audiobook Archives - Tim Porter's Second DraftTim Porter's Second Draft

Approaching the midpoint of a year in books best described as “meh” – a result of my own poor selection and persistent intrusion into my quiet hours by the noise of the real world – I can say as a positive note that more than a few of the most satisfying titles thus far are audiobooks.

The four novels below have one thing: a stellar reader whose rhythm, accent, and overall transformation of the written word into literary performance is as soothing as it is captivating.

They are:

* Hang on St. Christopher, Adrian McKinty, the eighth of the Sean Duffy detective novels. Narrated, as were the previous seven, by Gerard Doyle, a true master of Irish nuance.

* The Road, Cormac McCarthy, the father-son tale of dystopic bleakness. Narrated by the late Tom Stechschulte, who delivers each of McCarthy’s precisely chosen words as a savory morsel. A delicious experience.

* The New Iberia Blues, James Lee Burke, part of the series about Louisiana detective Dave Robicheaux. As always with Burke, the story packs punch, but the narration by actor Will Patton (one of my favorite readers) elevates the prose to theater.

* The Stars at Noon, Denis Johnson, the story of a young woman adrift in Nicaragua during the Sandinista rebellion. Narrated again by Patton, his hypnotic almost comforting manner provides antidote to the angst, danger, and dissoluteness that defines the story. `,

This is a short observation about reading vs. listening:

When I first read “Between the World and Me” three years ago (a bit late to the game), its unblinking directness astounded me and my truculent ignorance ashamed me. I wrote:

“There are sounds in life so distinct and universal they cannot be mistaken for anything else – the tumble and hiss of heavy surf onto sand, the guttural reverb of distant thunder, the ominous hustle of night winds through tall trees.

“To these voices of the world I would add that of Ta-Nehisi Coates, who speaks through the pages of this epistolary essay about blackness and whiteness in America with such honesty and authenticity that from now on I will measure the veracity of all other literary voices against his.”

Just the other day, I listened to Coates’s narration of the book and found it to be even more profound. His voice, eloquent, educated, but still inflected by the streets of West Baltimore, amplifies the wisdom, truth and necessity of his written words. Heard aloud, their poetry flourishes even further, as does their urgency.

If you have not read Between the World and Me, I urge you to do so. If you have read it, I suggest you also listen to it.

(Original review)

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