Local bookseller recommendations

Ours

By: Phillip B. Williams

Narrated by: Joniece Abbott-Pratt

Length: 22 hours 47 minutes

Abridged: No

Chosen as a Most Anticipated Book of 2024 by Oprah’s Book Club, Elle, Reader’s Digest, The Rumpus, Kirkus Reviews, The Millions, Lit Hub, and more

“An inventive ode to self-determination and also a surrealistic vision of Black life as forged within the crucible of American history . . . [written in] lush, ornamental prose.” —The New Yorker

“Fans... Read more

The Last Word

By: Gerri Lewis

Narrated by: Alex Raby

Length: 9 hours 41 minutes

Abridged: No

Obituary writer Winter Snow is no stranger to grief, and writing obituaries for the citizens of Ridgefield, Connecticut, is her way of providing comfort to those who have been in her shoes. But funerals and eulogies are meant for the dead, so when the very much alive Leocadia Arlington requests her own obituary by the end of the week, Winter’s... Read more

Splinters

By: Leslie Jamison

Narrated by: Leslie Jamison

Length: 8 hours 32 minutes

Abridged: No

From the New York Times bestselling author of The Recovering and The Empathy Exams comes the riveting story of rebuilding a life after the end of a marriage—an exploration of motherhood, art, and new love.
 
Leslie Jamison has become one of our most beloved contemporary voices, a scribe of the real, the true, the complex. She has been compared... Read more

I Done Clicked My Heels Three Times

By: Taylor Byas

Narrated by: Taylor Byas

Length: 1 hour 51 minutes

Abridged: No

Inspired by The Wiz, this debut, full-length poetry collection celebrates South Side Chicago and a Black woman's quest for self-discovery—one that pulls her away from the safety of home and into her power



I Done Clicked My Heels Three Times takes its inspiration and concept from the cult classic film The Wiz to explore a Black woman's journey out... Read more

The Fortune Seller

By: Rachel Kapelke-Dale

Narrated by: Stephanie Cannon

Length: 10 hours 56 minutes

Abridged: No

Yellowjackets meets The Cloisters in this beguiling coming-of-age story about class, reinvention, and destiny, set against the backdrop of two mysterious deaths.

Middle-class Rosie Macalister has worked for years to fit in with her wealthy friends on the Yale equestrian team. But when she comes back from her junior year abroad with newfound... Read more

Ten Bridges I've Burnt

By: Brontez Purnell

Narrated by: Brontez Purnell

Length: 1 hour 28 minutes

Abridged: No

In Ten Bridges I've Burnt, Brontez Purnell—the bard of the underloved and overlooked—turns his gaze inward. A storyteller with a musical eye for the absurdity of his own existence, he is peerless in his ability to find the levity within the stormiest of crises. Here, in his first collection of genre-defying verse, Purnell reflects on his... Read more

A Wild and Heavenly Place

By: Robin Oliveira

Narrated by: Angus King, Katy Townsend & Tavia Gilbert

Length: 12 hours 46 minutes

Abridged: No

How far would you go? How much would you risk?

Hailey MacIntyre seems conjured from the depths of Samuel Fiddes’s loneliness. Caring for his young sister in the tenements of Glasgow, Scotland, Samuel has known only hunger, while Hailey has never known want. Yet, when Samuel saves Hailey’s brother from a runaway carriage, their connection is... Read more

Swanna in Love

By: Jennifer Belle

Narrated by: Sophie Amoss

Length: 8 hours 1 minute

Abridged: No

It’s the summer of 1982 and fourteen-year-old Swanna Swain is the only one left at camp. The place is a ghost town by the time her mother Val finally shows up six hours late—stoned and radiant—in a Ford pickup driven by Borislav, her new young Russian lover. Assuming she is headed home to her air-conditioned Upper West Side apartment, Swanna and... Read more

Sex, Lies and Sensibility

By: Nikki Payne

Narrated by: Kacie Rogers, Phil Ava & Nikki Payne

Length: 11 hours 9 minutes

Abridged: No

“Nikki Payne skillfully spins the tale of a well-known Jane Austen classic and makes it entirely her own. Thoughtful, hilarious, and smolderingly steamy.”—Kristina Forest, author of The Partner Plot

Two sisters roll up their sleeves to run a dilapidated inn but must learn to work with the locals in this deliciously spicy novel inspired by Sense... Read more

Everyone Who Can Forgive Me Is Dead

By: Jenny Hollander

Narrated by: Marisa Calin

Length: 8 hours 32 minutes

Abridged: No

What if everything you know about the worst night of your life turns out not to be true?

Nine years ago, with the world's eyes on her, Charlie Colbert fled. The press and the police called Charlie a "witness" to the nightmarish events at her elite graduate school on Christmas Eve—events known to the public as "Scarlet Christmas"—though Charlie... Read more

When Grumpy Met Sunshine

By: Charlotte Stein

Narrated by: Emily Spowage

Length: 9 hours 17 minutes

Abridged: No

A steamy, opposites-attract romance with undeniable chemistry between a grumpy retired footballer and his fabulous and very sunshine-y ghostwriter.

When grumpy ex-footballer Alfie Harding gets badgered into selling his memoirs, he knows he’s never going to be able to write them. He hates revealing a single thing about himself, is allergic to... Read more

Dear Black Girls

By: A'ja Wilson

Narrated by: A'ja Wilson

Length: 3 hours 39 minutes

Abridged: No

This program is read by the author.

