2011 Audiobook Challenge Wrap-up and 2012 Audiobook Challenge Sign-up

 This year I joined The 2011 Audio Book Challenge hosted by Teresa's Reading Corner.  My goal for the year was to listen to twelve audiobooks.  I met that goal and listened to a couple of extra for a total of fourteen audio books this for the year 2011.  The audiobooks I listened to were as follows:

1.  Rescue by Anita Shreve
2.  Cleopatra by Stacy Schiff

3.  An Object of Beauty by Steve Martin

4.  The Cinderella Deal by Jennifer Crusie
5.  Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen

6.  The Disappearing Spoon by Sam Kean

7.  Maybe This Time by Jennifer Crusie
8.  A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick
9.  The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

10.  Burnt Mountain by Anne Rivers Siddons

11.  Silver Girl by Elin Hilderbrand

12.  The Help by Kathryn Stockett
13.  The End of Normal by Stephanie Madoff Mack
14.  Matched by Ally Condie

I listened to a lot of fantastic audiobooks throughout 2011.  I wanted to pick out a clear favorite, but I enjoyed too many of them in different ways to pick one best audiobook.   I did love learning about the history of the legendary Cleopatra in Stacy Shiff's fantastic biography.  I also loved the light hearted romance in The Cinderella Deal by Jennifer Crusie.   The Madoff scandel was brought to life in the fictional account of a wronged wife in Silver Girl by Eline Hilderbrand, and in the painful, but beautiful memoir The End of Normal by Stephanie Madoff Mack.  I enjoyed starting a new trilogy with Matched by Ally Condie and I'm almost finished with listening to the second book in the series (Crossed) right now.  The Help was a wonderful audiobook.  I loved the actors who read the parts for each of the main charactesr and brought the story to life.  Juliet Stevenson is a marvelous actress and also a wonderful audiobook reader.  Her audiobook reading of Sense and Sensibility is not to be missed. 

What didn't I like?  While The Disappearing Spoon was fascinating subject matter, I think I would have much prefered to read the book rather than listening to it.  I needed a periodic table of elements at hand to go along with a lot of the stories.  Maybe This Time by Jennifer Crusie just didn't have the same magic for me as The Cinderella Deal did.  Burnt Mountain by Anne Rivers Siddons wanted to be a good audiobook, but abrupt changes in genre brought the book to a rather messy conclusion.

Seven of the audiobooks I listened to I check out from the Kewaunee Public Library, five I received as review copies from Hachette Audio, and two I received from Penguin Audio.  Thirteen of the audiobooks I listened to on CD, while one I listened to as a digital audiobook on my droid.  I really liked the digital audiobook experience and hope to check it out more this year.  Unfortunately, while my library does offer digital audio to check out, most of the books I look up have a VERY long waiting list.

I am joining the 2012 Audiobook Challenge once again hosted at Teresa's Reading Corner.  I am going to aim for 12 audiobooks again this year, which is the level "Going Steady."  It looks like it will be a fun challenge again this year with a few new and intriguing features.  I'm currently listening to Crossed by Ally Condie and A Christmas Homecoming by Anne Perry.  What are you listening to or planning to listen to this year?

The Help by Kathryn Stockett (audiobook)

I read The Help two years ago and loved it. It was one of my top ten reads for 2009. I was excited when my FLICKS Book and Movie Club picked this book for our December read. It was good to revisit a book I loved; although this time I decided to revisit it in a new format, audiobook. I had read several reviews that stated that this was an audiobook not to be missed.


It was a riveting audiobook. Read by Jenna Lamia, Bahni Turpin, Octavia Spencer, and Cassandra Campbell; each of the main characters (Skeeter, Minnie, and Aibileen) has their own distinctive voice and personality. I found myself listening to the audiobook everywhere I could to find out how the story would end. Listening to the audiobook seemed like listening to my favorite characters tell the story in their own words. I loved it. My only complaint was that the ending seemed rather abrupt, more so than when I read the novel. I was ready to listen to even more of the story!

My original review of the novel is located at this link. For a quick summary of the plot, this book takes place in racially charged Jackson, Mississippi during the early 1960’s. Aibileen is an African American woman that works for a young family and takes care of their daughter. She is troubled by the lack of love that Elizabeth displays towards her daughter, and also about the racially charged death of her own son. She gets to know one of Elizabeth’s friends, Skeeter, and together they work towards changing their world. Skeeter is a young white woman who is dissatisfied by her current life and expectations for a female during this era. She does not like how her friend Hilly treats the African American servants and wonders why the woman that raised her, Constantine disappeared right before she graduated from college. Aibileen and Skeeter start to work with different maids to put together their stories anonymously on what life is like as a maid in the segregated South. One of these maids is Minnie. Minnie tells it the way it is, which does not make her a popular maid, although her famous cooking skills make up for it. She tries to raise her kids and deal with an abusive husband, while also trying to keep a job.

The Help is a novel that adapts particularly well to the audiobook format. It is my twelfth audiobook for The Audiobook Challenge 2011 – I have made my goal for the year!

