For the love of audio books

I wanted to write a post about my favorite audio books.  You know, the ones that stick with you way after you have listened to them.  The ones that you can still remember exactly what you were doing while you were listening.  When you pull into the driveway and can't turn it off.  Or you take the long way home just so you can keep listening. Those ones.

First, Rules by Cynthia Lord.  I remember my kitchen floor was never that clean before I had the CD rolling and has never been that clean since. This was back before we redid our kitchen when we had one of those hangover CD players under our cabinets.  It was many years ago but I still remember hugging the mop with tears streaming down my face.  I hated when that book ended.*

And then there was An Abundance of Katherines.  I was taking a YA literature course and just getting introduced to John Green.  This was way before TFIOS.  That time my driveway never got shoveled as perfectly as it did that afternoon.  I was grateful for the snowstorm, plugged in my iPod (before iPhones) and happily shoveled the driveway.

I cannot forget Revolution by Deborah Wiles.  Hours and hours but worth every second.  This is a performance and reading all wrapped together. Listen to the Beatles.  Imagine the poems.  The actors bring 1964 to life through the fiction and nonfiction text.  I found myself driving extra slow so my time for turning off the audio would be lengthened.

Do you like spooky?  Try listening to The Thickety by JA White, especially on a long and winding DARK road.  And then plan to have a deer run in front of your car.  My heart was pounding.  Read by a woman with an Irish accent, this fantasy story feels even more real than ever.

My newest addition to the list is Echo by Pam Munoz Ryan.  You can read my review of the book in my previous post.  The audio is just perfect.  With all the musical references, the book was meant to be an audio book.  From Brahams Lullaby, to Tchaikovsky, to Rodgers and Hammerstein, it is completely lovely and soothing.

And of course, there is Harry Potter.  Every. Single. One.  Don't tell him, but I have a huge crush on Jim Dale.  How many different voices has he had to do for all seven books?  I could listen to him read for days on end.

*I just saw that Jessica Almasy, the reader of Rules, also is the reader for Under the Egg, by Laura Marx Fitzgerald.  I loved that book.  Now I need to listen to the audio!