Behind the Mic With Kirkus Reviews

In today’s special edition of Behind the Mic, narrator Marisa Blake shares her thoughts on one of this year’s Best YA Audiobooks, WE ARE NOT FROM HERE by Jenny Torres Sanchez. She and AudioFile’s Robin Whitten discuss the challenging and powerful audiobook that tells the story of three teenagers escaping a gang leader in Guatemala and making their way to America. Published by Dreamscape. 2020 Best...

Narrator T. Ryder Smith joins AudioFile’s Robin Whitten to talk about narrating FIRE IN PARADISE, Alastair Gee and Dani Anguiano’s study of the devastating 2018 Northern California fire. Listen to hear how Smith balanced narrating the fire science and California history with voicing the dramatic personal portraits of the California residents. Published by Recorded Books. 2020 Best Nonfiction & Cul...

On today’s episode, narrator David Pittu joins AudioFile’s Michele Cobb to discuss THE LAST TOURIST. Olen Steinhauer’s CIA thriller is one of AudioFile’s Best Mystery Audiobooks of the year. David tells Michele about narrating an unsettling, immersive audiobook, and his work on the Milo Weaver series. Published by Macmillan Audio. 2020 Best Mystery & Suspense Audiobooks: ALL THE DEVILS ARE HERE by...

AudioFile is celebrating the best audiobooks of the year, and in this special episode narrator Marin Ireland joins AudioFile’s Michele Cobb to discuss LEAVE THE WORLD BEHIND. Rumaan Alam’s fascinating audiobook exploring race, class, family, and global catastrophe is one of AudioFile’s Best Fiction Audiobooks of the year. Listen to the episode to hear Marin’s thoughts on the audiobook -- and add i...

AudioFile Magazine is celebrating the best in this year’s audiobooks! Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Robin Whitten give a peek behind the scenes in the making of the 2020 Best Audiobooks list. In a year where audiobooks have meant so much to so many of us, choosing the titles that stood out above the rest was a difficult task. There are timely, heartfelt, and joyful audiobooks to dive into, all narr...

Nikki Giovanni’s slightly raspy, slightly sibilant voice draws listeners into this important collection of poetry and prose. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Emily Connelly discuss Giovanni’s skill at wringing out all the humor, anger, and sorrow in her poetry. Warm tones express themes of quilts and songs and love, and her poet’s sense guides her tempo as she explores her perspectives on being Black...

Looking for something to entertain younger listeners -- or the whole family? Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Emily Connelly discuss Rena Barron’s middle-grade fantasy audiobook that shines thanks to Soneela Nankani’s animated performance. Maya has loving parents, good friends, and a welcoming community in Chicago. She also has just discovered that everyone’s been hiding a huge secret -- they have mag...

Eric Gansworth is poetic, intense, and defiant as he delivers his coming-of-age story in verse, telling of his life growing up in an Onondaga family in the Tuscarora Nation. AudioFile’s Emily Connelly and Host Jo Reed discuss this moving, hilarious, and heartfelt memoir for young adult listeners. Gansworth traces how the government boarding schools divided his family, the impact of the Vietnam war...

Moira Quirk’s lively voice draws listeners into a magical Regency-inspired tale. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Emily Connelly discuss C.L. Polk’s new fantasy audiobook that is sure to provide all the distractions you need right now. Beatrice Clayborn is a young ingénue entering her first “bargaining season” where eligible suitors vie for her hand. Once married, Beatrice will be forcibly cut off fro...

An outstanding full cast of narrators captures the experiences of fourteen teenagers who grew up together in San Francisco -- and were forced into incarceration camps because of their Japanese ancestry during WWII. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Emily Connelly discuss Traci Chee’s National Book Award finalist for Young People’s Literature, one that truly is a must-listen. Interconnecting chapters tr...

Imogen Church’s lively narration pairs well with Anne Willan’s informative and playful survey of women cookbook writers who changed culinary history. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Robin Whitten discuss Church’s deliciously entertaining and painlessly educational performance that serves up fascinating insights about food and its preparation. Trace changes in kitchens from Hannah Wooley’s hearth fire...

Rick Adamson presents naturalist and adventurer Craig Childs’s essays about the deserts of the American Southwest in a fitting gruff, masculine voice. AudioFile’s Robin Whitten tells host Jo Reed about this audiobook for those who love deserts -- and those who long to visit them. During a pandemic, this might be exactly the listening experience many are after. Adamson narrates the journeys to dese...