I have yet to see the movie The Help and will probably watch it whenever I can get a copy of the DVD from the library. Have any of you seen the movie? What did you think?

Audiobook Source – The Kewaunee Public Library

Laura’s Top Ten Books of 2009

I’m a little late getting to my annual list of favorite books of the year. My top ten books include books I read in the year 2009, but that weren’t necessarily published in 2009. I didn’t count books that I read again for at least a second time as I obviously love them, such as Wuthering Heights, Sense and Sensibility, Outlander, My Sister’s Keeper, Twilight, etc.

I read many good books in the year 2009 and was excited to join challenges for the first time, such as The Victorian Challenge , The Everything Austen Challenge, and The Classics Challenge. The books I picked for this list are books that I read, thought about, pondered, and have stayed with me through the year. (Also see my top picks for 2007 and 2008).

In no particular order, my top ten books of 2009:

1. Watchmen by Alan Moore & Dave Gibbons: This was my first graphic novel, and it was definitely a great first impression. Moore and Gibbon’s tale of an alternate world populated by super heroes was fascinating and thought provoking. The story, within a story “The Black Freighter” was also riveting and provided a great parallel to the story.

2. The Piano Teacher by Janice Y.K. Lee: The Piano Teacher was an unforgettable love story set in Hong Kong at the start of WWII. It was a painful story of what one sometimes has to do to survive.

3. The Help by Kathryn Stockett: The Help is a multi-faceted story, on one hand it is a great story about racism in the 1960’s south, but on the other hand, it is the story of a group of very strong women and their friendship. Overall, it is unforgettable.

4. Pride & Prejudice & Zombies by Jane Austen and Seth Grahame-Smith: I read many great Jane Austen spin-offs this year as part of the Everything Austen Challenge. PP&Z was my favorite though as it was a totally original concept that made me laugh out loud . . . a lot! Seth Grahame-Smith kept much of Austen’s original text, but changed just enough to create a great Zombie story. I like how Grahame-Smith was able to make a lot of inside jokes that Pride and Prejudice lovers would love as you read through the book. Now there are a lot of similar type spin-offs, but I’m not sure about them. For more serious spin-offs, I loved The Other Mr. Darcy by Monica Fairview and I think it is the best Pride and Prejudice sequel I have ever read.

5. An Echo in the Bone by Diana Gabaldon: I LOVE Diana Gabaldon. The only thing I don’t love is the long wait in between the books of her Outlander series. The long wait for An Echo in the Bone did not disappoint. It was a great novel and the only negative was that it had to end. The Outlander series is a fantastic historical fiction saga with great love, great characters, and great description. If you haven’t read the Outlander series, what are you waiting for?

6. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury: I finally read this classic for the first time and loved it. In beautiful prose, Bradbury wrote a great adventure story that includes the evils of banning books as well as the evils of being caught up too much in an electronic world.

7. The Bridge of San Luis Rey by Thornton Wilder: What is the meaning of random “Acts of God?” Are some people’s lives worth more than others? This beautiful and short book explores very deep themes. I loved it!

8. Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout: Olive is not a woman that I liked, but her story is unforgettable. My entire book club loved this book and all for different reasons. A series of short stories that all involve the character of Olive Kitteridge, this book was a very interesting study on perception.

9. True Compass by Edward M. Kennedy: Whatever your politics, Ted Kennedy lived a fascinating life. His candid biography was riveting and really brought history to life.

10. Say You’re One of Them by Uwem Akpan: I listened to the audiobook of Say You’re One of Them, and it was painful at times. It is hard to believe that such evil can still exist in the world. The stories did make you think about what it means to be human and what life is like outside of the United States.

And for a Bonus, a good light book for a good laugh, Bet Me by Jennifer Cruise.

What are your thoughts on these books? What favorite books did you have in 2009?

The Help by Kathryn Stockett

I read MANY good reviews of this novel from Entertainment Weekly to fellow reader’s blogs and beyond; but the concept of the novel kept me wary. The Help is a story written by a white woman about African American maids in the 1960’s in Mississippi . . .something seemed sacrilegious about this entire concept.

I was therefore surprised when I started to read this book and found that I couldn’t put it down. Aibileen is a black maid for a lower middle class white family. Her employer is a 22-year woman named Elizabeth who has two good friends; Hilly and Skeeter. Hilly wants to keep “coloreds” in their place, while Skeeter has other ideas. Aibileen’s sassy friend Minny has troubles keeping a job, although she is a great cook (I want to taste her Carmel cake!). She finds a job with a woman who has a secret of her own. Skeeter decides to write a book about domestics in the South with Aibileen and Minny’s help. This puts them all at great risk.

I can’t believe such a world existed . . . and that it was only 40 years ago!! How could people ever have been treated this way?

While this book was a disturbing look at racism, it was also a great story of a group of very strong women with very interesting self-stories. I really enjoyed this book and think it would perhaps make a good future book club pick!