I recently listened to an episode of the podcast Books In The Freezer (check it out of you like horror!) where the hosts discuss their favorite horror/thriller audiobooks as well as what makes a good audiobook. I’m a huge fan of audiobooks  (not just horror, but definitely some of those) and I was happy to get some new recommendations as well as get validation that these ladies like some of the same books I really like.  That made me want to share my favorite audiobooks here!

What makes a good audiobook?

• Good narration – a narrator that can help immerse you right into the story is essential.  For me, I like a narrator who can get across the emotion of what’s going on, that’s what really puts me in the protagonist’s shoes.
• Good production value – sometimes sound effects or music can aid in setting a scene, but just as often choosing how and what to record is equally important. Case in point: the worst audiobook I’ve ever heard was a copy of Dune that sounded like it was read by a robot.  It wasn’t just the narrator’s voice that made it awful though, it was the pacing and recording quality and the decision to direct the narrator to keep a monotonous style made an already pretty dense book even more of a slog.  I recently saw a version of Dune recorded by a full cast (including some narrators I really love) that I’m considering listening to, and I think it will be much more enjoyable if the Reverend Mother doesn’t sound exactly like Thifur Hawat.
• Good writing and style – not all books are suited to being read aloud!

Now, on to my favorites! These are in no particular order, and are books I either borrow from the library over and over again or just outright own because I want to listen to them repeatedly.

Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman (read by Lenny Henry)

This is my favorite Gaiman book, which surprises some of my friends.  I love it because it has a mix of everything: laughs, chills, romance, suspense, and mystery.  This is a sequel to American Gods (though I don’t think you need to have read it to enjoy this book), but this time the magical elements are front and center in the story and the main character really deals with his rough relationship with his father as a man and as a god.  Also, if you’re like me and you heard Anansi stories growing up, it’s a nice to hear a few again and get back in that head space.

Henry hits an absolute home run with the recording.  He has to portray a shy and insecure British accountant, a smooth and kind of cocky American slacker, two incredible villains (who are both despicable and terrifying in very different ways), young women of differing social backgrounds and persuasions, several intimidating old ladies (she’s 104!!), and a range of Caribbean accents and he does them all magnificently. I’ve tried to look for other books he’s narrated but most seem to be children’s books, so I’ll just treasure his performance here.

Sleeping Giants, Waking Gods, and Only Human by Sylvain Neuvel (read by a full cast)

If you’ve ever had a good experience with giant robot stories (Ultraman, Neon Genesis Evangelion, The Iron Giant, etc.), this series is a great companion!  Neuvel peppered tons of references to other science fiction properties throughout his novels, which themselves are technologically sound but also very relatable.  I’ve seen it compared pretty effectively to Pacific Rim – a disparate cast comes together to make sense of giant robot parts found all over the world and after putting the parts together they learn to pilot the robot, the whole time trying to understand where it came from and what it should be used for.  There’s romance, drama, and action, all told through recorded interviews with a secretive nameless person. For me, the limited information provided in the interviews created a real mystery that I was excited to solve.

This is one of the audiobooks read by a full cast that really gets it right.  Some people are really put off by the interview style of prose, but I think the characters are so dynamic and well-acted that they paint a vivid picture of the setting and action.  They also sound like they were able to play off of one another, so the dialogue sounds as natural as it would be if they were really in the same room arguing about linguistics or physics.

Beauty Queens by Libba Bray (read by the author)

I don’t read much YA anymore, but this one has a special place in my heart.  Taking place in a heightened version of our reality, this story is about a group of teen girls on their way to compete in the Miss Teen Dream beauty pageant when their plane crashes on (what appears to be) a deserted island.  Suddenly these girls who have been rehearsing and practicing how to outperform each other for months have to work together to survive.  It’s an acidic satire of toxic femininity, corporate greed, and misogyny while also being a sweet and affirming story of empowerment.

Libba Bray knew exactly what she was going for when she wrote the book, so she brings that to the narration.  While it’s a little weird to hear a white woman do the voices of several women of color (I’m really not fond of some of the accents she uses in general), she doesn’t descend into caricature much until she has to voice an actual caricature.  She’s wickedly funny too, and takes every opportunity to read the footnotes and commercial ad copy – yes, the book includes fake commercials for products that you might see in this world and they are hilarious – in her best peppy commerical voice.  I swear I can hear sparkles when she says the “TM” at the end of brand names!

Under The Banner Of Heaven: The Story Of A Violent Faith by Jon Krakauer (read by Scott Brick)

A somewhat morbid pick, but this is one of my favorite books ever.  While the actual murder that forms the core story is interesting I’m more fascinated by the deep dive Krakauer took into the LDS and FLDS communities, tying together incidents of mania and violence throughout the religion’s history.  I grew up in areas with noticeable Mormon populations (not FLDS) and while a few of my good friends have been Mormons I was always a bit creeped out by some of the things I heard and saw in their religion. They have nothing on the FLDS though, some of those communities make horror stories sound tame.

Scott Brick is a very prolific audiobook narrator – he’s in the cast of that Dune audiobook I mentioned at the top as well as many other popular books.  I find his voice incredibly calming, even when he’s evoking Dan Lafferty or Joseph Smith.  He’s one of those narrators I specifically look for and I usually try out an audiobook sight unseen if he’s narrating it.

The Bride Test by Helen Hoang (read by Emily Woo Zeller)

The Bride Test is the second book in this series (the first is called The Kiss Quotient and it also has a good audio version) of romance stories featuring neurodivergent protagonists.  Khai is a handsome man with a good head for business, but bad reactions to his autism spectrum disorder when he was a child have convinced him that he is incapable of loving another person.  His mom is afraid he’ll never get married, so she travels to Vietnam to find him a bride.  She meets Esme, a young, poor single mom and gives her the chance to come to California to meet Khai and maybe start a new life there.  Esme is beautiful, brave, whip smart, and a perfect match for Khai, if only she can get him to open up to her.

Zeller is another prolific audiobook narrator, though this is the first book I’ve heard her read.  I really appreciate that they got a narrator who can speak in a recognizable Vietnamese accent to help bring the story to life.  She doesn’t trip over the male voices either, which can be a stumbling point particularly in romance novels. The love scenes are genuinely exciting, and the heartbreaking scenes are very powerful too. She’ll have you rooting for Esme and Khai before the first half of the book is over!

Sabriel by Garth Nix (read by Tim Curry)

I read this book for the first time in junior high school and it’s one of the few YA novels that I’ve carried with me into adulthood.  It’s the story of a smart, brave young woman who is called to take up her father’s mantle when he is presumed dead.  She travels into a magical kingdom to find her father and the evil entity that defeated him, using her training in magic (specifically in necromancy) to stay alive and ahead of her enemies. There’s also a bit of romance in this bildungsroman, if you’re interested in that (you already know I am!).

You don’t need me to tell you that Tim Curry can do it all.  He’s a phenomenal actor with an impressively wide range that is on display in the whole Sabriel trilogy (he narrates all three books). He’s a convincing teenage girl, seasoned military guard, evil spirit, or enchanted cat! I’ll definitely check out other audiobooks he’s narrated just because I enjoy his voice.