Actress Olivia Colman is a new voice to the His Dark Materials series, and she slips easily into Lyra’s boots. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Robin Whitten discuss this puzzle piece of an audiobook that helps to complete the full picture of Pullman’s fantastic world. Set after the events of THE AMBER SPYGLASS, this short story serves as an effective bridge between that book and the second in Pullman...

Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Robin Whitten share their thoughts on Robert Harris’s latest audiobook V2, narrated with a detached air by David Rintoul. Wernher von Braun and his team of rocket scientists are on the verge of defection to the U.S. The story, told from the opposing perspectives of two fictional characters, von Braun’s colleague Dr. Rudi Graf and WAAF officer Kay Caton-Walsh, traces th...

Entrepreneur, bestselling author, and speaker Seth Godin is back to narrate his newest audiobook on engaging our creativity. AudioFile’s Robin Whitten shares with host Jo Reed all that she loves about listening to Godin’s audiobooks. In this latest, Godin turns his attention to individual creativity with high-impact advice on how to share your art with the world. His narration is quiet but intense...

Narrator Je Nie Fleming’s soft voice is a good match for this mystery audiobook. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Michele Cobb discuss a story about Grayson Sykes, a new private eye excited for her first serious case finding a doctor’s missing ex-girlfriend. Fleming highlights Gray’s frustrations at making rookie mistakes, her growing suspicion of foul play, and her conflicted feelings for her male bo...

A group of people is meeting in New York for Super Bowl 2022 when the world’s electronics go down. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Michele Cobb discuss a multicast audiobook that chronicles a return to a world without modern technology. Listen as survivors of a plane crash are treated in a clinic also impacted by the blackout. Neighbors are forced to interact, and DeLillo reflects on the nature of hu...

English actress Carey Mulligan narrates a wondrous audiobook about a woman’s existential journey between life and death. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Michele Cobb discuss this moving audiobook about what it means to have a good life. Nora Seed’s life has taken a dark turn—no job, many losses, and a relationship not worth continuing. When she attempts suicide, she wakes up in the Midnight Library w...

Sam and Annie are a young couple moving to upstate New York for a quieter life, and to support Sam’s mother—and then Sam disappears. Don’t read too much about this audiobook before you start listening, AudioFile’s Michele Cobb advises host Jo Reed—just jump right in. The multicast aspect of this audiobook is perfect for all the plot twists you experience, and the casting makes for an engaging list...

Vivienne Leheny’s narration captures each character’s outward persona and true self in this captivating thriller. In today’s episode, host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Michele Cobb confess their love for a good thriller. Seatmates Selena and Martha swap confessions on a stalled train ride. Selena believes her husband is having an affair with the nanny, and Martha is having an affair with her boss. When...

Narrator John Lee does a masterful job bringing a devilish mystery to life. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Alan Minskoff discuss this historical mystery set in rural Ireland in 1957. Listeners hear Lee’s pitch-perfect renditions of the locals and the Protestant gentry’s upper crust speech. He smoothly voices detective inspector Strafford, who like the people he is investigating, comes from the gentr...

David Attenborough is best known for his BBC nature documentaries, with their stunning scenes of wild animals and their habitats around the globe. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Alan Minskoff share thoughts on how Attenborough’s many skills at documentary filmmaking translate to the audiobook. His elegant prose and rounded tones serve his purpose to make a witness statement to his long broadcast car...

Actor Laurence Fishburne expertly modulates his tone and suits his cadence to the scenes and dialogue in this audiobook following the life of Malcolm X. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Alan Minskoff share their thoughts on this new narration of an outstanding life. The Black rights champion and faithful believer could not have a more compelling narrator. Fishburne’s extraordinary vocal talents elevat...

This stirring audiobook offers a memorable merging of author, subject, and narrator. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Alan Minskoff discuss how JD Jackson voices John Lewis with an authenticity and nuanced nod to the Congressman’s rural Alabama roots. His powerful retelling of John Lewis’s life’s work fighting to bring civil and voting rights to Black Americans stays with the listener. Famed for overc...

AudioFile’s Alan Minskoff and host Jo Reed discuss an eye-opening collection of climate change nonfiction from THE NEW YORKER magazine. Kaleo Griffith, Gabra Zackman, and Cat Gould narrate with engagement, clarity, and an admirable mix of insistence and calm. Written by many of the magazine’s most well-known authors, including Elizabeht Kolbert, Bill McKibben, Burkhard Bilger, Kathryn Schulz, and...