Behind the Mic With Kirkus Reviews

Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Robin Whitten discuss this compelling coming-of-age novel set on a Maine island. Evan Sibley performs Lewis Robinson’s audiobook with narrative drive, a convincing tone, and a sure sense of the unfolding drama. The setting is a posh but remote club on fictional Whaleback Island—just the place to retrain young misfits to work hard on land and sea to please the billionai...

When executed as beautifully as this one, multigenerational novels are all consuming in the best way. Sandra Oh's performance of Min Jin Lee’s audiobook makes the experience even more immersive. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Robin Whitten discuss this story of young Sunja, who is saved from ruin and moves from Korea to Japan. Thus a family tale begins and proceeds through four generations in the ea...

Danez Smith, a poet, performance artist, and devotee of Harlem Renaissance poet Langston Hughes presents a selection of Hughes’s early poems, songs, and other writings, created from 1921 to 1927. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Robin Whitten discuss this collection and Smith’s extraordinary performance. With their clear baritone voice and extraordinary vocal talent, Smith’s performance is beautiful t...

Each American poet laureate is expected to carry out at least one project, and the 24th, Ada Limón, created this anthology of poems about humans in nature. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Emily Connelly discuss Kim Ramirez’s narration of this collection that includes a range of exemplary contemporary poets. Ramirez gives each of the 50 poems its due, acting but never overdramatizing, allowing rather...

Shannon Tyo’s gentle, soothing tone proves effective and engaging as she narrates Miye Lee’s Korean bestseller, now in translation by Joosun Lee. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Emily Connelly discuss the whimsical story. Penny lands her dream job at the Dallergut Dream Department Store. Each floor of the store sells different types of dreams. As Penny learns about the importance of sleep and dreams...

Ciaran Saward gives an appealing narration of Maiga Doocy’s fantasy. AudioFile’s Emily Connelly tells host Jo Reed about the fun of this magical adventure. Leo, a rakish scriver from a privileged gentry family, and Sebastian Grimm, a studious caster whose parents are farmers, are rivals in their fifth year at the Fount, a school of magic. After Grimm unwittingly casts a spell on Leo that compels h...

Cindy Kay sweeps listeners away into Samantha Sotto Yambao’s memorable and otherworldly story. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Emily Connelly discuss an audiobook full of magic and adventure. On the day Hana is due to inherit her family’s pawn shop, where people from our world can trade away their greatest choices and regrets, she wakes to find it ransacked, her father missing—and one of their precio...

Caitlin Davies performs Sarah Beth Durst’s enchanting fantasy story about a reclusive librarian finding her way home. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Emily Connelly discuss the fun of listening to this magical audiobook. Academic librarian Kiela has lived in the Great Library of Alyssium for years, caring for the Empire’s spellbooks with only a sentient spider plant named Caz for company. When the fi...

Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Alan Minskoff discuss this anthology that presents widely varied mystery and suspense tales. They are quite well read and will hold the attention of mystery lovers and curious listeners. Jane Oppenheimer’s intimate and expressive narration of Abby Geni’s “The Body Farm” tells a story of justifiable homicide. Nicole Lewis captures the multiple voices, quick pulse, and m...

Dr. Sacks was a prodigious researcher, tireless clinician, voracious reader, competitive weight lifter, indefatigable traveler, influential neurologist, and long-winded correspondent. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Alan Minskoff discuss James Langton’s narration of Sacks’s letters, through which he seems to inhabit the great man’s extraordinary mind. These revealing and erudite letters testify to Sa...

British food writer, television personality, and memoirist Nigel Slater writes stylishly, and his fine performance is a happy surprise for listeners. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Alan Minskoff discuss this packed text with short chronicles of Slater’s experiences dining, cooking, traveling, and reporting from countries ranging from Lebanon to Iceland.  But it may be his more homespun revelations o...

Maya Hawke performs Joan Didion’s classic collection superbly. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Alan Minskoff discuss how Hawke pays attention to Didion’s exquisite prose and captures her careful observations. Hawke gets Didion’s measured pace and thoughtful tone just right as she conveys the much-admired author’s idiosyncratic, elegant language. The audiobook vividly brings back the 1960s, when Didio...

Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Alan Minskoff discuss an exquisite novel on audio from celebrated Canadian poet and novelist Anne Michaels. Her novel, shortlisted for the Booker Prize, looks at love, loss, and human connection. Michaels’s intimate delivery and empathetic tone serve her bittersweet and elegiac text well. Starting in 1917 with a battlefield explosion, her exploration of characters duri...

