universe than a mere sex scene. The ending just dropped the ball as well, an anticlimax if there ever was one. Important note: Phil Gigante was not the right reader for this book. His style is monotonous, there are only two voices - "male" and "female" or maybe four, if you include "Chinese female" and "Chinese male". Worst, he has no knowledge of French whatsoever and mangles the pronunciation of French words and phrases enough to make you wince many times. Ouch!

Truly awful.

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Title: Nikolski

Author: Nicolas Dickner, Lazer Lederhendler (translator)

Narrator: Chris Patton

Format: Unabridged

Length: 6 hrs and 28 mins

Language: English

Release date: 01-06-12

Publisher: Audible Studios

Ratings: 3.5 of 5 out of 10 votes

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

Intricately plotted and shimmering with originality, Nikolski charts the curious and unexpected courses of personal migration, and shows how they just might eventually lead us to home.

In the spring of 1989, three young people, born thousands of miles apart, each cut themselves adrift from their birthplaces and set out to discover what - or who - might anchor them in their lives. They each leave almost everything behind, carrying with them only a few artefacts of their lives so far - possessions that have proven so formative that they can't imagine surviving without them - but also the accumulated memories of their own lives and family histories.

Noah, who was taught to read using road maps during a life of nomadic travels with his mother - their home being a 1966 Bonneville station wagon with a silver trailer - decides to leave the prairies for university in Montreal. But putting down roots there turns out to be a more transitory experience than he expected. Joyce, stifled by life in a remote village on Quebec's Lower North Shore, and her overbearing relatives, hitches a ride into Montreal, spurred on by a news story about a modern-day cyber-pirate and the spirit of her own buccaneer ancestors. While her daily existence remains surprisingly routine - working at a fish shop in Jean-Talon market, dumpster-diving at night for necessities - it's her Internet piracy career that takes off. And then there's the unnamed narrator, whom we first meet clearing out his deceased mother's house on Montreal's South Shore and who decides to move into the city to start a new life. There he finds his true home among books, content to spend his days working in a used bookstore and journeying though the many worlds books open up for him.

Over the course of the next 10 years, Noah, Joyce and the unnamed bookseller will sometimes cross paths, and sometimes narrowly miss each other, as they all pass through one vibrant neighbourhood on Montreal's Plateau. Their journeys seem remarkably unformed, more often guided by the prevailing winds than personal will, yet their stories weave in and out of other wondrous tales - stories about such things as fearsome female pirates, urban archaeologists, unexpected floods, fish of all kinds, a mysterious book without a cover and a dysfunctional compass whose needle obstinately points to the remote Aleutian village of Nikolski. And it is in the magical accumulation of those details around the edges of their lives that we begin to know these individuals as part of a greater whole, and ultimately realize that anchors aren't at all permanent, really; rather, they're made to be hoisted up and held in reserve until their strength is needed again.

Critic Reviews:

Nikolski offers a breathtakingly original perception of the world, mixing geography, cartography and longing in a language and construction both intellectually sophisticated and emotionally affecting." (The Globe and Mail)

"The characters are so infused with vitality and surprise that they become unforgettable; the language (and in translation - remarkable) is as lively as the characters; and the humorous, sweetly sad view of life in general is engaging.... This novel is so richly textured and multi-layered that a single short review may do it a disservice.

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Title: Angelo's Journey: A Border Collie's Quest for Home

Author: Leland Dirks, Angelo Dirks

Narrator: Brian McCracken

Format: Unabridged

Length: 2 hrs and 15 mins

Language: English

Release date: 01-06-12

Publisher: Leland R Dirks

Ratings: 3.5 of 5 out of 22 votes

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

You're a dog: a Border Collie. You're dognapped and taken hundreds of miles away. What do you do when you escape and make your way home? You herd a few sheep, and mend a few lives. Follow Angelo as he takes the long road home through the beautiful landscapes of New Mexico and Colorado.

Critic Reviews:

"[A] great read and I recommend it for anyone looking for an exciting and inspirational book." (Eric Goebelbecker, noted dog trainer, Dog Spelled Forward)

Members Reviews:

The Long Journey Home

A Border Collie is stolen in Colorado and taken to Fort Stockton, Texas, where he manages to escape. On his long journey home he changes the lives of every person who takes him in and helps him along the way. Though this isn't exactly the most complicated or sophisticated writing it's heartwarming affect tugs at your emotions; this is a great feel good listen, just make certain that you have Kleenex available.

