Jump to content
View in the app

A better way to browse. Learn more.

Surly Horns

A full-screen app on your home screen with push notifications, badges and more.

To install this app on iOS and iPadOS
  1. Tap the Share icon in Safari
  2. Scroll the menu and tap Add to Home Screen.
  3. Tap Add in the top-right corner.
To install this app on Android
  1. Tap the 3-dot menu (⋮) in the top-right corner of the browser.
  2. Tap Add to Home screen or Install app.
  3. Confirm by tapping Install.

Featured Replies

What are some books you listened to as an audio book that you liked better than reading it yourself?

I liked the new Thrawn book last year. The guy did a good job on all the voices and they included Star Wars sound effects. I'm looking forward to the sequel later this month. I wonder how LotR would be. I imagine the songs would sound much better than when I tried to sing it in my head.

I thought The Martian was set perfectly for an audio book and the reader did a great job.

2 hours ago, TKthunder2 said:

Ready Player One and Mistborn were great audio books

+1 for Ready Player One. I want Whil Wheaton to do more audiobooks.

The Magic 2.0 series. The reader does a magnificent job hitting the timing and pauses which really brings out the humor and wit. If you're just reading it you may miss or skip right over some of it.

the Dark Tower (series) was really great as an audio book.  I think the last one was done by a different reader, though. 

Same guy did Talisman and Dark House and i am sure a lot of other King books

1 hour ago, gyroprotagonist said:

the Dark Tower (series) was really great as an audio book.  I think the last one was done by a different reader, though. 

Same guy did Talisman and Dark House and i am sure a lot of other King books

The first guy did a great job (I think he did the first 5 books), the second guy sucked.

  • 3 weeks later...

Lonesome Dove was a great audiobook but it was long as hell.  Something like 36 hours.

  • 1 month later...

Barry Bostwick does a masterful job bringing Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas to life. By far Tom Robbins' best. A self-centered stockbroker gets desperate and horny. She runs into a most unusual character. About 18 hours of humor, folklore and history.

FWIW, local libraries can get most audio books for you for a pittance to listen to. Mine charges 50 cents or so.

Edited by Irish Wrist Watch

On 7/12/2018 at 7:24 AM, SimonBolivar said:

I thought The Martian was set perfectly for an audio book and the reader did a great job.

The Martian was excellent.

If you like police detective novels, Michael Connelly has some good ones. Make sure you go with Harry Bosch.

 

Aaronovitch has a couple of pretty good vampire stories, told with a lot of humor: Moon over Soho and Rivers of London come to mind.

  • 1 month later...

Grisham books are also good listens.  Michael Beck (from the 70s film "The Warriors") does a great job with the Southern accents in the Grisham novels.

Larry King's reading of "The Bible" is riveting. 

 

  • 6 years later...

Hail Mary - Andy Weir was great.  Demon Copperhead is really good so far too.

Red Rising was, eh...

 

I'm looking for a few more listens if anything else comes to mind..

The Expeditionary Force books would not be near as funny without the way the guy does the voice of Skippy.

Going back to the original post, I listened to the first Thrawn book (I think it was the first one) and the way the guy kept doing "Double Vision" made me nearly turn off the damn thing.  Not sure what was worse, the author writing that or the guy performing it.

On 7/12/2018 at 7:24 AM, SimonBolivar said:

I thought The Martian was set perfectly for an audio book and the reader did a great job.

Project Hail Mary is also phenomenal on audio. Waaaay better than the book. 

The book was very good.  The audiobook was fantastic.  The accents, enunciation, etc. helped differentiate the characters.
image.png.b77c12e1e603a936872e64e99141da25.png

When my kids were young we bought all of the Harry Potter books on CD.  Our kids loved the books but the audiobooks were awesome too.

James Lee Burke books featuring the semi-alky take no shit Cajun detective Dave Robicheaux, read by Will Patton, are superb.  His Scotch and smokes voice as Dav’s former NOLA PD partner Clete Purcel puts you right there in the mysterious Atchafalaya basin with the criminals and gators.

The early John Sandford “Prey” series books are also good.  Lucas Davenport and Virgil Flowers and an assortment of kooky Minneapolis/ St Paul LEO characters (think Lenny and Squiggy)  flesh out Sandford’s good stories. Sonewhat formulaic but really good listens.

Edited by Bama Llama
Hood Goid getting old is hard on the eyes

Steven Pacey knocks the Joe Abercrombie books (First Law Trilogy and its related works) out of the fucking park. 

I'll go the other direction, audiobooks where the narrator makes it worse.

1) Jefferson Mays on the Expanse and Capitve's War.  Some may like it, but the way he draws out certain words, the whole cadence, drives me nuts.  I largely still listened to the expanse but I nearly turned off The Mercy of Gods.  I'll be reading the next one.

2) Dick Hill - the Acacia trilogy.  I read somewhere one some list that this was a really great series, so I decided to give it a try.  I don't know where Hill is actually from, but he reads it in what seems like an over exaggerated attempt at a middle ages English accent.  It killed me.  Maybe I'll read the remaining two books, but I barely mnmade it through the first one.

3) Scott Brick - The Shannara Chronicles - dude just gets WAY too excited and over emphasizes things.  I enjoyed the first book, bit desipe having bought a couple of them, I haven't been able to listen to anymore.

 

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

Configure browser push notifications

Chrome (Android)
  1. Tap the lock icon next to the address bar.
  2. Tap Permissions → Notifications.
  3. Adjust your preference.
Chrome (Desktop)
  1. Click the padlock icon in the address bar.
  2. Select Site settings.
  3. Find Notifications and adjust your preference.