Tiffany Yu invites listeners to join her in advocating for a more accessible society for disabled people. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Kendra Winchester discuss this audiobook from the founder of Diversability, an organization dedicated to disability advocacy. Using a combination of personal experience and research, Yu examines topics like language, microaggressions, and the importance of creating...

Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Kendra Winchester discuss disability rights advocate Johanna Hedva’s essay collection, 10 years in the making. Hedva’s observations about society are sharp and insightful. Disability sits at the core of their writing, and they challenge listeners to see it as a social experience, in addition to a biological one. Hedva’s performance, personable and intimate, makes the l...

Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Kendra Winchester discuss a delicious story set in Japan. Hanako Footman performs this feel-good novel about Chef Negare and his daughter, Kioshi, who run the Kamogawa Diner in Kyoto. Together, they are the Kamogawa Food Detectives, who track down lost recipes from their clients’ pasts. Footman’s narration captures the cozy atmosphere and heartwarming tone of the novel...

Kristin Atherton delivers a powerhouse performance of the final volume in Booker Prize novelist Pat Barker’s trilogy reimagining the Trojan War from a female perspective. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Kendra Winchester discuss this story of Ritsa, a Trojan healer who is enslaved to Cassandra, who is herself the slave-concubine of King Agamemnon. The war is over, the seas perilous, egos fragile, pro...

Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Kendra Winchester discuss an Appalachian horror story set in West Virginia. Dani Martineck performs as Miles Abernathy, who is sixteen and has just come out to his parents when a group of boys attack him and land him in the hospital. The Abernathys have been in a blood feud for over a century, but Miles believes he finally has a way to end it once and for all. Martinec...

We’re revisiting our conversation about Hanif Abdurraqib’s latest audiobook, THERE’S ALWAYS THIS YEAR. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Emily Connelly discuss Abdurraqib’s mesmerizing narration and rich writing. You can hear the love in his voice as he performs his ode to his hometown of Columbus, Ohio; a love letter to basketball; a meditation on home and belonging; and an exploration of faith, Black...

In today’s episode, we revisit host Jo Reed’s conversation with AudioFile’s Michele Cobb about Whoopi Goldberg’s BITS AND PIECES. It’s what Michele calls an “audio must,” as Goldberg’s raspy timbre and amused tone make her the only person appropriate to narrate her memoir. Listen to learn more about one of AudioFile’s picks for Best Memoir and Biography Audiobooks of 2024. And for even more insigh...

AudioFile is celebrating our 2024 Best Audiobooks by sharing conversations about the year’s best listening. Today’s episode features host Jo Reed’s conversation with AudioFile’s Robin Whitten about the joy of OLIVETTI, written by Allie Millington, and read by Christopher Gebauer and Simon Vance. This unusual listen is one of the Best Children’s and Family listening of 2024. It’s a charming story a...

Today’s episode revisits host Jo Reed’s conversation with AudioFile’s Robin Whitten exploring Harini Nagendra’s A NEST OF VIPERS, one of AudioFile’s 2024 Best Mystery Audiobooks. Golden Voice Soneela Nankani immerses listeners in this third installment of the Bangalore Detectives Club series, set in 1920s India. It’s a story rife with intrigue, politics, and the fight for autonomy. Nankani’s brisk...

This week, we’re sharing some of our conversations about audiobooks on our 2024 Best Audiobooks list. Today’s episode features host Jo Reed and AudioFile’s Kendra Winchester discussing JAMES by Percival Everett and read by Golden Voice narrator Dominic Hoffman. JAMES won the 2024 National Book Award for Fiction, and Hoffman’s captivating narration earned it a spot on AudioFile’s list of Best Ficti...

Host Jo Reed is joined today by AudioFile contributor Caitlin Augusta, who has shared her insights on romance audiobooks in her Tease column and audiobook reviews for years. Today she talks about gifting KISS ME AT CHRISTMAS, Jenny Bayliss’s story full of Christmas magic, narrated by Caroline Fantozzi. It’s centered around an underdog production of A Christmas Carol, with school counselor Harriet...

Host Jo Reed and AudioFile contributor Ellen Quint discuss the fun of gifting mysterious listens during the holidays. Ellen’s been writing about mystery audiobooks for AudioFile for years, and we’re delighted to have her on to discuss Edoardo Ballerini’s narration of A DEATH IN CORNWALL. Daniel Silva’s latest starts in Venice, where Gabriel Allon and his wife get a call to investigate a death in C...