Audiobooks for Tortured Poets

Upstream

Selected Essays

By: Mary Oliver
Narrated by: Hala Alyan, Joy Sullivan & Kate Baer
Length: 4 hours 3 minutes

The New York Times bestselling collection of essays from beloved poet Mary Oliver, also named one of O, The Oprah Magazine’s Ten Best Books of the Year, now in audio. “I had to go out into the world and see it and hear it and react to it, before I knew at all who I was, what I was, what I wanted to be.” So begins Upstream, a collection of... Read more

Chilean Poet

A Novel

By: Alejandro Zambra
Narrated by: Gisela Chípe
Length: 12 hours 1 minute

A NEW YORKER BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR
A WALL STREET JOURNAL TOP 10 BOOK OF THE YEAR
ONE OF NPR’S “BOOKS WE LOVE”

“A tender and funny story about love, family and the peculiar position of being a stepparent…[Chilean Poet] broadens the author’s scope and quite likely his international reputation.” —Los Angeles Times

“Zambra [is] one of the most... Read more

Bluets

By: Maggie Nelson
Narrated by: Maggie Nelson
Length: 2 hours 4 minutes

Suppose I were to begin by saying that I had fallen in love with a color …Since 2009, when it first published, to today, Bluets has drawn scores of readers with its surprising insights into the emotional depths that make us most human—via 240 short pieces, at once lyrical and philosophical, on the color blue. This new edition celebrates Maggie... Read more

Ace of Spades

By: Faridah Àbíké-Íyímídé
Narrated by: Jeanette Illidge & Tapiwa Mugweni
Length: 13 hours 48 minutes

“This thriller (think Get Out) had me on the edge of my seat. Read more

I Have Some Questions for You

A Novel

By: Rebecca Makkai
Narrated by: Julia Whelan & JD Jackson
Length: 14 hours 3 minutes

“Rebecca Makkai is an expert story weaver. From minute 1, I was hyper-engrossed in her newest novel and it consumed every free moment I had for 48 hours. From it's quaint, cozy, and problematic boarding school campus to the world of podcasting, to an ever unraveling murder mystery, I Have Some Questions for You defies all expectations and keeps... Read more

Never Let Me Go

By: Kazuo Ishiguro
Narrated by: Rosalyn Landor
Length: 9 hours 40 minutes

“Ishiguro is a master at transporting readers viscerally into his settings, and this book is no exception. It's dreary and haunting, brooding and intimate, and the nonchalance with which he presents the biggest twist of the novel can be quite jarring on your first read. Read more

Babel

Or the Necessity of Violence: An Arcane History of The Oxford Translators' Revolution

By: R. F. Kuang
Narrated by: Chris Lew Kum Hoi & Billie Fulford-Brown
Length: 21 hours 45 minutes

“Finishing a book like this is equal parts pleasure and pain: pleasure in reading something so striking and beautiful juxtaposed by the pain of it ending. Few books have brought tears to my eyes; Kuang’s Babel is now numbered among them. Read more

The Bell Jar

By: Sylvia Plath
Narrated by: Maggie Gyllenhaal
Length: 7 hours 24 minutes

“You cannot deny that Sylvia Plath is one of the greatest writers to have lived. Ester Greenwood is the characterization of the writer. The fact that this book leaves us hanging at the end is very unsettling. Here is a woman who is less mentally/emotionally ill and more spiraling mentally because she is disenfranchised as a woman - this... Read more

Time Is a Mother

By: Ocean Vuong
Narrated by: Ocean Vuong
Length: 1 hour 43 minutes

“I was stunned by Vuong’s gorgeous prose and raw revelations. Time is a Mother was an intense experience. The audiobook is less that two hours, but I have spent days thinking about Vuong’s words. I highly recommend this incredible poetry collection. Read more

Couplets

A Love Story

By: Maggie Millner
Narrated by: Maggie Millner
Length: 1 hour 29 minutes

“A beautiful story of self-discovery and new love, told in rhyme. Maggie Millner performs this short audiobook with a spare, confessional, and self-questioning style that gives shape to the transformation of her self-identity. Read more

Inseparable

A Never-Before-Published Novel

By: Simone de Beauvoir
Narrated by: Julia Whelan & Gabra Zackman
Length: 3 hours 59 minutes

“This previously unpublished novel by French feminist and existential philosopher Simone de Beauvoir is an intimate examination of what is, for most of us, our first experience of love beyond family—that of close childhood friendship. This novel follows fictive versions of de Beauvoir and her childhood friend “Zaza” as they come of age and come... Read more

Emily Dickinson

Poems and Letters

By: Emily Dickinson
Narrated by: Alexandra O'Karma
Length: 2 hours 9 minutes

Emily Dickinson, born in 1830, was the granddaughter of the founder of Amherst College. Except for a few journeys when she was young, Emily lived the life of a recluse in her father's house, spending her days writing poems and letters. In 1862, she sent a few of her poems to a publisher. He replied that her work was too unusual, too different.... Read more

The Picture of Dorian Gray

By: Oscar Wilde
Narrated by: Simon Vance
Length: 7 hours 44 minutes

“Dorian sells his soul so that his portrait will age instead of him. He embarks on a hedonistic self-indulgent lifestyle as his portrait becomes hideously unrecognizable. This was assigned reading for me in the 11th grade and now has a permanent home on my favorite bookshelf. Read more

If We Were Villains

A Novel

By: M. L. Rio
Narrated by: Robert Petkoff
Length: 12 hours 49 minutes

“Each year, when Fall finally comes around, I find myself wanting to revisit this book. Seven thespians studying Shakespeare, a murder, and the dark academia genre that has become so very popular these days. What more could you ask for in a book? Read more

The Secret History: A Read with Jenna Pick

A Novel

By: Donna Tartt
Narrated by: Donna Tartt
Length: 22 hours 2 minutes

“Moody, tense, and perfect for autumn. The Secret History is rich in character, setting, and Donna Tartt's narration will have you hypnotized. One of my favorite audiobooks of all time! Read more

The Waves

By: Virginia Woolf
Narrated by: Julia Franklin
Length: 9 hours 3 minutes

Six children - Bernard, Susan, Rhoda, Neville, Jinny and Louis - meet in a garden close to the sea, their voices sounding over the constant echo of the waves that roll back and forth from the shore. The book follows them as they develop from childhood to maturity and follow different passions and ambitions; their voices are interspersed with... Read more

Possession

By: A.S. Byatt
Narrated by: Virginia Leishman
Length: 22 hours 18 minutes

Winner of England's Booker Prize and a literary sensation Possession is an exhilarating novel of wit and romance, at once an intellectual mystery and a triumphant love story. As a pair of young scholars research the lives of two Victorian poets, they uncover their letters, journals, and poems, and track their movements from London to Yorkshire... Read more