Staff Picks: Adults

Wednesday's Child

Stories

By: Yiyun Li
Narrated by: Yiyun Li
Length: 9 hours 38 minutes

This program is read by the author and includes an audio-only bonus story, Call Me Ishmael's Mother.

A new collection—about loss, alienation, aging, and the strangeness of contemporary life—by the award-winning, and inimitable, author of The Book of Goose.

A grieving mother makes a spreadsheet of everyone she’s lost. Elsewhere, a professor... Read more

The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store

A Novel

By: James McBride
Narrated by: Dominic Hoffman
Length: 12 hours 21 minutes

“This is a humorous, compassionate and insightful novel, and my favorite of 2023 so far! A skeleton found at the bottom of a well, clutching a mezuzah. This is the mystery that McBride puts at the outset of his fabulous new novel, The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store. From this opening, McBride populates the world of 1930s Pottstown,... Read more

The Great Transition

A Novel

By: Nick Fuller Googins
Narrated by: Stacy Carolan & Stacy Gonzalez
Length: 11 hours 31 minutes

“What a propulsive thriller! I was immediately sucked into this climate story which is full of emotion, adventure and strong characters. Larch (father) and Emi (daughter) are searching for Kristina (mother) who has suddenly gone missing. Told through multiple voices and a great high school history project, the story of how the world almost ended... Read more

The Fraud

A Novel

By: Zadie Smith
Narrated by: Zadie Smith
Length: 12 hours 24 minutes

“An exuberant story based on historical characters and events in Victorian England and Jamaica, this novel is even better as an audio book! Zadie Smith reads it herself and she is an absolutely amazing voice-actor, able to take on the lilt, intonation and brogue of the novel’s characters, whether they are from Scotland, London or Jamaica. Read more

The Invisible Hour

A Novel

By: Alice Hoffman
Narrated by: Jessie Mueller
Length: 7 hours 44 minutes

“Mia's mother joins a cult where among other rules, no reading is allowed. When Mia finds a library, she is able to create a plan to get away and the Scarlet Letter and Nathaniel Hawthorne save her life. The Invisible Hour is a book about the power of reading and how it can literally rescue you from an awful situation. A magical read. Read more

The Sea Elephants

A Novel

By: Shastri Akella
Narrated by: Vikas Adam
Length: 13 hours 21 minutes

For fans of Shuggie Bain and A Burning, a queer coming-of-age novel set in 1990s India, about a young man who joins a traveling street theater troupe, seeking to outrun the dark secrets of his past

"An exquisite novel destined to be a classic.” ―Eric Nguyen, author of Things We Lost to the Water

Shagun knows he will never be the kind of son his... Read more

Learned by Heart

By: Emma Donoghue
Narrated by: Shiromi Arserio
Length: 8 hours 50 minutes

“Immersive, heart wrenching, and meticulously researched, Learned by Heart is everything fans of historical fiction are looking for. Arserio's narration brought the text to life in an almost dreamlike way. I couldn't have loved it more. Read more

Others Were Emeralds

A Novel

By: Lang Leav
Narrated by: Shiromi Arserio
Length: 7 hours 33 minutes

“Others Were Emeralds kept me on the edge of my seat from beginning to end. With lyrical and moving prose, Lang tells a stunning tale of love, loss, and the true power of friendship. A deep, beautiful novel." — Etaf Rum, New York Times bestselling author of A Woman is No ManInternationally acclaimed poet Lang Leav’s debut adult novel combines... Read more

Flags on the Bayou

A Novel

By: James Lee Burke
Narrated by: MacLeod Andrews, Michael Crouch, Dana Gourrier, Marin Ireland, January LaVoy & Ray Porter
Length: 8 hours 59 minutes

From American master James Lee Burke comes a novel set in Civil War-era Louisiana as the South transforms and a brilliant cast of characters—enslaved and free women, plantation gentry, and battle-weary Confederate and Union soldiers—are caught in the maelstrom.

