What are we listening to? (audiobooks)

[ApK]

Originally Posted by Tarana

Oh, and gotta tell you guys about something so exciting. I went into Miracle Ear for my hearing aid checkup and they upgraded my hearing aid for free! Now I can listen to audiobooks directly from my Iphone app into the hearing aid via bluetooth!!So much nicer when I'm out and about. I have the cheapest from the top-of-the-line.

This is bordering on bionic cyborg tech. Hook up a laser mic, and you pretty much have super powers.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by Tarana

Finished I Shall Wear Midnight by Terry Pratchett and started Snuff, which is also in the same series. Both are narrated by Stephen Briggs. As usual, wonderful performance and great and funny books! I also finished The Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle and narrated by Paul Hecht. All I can say is that it made a better movie and I'm glad I got it from the library and didn't buy it. The arrogance of some of these guys almost made me quit the book. Obviously, he was trying to portray characters, but geeze. Maybe it's the writing style - I've never been a big fan of Sherlock Holmes books but I always assumed it was the drug references that turned me off.

Oh, and gotta tell you guys about something so exciting. I went into Miracle Ear for my hearing aid checkup and they upgraded my hearing aid for free! Now I can listen to audiobooks directly from my Iphone app into the hearing aid via bluetooth!!So much nicer when I'm out and about. I have the cheapest from the top-of-the-line.

That was pretty much the Victorian mindset. You see it in Kipling as well. I read a lot of books from the turn of the century to the 20's or so. I find that I have to kind of flip a switch in my head when I read those type of books. They are definitely jarring viewed through the lens of in this more cynical, PC world.

Oddly enough, I just finished reading Space Cadet, one of Robert Heinlein's juvies from 1948. Let's just say that we don't quite have the faith in men of science that they did back then and certainly word word sexist comes to mind. It was just a different time.

Wonderful about your hearing aid. Congratulations!

[SeaBookGuy]

Julia Whalen is doing a terrific job reading Ottessa Moshfegh's My Year of Rest and Relaxation, which involves a brat scoring downers off her shady shrink to get through life. Great satire!

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by SeaBookGuy

Julia Whalen is doing a terrific job reading Ottessa Moshfegh's My Year of Rest and Relaxation, which involves a brat scoring downers off her shady shrink to get through life. Great satire!

Did you read Moshfegh's Eileen? I thought that had a pretty high ick factor, and I'm wondering if My Year of Rest and Relaxation is less gross.

[SeaBookGuy]

Originally Posted by Catlady

Did you read Moshfegh's Eileen? I thought that had a pretty high ick factor, and I'm wondering if My Year of Rest and Relaxation is less gross.

No, but in another form when I mentioned that the characters here can be quite unlikable, a poster responded he felt that way about Eileen. Not so much gross, although the rare explicit sex discussions I skimmed through and I'm no prude, but that the main character is basically a lazy brat, and her shrink is more of a mess than she is. I'm enjoying the satirical aspects of the story.

Put it this way - not sorry I dropped an Audible credit on it.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by SeaBookGuy

No, but in another form when I mentioned that the characters here can be quite unlikable, a poster responded he felt that way about Eileen. Not so much gross, although the rare explicit sex discussions I skimmed through and I'm no prude, but that the main character is basically a lazy brat, and her shrink is more of a mess than she is. I'm enjoying the satirical aspects of the story.

Put it this way - not sorry I dropped an Audible credit on it.

It wasn't sex that put me off Eileen--offhand, I don't remember any sex scenes at all--but gross descriptions in general, and an emphasis on ugliness in everything. The interesting parts and good writing were smothered in all the muck.

[SeaBookGuy]

I'm trying to think of what would be "gross" in the book? The gal lets herself and her apartment go, so that both can appear "squalid" at times I suppose; similarly, her quack of a shrink has issues with her office and personal appearance as well. All that is more sad than yucky to me though. It's becoming scary as she doesn't so much sleep, but black out more than a day at a time, waking up to evidence of having been out of the house interacting consciously with others, no memory of it at all.