“Through honest stories and inspiring lessons from her life, A’ja Wilson reminds us to never doubt who we are or apologize for being true to ourselves. Dear Black Girls is a must-read for every Black girl out there.” ―Gabrielle Union, New York Times bestselling author of We're Going to Need More Wine and You... Read more

Alphabetical Diaries

By: Sheila Heti

Narrated by: Kate Berlant

Length: 5 hours 26 minutes

Abridged: No

"Berlant adds that extra pizazz, so you really get a window into the creative mind as it shifts quickly from moments of despair to lightbulbs of insight to incidents of sexual desire to the recollection of totally random literary facts."—Vulture on Alphabetical Diaries

"Heti's candid revelations will stir listeners."—AudioFile on Alphabetical... Read more

The Antique Hunter's Guide to Murder

By: C.L. Miller

Narrated by: Emilia Fox

Length: 11 hours 2 minutes

Abridged: No

USA TODAY BESTSELLER

In this fun, cozy, debut mystery, an antiques hunter investigates a suspicious death at an isolated English manor, embroiling her in the high-stakes world of tracking stolen artifacts.

What antique would you kill for?

Freya Lockwood is shocked when she learns that Arthur Crockleford, antiques dealer and her estranged mentor,... Read more

How the Boogeyman Became a Poet

By: Tony Keith Jr.

Narrated by: Tony Keith Jr.

Length: 5 hours 3 minutes

Abridged: No

Poet, writer, and hip-hop educator Tony Keith Jr. makes his debut with a powerful YA memoir in verse, tracing his journey from being a closeted gay Black teen battling poverty, racism, and homophobia to becoming an openly gay first-generation college student who finds freedom in poetry. Perfect for fans of Elizabeth Acevedo, George M. Johnson,... Read more

Your Shadow Half Remains

By: Sunny Moraine

Narrated by: Sunny Moraine

Length: 4 hours

Abridged: No

This program is read by the author.

The Last of Us meets Bird Box in Sunny Moraine's Your Shadow Half Remains, a post-apocalyptic tale where eye contact causes people to spiral into a deadly, violent rage.

ONE LOOK CAN KILL.

Riley has not seen a single human face in longer than she can reckon. No faces, no eyes. Not if you want to survive.

But when... Read more

Across So Many Seas

By: Ruth Behar

Narrated by: Allison Strong, Victoria Villarreal, Sol Madari...

Length: 5 hours 52 minutes

Abridged: No

"As lyrical as it is epic, Across So Many Seas reminds us that while the past may be another country, it's also a living, breathing song of sadness and joy that helps define who we are." --Alan Gratz, New York Times bestselling author of Refugee

Spanning over 500 years, Pura Belpré Award winner Ruth Behar's epic novel tells the stories of four... Read more

Since She's Been Gone

By: Sagit Schwartz

Narrated by: Ann Sprinkle

Length: 9 hours 23 minutes

Abridged: No

A clinical psychologist is thrown into her dark past as she races to uncover the truth about her mother's death while struggling with her own mental health.



Can we ever truly know the people we love?



Losing her mother to a hit-and-run at age fifteen threw Beatrice "Beans" Bennett's life into turmoil. Bereft, she developed a life-threatening eating... Read more

The Fixer Upper

By: Phoebe MacLeod

Narrated by: Jess Nesling

Length: 7 hours 40 minutes

Abridged: No

'I absolutely loved this book!' Maxine Morrey Finding a man is like buying a house: sometimes you have to look beyond the exterior to see the potential underneath.As an estate agent, Alex’s job is to create happy-ever-afters. It’s just a shame she can’t work the same magic on her own life. Her long-term boyfriend Thomas still lives with his... Read more

Your Utopia

By: Bora Chung

Narrated by: Greta Jung

Length: 6 hours 54 minutes

Abridged: No

From the internationally acclaimed author of Cursed Bunny, in another thrilling translation from Korean by Anton Hur, this collection shares tales of loss and discovery, idealism and dystopia, death and immortality. ​

In “The Center for Immortality Research,” a low-level employee runs herself ragged planning a fancy gala for donors, only to be... Read more

A Quantum Love Story

By: Mike Chen

Narrated by: Patti Murin

Length: 10 hours 53 minutes

Abridged: No

A cozy sci-fi novel from the New York Times bestselling author of Star Wars: Brotherhood

The only thing harder than finding someone in a time loop is losing them.

Grieving her best friend's recent death, neuroscientist Mariana Pineda’s ready to give up everything to start anew. Even her career—after one last week consulting at a top secret... Read more

The Mountain King

By: Anders de la Motte

Narrated by: Cassandra Campbell

Length: 14 hours 27 minutes

Abridged: No

This atmospheric and sinister mystery will have you “hooked from the very first page” (Kyle Mills, #1 New York Times bestselling author) as it follows a brilliant female detective investigating the darkest side of humanity.

Detective Leonore Asker seems to have the leading position at Malmö’s Major Crime Division within reach. But things go awry... Read more

Midnight on Beacon Street

By: Emily Ruth Verona

Narrated by: Christine Lakin

Length: 7 hours 3 minutes

Abridged: No

“Midnight on Beacon Street is a lot of things. It’s a taut thriller about a babysitter and two kids surviving one weird night. It’s a celebration of classic horror movies. It’s a creepy narrative that involves a ghost and late night home break-ins. And, most important, it’s a lot of fun. . . Verona plays with home invasion tropes by delivering a... Read more

Hard by a Great Forest

By: Leo Vardiashvili

Narrated by: Luke Thompson

Length: 10 hours 24 minutes

Abridged: No

NAMED ONE OF THE OBSERVER’S 10 BEST NEW NOVELISTS FOR 2024

"The stakes could barely be higher in Leo Vardiashvili’s propulsive page-turner…It’s a spellbinding achievement."—The Financial Times

“Has a commercial-fiction spring in its step.… Vardiashvili also has captured the winking, world-weary humor and magic-realist touches that mark a lot of... Read more