In the fall of 1863, the Union army is in control of the Mississippi river. Much of... Read more

Terrace Story

A Novel

By: Hilary Leichter
Narrated by: Xe Sands
Length: 4 hours 44 minutes

From the author of the acclaimed novel Temporary, an intimate exploration of time, a fable about love, an epic daydream for a broken-hearted world Annie, Edward, and their young daughter, Rose, live in a cramped apartment. One night, without warning, they find a beautiful terrace hidden in their closet. It wasn’t there before, and it seems to... Read more

Beyond That, the Sea

A Novel

By: Laura Spence-Ash
Narrated by: Ell Potter
Length: 12 hours 17 minutes

"Ell Potter's narration spans countries and decades as the story follows Bea and her connection to two families and two very different lives. Potter creates believable distinctions between well-developed characters of different ages from different locales. Listeners will be captivated by this compelling story."- AudioFile Magazine


A sweeping,... Read more

Masters of Death

A Novel

By: Olivie Blake
Narrated by: Steve West
Length: 15 hours 2 minutes

From Olivie Blake, the New York Times bestselling author of The Atlas Six comes Masters of Death, a story about vampires, ghosts, and death itself!

Viola Marek is a struggling real estate agent, and a vampire. But her biggest problem currently is that the house she needs to sell is haunted. The ghost haunting the house has been murdered, and... Read more

The Blonde Identity

A Novel

By: Ally Carter
Narrated by: Emily Ellet & Andrew Eiden
Length: 9 hours

"A unique, delightful, hilarious, unputdownable romance… I’m wonderstruck by The Blonde Identity!" — Ali Hazelwood, New York Times bestselling author of The Love HypothesisThe New York Times bestselling YA author of the beloved Gallagher Girls series bursts onto the adult scene with a fast-paced, hilarious road trip rom-com about a woman with... Read more

The Peacock and the Sparrow

A Novel

By: I.S. Berry
Narrated by: Pete Simonelli
Length: 11 hours 36 minutes

During the Arab Spring, an American spy’s final mission goes dangerously awry in this eerily realistic and sophisticated espionage debut from a former CIA officer that is perfect for fans of John le Carré, Viet Thanh Nguyen, and Alan Furst.

Shane Collins, a world-weary CIA spy, is ready to come in from the cold. Stationed in Bahrain off the coast... Read more

Between Us

A Novel

By: Mhairi McFarlane
Narrated by: Mira Dovreni
Length: 9 hours 47 minutes

"The whole time I'm reading a Mhairi McFarlane novel, I feel like a fist is squeezing my heart… she is so ridiculously talented." – Emily Henry International bestseller Mhairi McFarlane delivers a witty, clever, emotional new novel about a woman whose life unravels spectacularly after her screenwriter boyfriend uses their relationship as... Read more

Accidentally in Love

By: Danielle Jackson
Narrated by: Zenzi Williams
Length: 10 hours 56 minutes

When Sam is stuck sharing the streets for Chicago’s summer festivals with a man she can’t stand, she’ll find it’s often a bumpy road that leads to love….
 
As office manager of the city’s leading luxury boudoir and pinup photography studio, lovable grump Samantha Sawyer has everything under control. With an eventful summer season on the horizon,... Read more

My Roommate Is a Vampire

By: Jenna Levine
Narrated by: Gilli Messer
Length: 8 hours 59 minutes

“Clever, charming, steamy — all a reader could want from a paranormal romantic comedy. Part Kate & Leopold; part What We Do in the Shadows; and witty, warm prose that makes it feel refreshing. It sunk its teeth into me and I was a willing victim! Read more

Study for Obedience

A novel

By: Sarah Bernstein
Narrated by: Sarah Bernstein
Length: 3 hours 59 minutes

Longlisted for the 2023 Booker Prize
Longlisted for the 2023 Giller Prize
Included in Granta's Best of Young British Novelists 2023

For readers of Shirley Jackson, Iain Reid, and Claire-Louise Bennett, a haunting, compressed masterwork from an extraordinary new voice in Canadian fiction.

A young woman moves from the place of her birth to the remote... Read more

The Weaver and the Witch Queen

By: Genevieve Gornichec
Narrated by: Nina Yndis
Length: 16 hours 25 minutes

The lives of two women—one desperate only to save her missing sister, the other a witch destined to become queen of Norway—intertwine in this spellbinding, powerful novel of Viking Age history and myth from the acclaimed author of The Witch’s Heart.

Oddny and Gunnhild meet as children in tenth century Norway, and they could not be more... Read more

Thornhedge

By: T. Kingfisher
Narrated by: Jennifer Blom
Length: 3 hours 43 minutes

From USA Today bestselling author T. Kingfisher, Thornhedge is the tale of a kind-hearted, toad-shaped heroine, a gentle knight, and a mission gone completely sideways.

There's a princess trapped in a tower. This isn't her story.

Meet Toadling. On the day of her birth, she was stolen from her family by the fairies, but she grew up safe and loved... Read more