[Catlady]

Originally Posted by SeaBookGuy

I'm trying to think of what would be "gross" in the book? The gal lets herself and her apartment go, so that both can appear "squalid" at times I suppose; similarly, her quack of a shrink has issues with her office and personal appearance as well. All that is more sad than yucky to me though. It's becoming scary as she doesn't so much sleep, but black out more than a day at a time, waking up to evidence of having been out of the house interacting consciously with others, no memory of it at all.

I looked upthread and found my brief comments on Eileen when I first read it:

Eileen, by Ottessa Moshfegh.
A miserable young woman trapped in a miserable life, Eileen latches on to a new female counselor at a juvenile detention center where they both work, back in the 1960s. Weird as hell; I picked it because the blurbs referenced Hitchcock and Shirley Jackson--but no. I finally decided there was no deep meaning or attempt at real suspense here; Eileen was nothing more than a jumble of disgusting character traits and the story lacked believability.

[Paperbackstash]

I'm listening to the Terror by Dan Simmons on Audible and the narrator is excellent so far. On Chapter 7. It's a long one.

I'm listening to Perry Mason's The Case of the Girl with the Lucky Legs on Scribd. Those are enjoyable, narrator is great and fun stories.

[Tarana]

Originally Posted by Paperbackstash

I'm listening to Perry Mason's The Case of the Girl with the Lucky Legs on Scribd. Those are enjoyable, narrator is great and fun stories.

Are these read from books? I didn't know there were Perry Mason books. I have the tv series and the old radio series - my late SIL and I had literally nothing else in common except my brother and Perry Mason.

[pwalker8]

Originally Posted by Tarana

Are these read from books? I didn't know there were Perry Mason books. I have the tv series and the old radio series - my late SIL and I had literally nothing else in common except my brother and Perry Mason.

Perry Mason was originally a books series by Erle Stanley Gardner. The series is 3rd in number of books sold (300 million) behind Goosebumps and Harry Potter. I read a number of them quite a few years ago, I think I got the books from an uncle. I have no idea what I did with them.

Gardner was actually a trial lawyer originally. The books are from the 30's, 40's and 50's. I think there were as many as 80. They were originally mostly published in pulp magazines if I remember correctly.

[Apache]

Erle Stanley Gardner was the best selling American Author of the 20th Century when he died in 1970.
Also Gardner devoted thousands of hours to "The Court of Last Resort", in collaboration with his many friends in the forensic, legal, and investigative communities. The project sought to review, and when appropriate, reverse miscarriages of justice against criminal defendants who had been convicted because of poor legal representation, abuse, misinterpretation of forensic evidence, or careless or malicious actions of police or prosecutors. The resulting 1952 book earned Gardner his only Edgar Award, in the Best Fact Crime category, and was later made into a TV series, The Court of Last Resort.

Apache

[CRussel]

@Apache: Thanks for that. I'd both watched the original TV series, and read many of the books in my youth, but knew little about the author.

I've just abandoned Laurie R. King's The Bones of Paris, her second Stuyvesant and Gray mystery. Nothing wrong with the narrator (Jefferson Mays), but I really was not enjoying the story or where it was going. WAY too dark for me. I enjoy her Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes books, and even her Kate Martinelli, but I'll be giving this series a pass from now on.

Next up? I think a re-listen to Neogenesis by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller (read by Eileen Stevens) to get ready for the release of Accepting the Lance, while I continue with Payment in Blood, the second in Elizabeth George's Inspector Lynley series.

[Tarana]

Thanks Apache and PWalker8. I had no idea about the books. Can't understand how I missed them. I really only started reading this genre 15 years ago, but still - never came across a single book! Thanks so much!

I finished Snuff by Terry Pratchett. Wonderful book that deals with some serious issues. Two books left in the official series plus a novella. Currently listening to Unfettered (fantasy anthology) edited by Sean Speakman and narrated by a variety of narrators. I'm lukewarm on the first 3 stories so far.

[Apache]

In the early Perry Mason books Mason was very hardboiled and not above breaking the law. Gardner toned him down in later books. The first book didn't even have a court room scene.
Apache