Man's best friend

Would you listen to Angelo's Journey: A Border Collie's Quest for Home again? Why?

I did enjoy Angelo's adventures and will listen to it again, maybe more than once.

What did you like best about this story?

I love dog stories, especially, smart and talented ones.

Have you listened to any of Brian McCracken???s other performances before? How does this one compare?

I don't know if I've listened to to any other books Brian McCracken has narrated but he has a wonderful deep and very masculine voice.

If you could take any character from Angelo's Journey: A Border Collie's Quest for Home out to dinner, who would it be and why?

I would take Angelo out to dinner, the human characters didn't have enough impact on me to want to know them better, and surely not to take them to dinner. Angelo sounded like he'd be the better company.

Any additional comments?

I liked this book for the most part. I had a Border Collie years ago, and he was as smart as Angelo. Angelo was a real survivor. I found some of the abuse he received with horror. I nearly did not want to listen to the book when it first started, as I can't stand anyone harming a dog, or any animal for that matter. Dogs are just special and forgive so well. Human's should take some valuable life lessons from them.

ilovedogs

This was a very well written book describing the pain that all animal lovers experience when loosing a pet to unknown circumstances. What made this story so unique was that it was really 2 parallel stories being told at the same time. Story one described each day from the point of view of the human and story two described it from the view of the pet. By the way, it does have a happy ending.

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Title: Angelina's Bachelors

Subtitle: A Novel, with Food

Author: Brian O'Reilly

Narrator: Xe Sands

Format: Unabridged

Length: 7 hrs and 22 mins

Language: English

Release date: 12-30-11

Publisher: Tantor Audio

Ratings: 4.5 of 5 out of 40 votes

Genres: Fiction, Contemporary

Publisher's Summary:

Sometimes the shortest distance between two people is the length of a kitchen table....

Far too young to be a widow, Angelina DAngelo suddenly finds herself facing a life without her beloved husband, Frank. Late one night shortly after the funeral, she makes her way down to the kitchen and pours all of her grief and anger into the only outlet she has left - her passion for cooking. In a frenzy of concentration and swift precision, she builds layer upon layer of thick, rich lasagna, braids loaves of yeasty bread, roasts plump herb-rubbed chicken; she makes so much food that she winds up delivering the spoils to the neighbors in her tight-knit Italian community in South Philadelphia.

Retiree Basil Cupertino, who has just moved in with his kindly sister across the street, is positively smitten with Angelinas food. In a stroke of good fortune, Basil offers Angelina (not only husbandless but unemployed) a job cooking for him - two meals a day, six days a week, in exchange for a handsome salary. Soon, word of her irresistible culinary prowess spreads and she finds herself cooking for seven bachelors - and in the process discovers the magical power of food to heal, to bring people together... and maybe even to provide a second chance at love.

Filled to the brim with homemade warmth, Angelinas Bachelors is a sweet tale of overcoming grief, redefining family, and following your heart - through food.

Critic Reviews:

"O'Reilly's keen ear for the neighborhood swells lends a charming, timeless quality to the tale. Light comedy and good food make a winning combination." (Kirkus)

Members Reviews:

A Mouthwatering Comfort Listen

What did you love best about Angelina's Bachelors?

Vocally, we experience every emotion Angelina experiences - warmth and love, a wrenching grief, sadness mixed with determination that turns to hope, and then delight as she builds a very different but once again happy life for herself. This takes place over time with the help of family, friends and Food.I loved the descriptions of the recipes, the memories of family they brought to Angelina and/or the reasons why she would create a new recipe. The details about the cooking and the meals plus the reactions of those who ate them let me live vicariously and it's a good thing or I would have gained ten pounds just listening! If you've ever watched the Food Network and been intrigued by all the small things that make a great dish then Angelina's Bachelors is a must listen for the food alone.

What was one of the most memorable moments of Angelina's Bachelors?

I don't know about an exact moment but from the point where Angelina uses her amazing cooking abilities as therapy and then the book moves forward as she also uses those abilities to make ends meet, while filling a spot in several different men's lives I was hooked and couldn't stop listening. It was an added bonus that Angelina's Bachelors moves at a fast pace with something new around every corner as the cast of characters builds and then grows together with each artfully created and mouth watering meal.

Have you listened to any of Xe Sands???s other performances before? How does this one compare?

Yes, and she is in top form with Angelina's Bachelors.