Audiobook Thoughts

The Prey by Linda Howard

Thirty-two-year-old Angie Powell has always spoken her mind, but in the presence of Dare Callahan she nurses a simmering rage. Three years ago, Dare returned home to rural Montana and opened a hunting business to rival Angie’s own, forcing her to close up shop. The infuriatingly attractive Iraq war vet even had the nerve to ask Angie out, not once but twice. Before Angie leaves town, she organizes one last trip into the wilderness with a client. But the adrenaline-fueled adventure turns deadly when Angie witnesses a cold-blooded murder and finds herself on the wrong side of a gun. Then a bear comes crashing through the woods—changing the dark game completely. Luckily, Dare is camping nearby and comes to her aid. Forced together for survival, Angie and Dare must confront hard feelings, a blinding storm, and a growing attraction—while a desperate killer and a ferocious five-hundred-pound beast stalk their prey.

The bear almost overshadowed Angie and Dare.  The suspense ramps up (finally) when Angie takes her last group on a guided hunt for bear. The narrator (Abby Craden) did a fine job with the action.

2 Bears

The Garden Intrigue by Lauren Willig

As Napoleon pursues his plans for the invasion of England, English operative Augustus Whittlesby gets wind of a top secret device, to be demonstrated over the course of a house party at Malmaison. The catch? The only way in is to join forces with that annoying American socialite, Emma Morris Delagardie, who has been commissioned to write a masque for the weekend’s entertainment. Even so, it should leave plenty of alone time with Augustus’ colleague (and goddess), Jane Wooliston, who has been tapped to play the heroine. Or so Augustus tells himself. In this complicated masque within a masque, nothing seems to go quite as scripted… especially Emma

One of my favorite series! This one is full of drama, poetry, humor and a little intrigue. Eloise and Augustus are I am anxious to see what happens to Eloise and Colin (in the present), as her time in England has come to an end, in the next installment! Fantastically read by Kate Reading.

3 Bears

The Invisible Ones by Stef Penny

Small-time private investigator Ray Lovell veers between paralysis and delirium in a hospital bed. But before the accident that landed him there, he'd been hired to find Rose Janko, the wife of a charismatic son of a traveling Gypsy family, who went missing seven years earlier.

Half Romany himself, Ray is well aware that he's been chosen more for his blood than his investigative skills. Still, he's surprised by the intense hostility he encounters from the Jankos, who haven't had an easy past. Touched by tragedy, they're either cursed or hiding a terrible secret-whose discovery Ray can't help suspecting is connected to Rose's disappearance. . . .

Dan Stevens does an awesome job narrating the two POVs (Ray and JJ).  I was totally absorbed in Ray's investigation of the missing, and in the mystery of the Janko family.  I was totally surprised by the revelation at the end of the book. 

4 Bears

The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach

At Westish College, a small school on the shore of Lake Michigan, baseball star Henry Skrimshander seems destined for big league stardom. But when a routine throw goes disastrously off course, the fates of five people are upended.

Henry's fight against self-doubt threatens to ruin his future. College president Guert Affenlight, a longtime bachelor, has fallen unexpectedly and helplessly in love. Owen Dunne, Henry's gay roommate and teammate, becomes caught up in a dangerous affair. Mike Schwartz, the Harpooners' team captain and Henry's best friend, realizes he has guided Henry's career at the expense of his own. And Pella Affenlight, Guert's daughter, returns to Westish after escaping an ill-fated marriage, determined to start a new life.

As the season counts down to its climactic final game, these five are forced to confront their deepest hopes, anxieties, and secrets. In the process they forge new bonds, and help one another find their true paths.

This story of family, friends, relationships, love and loss centers around college baseball, but it is much more than a baseball story.  You get so caught up with the characters and their lives. It is humorous, touching with a little heartbreak an over all brilliant debut.  Narrated superbly by Holter Graham

4 Bears