Sound Learning Audiobook Collection Lists & Samples, Now Expanded in 2018 Grades 9 through 12 Use this annotated list to guide your audiobook collection development for grades 9 through 12. Titles are divided into sections reflecting curriculum areas and a final section suggesting great listens for teens beyond their classroom studies. Click on the link for a performance sample and read a format-specific review from the AudioFile Magazine database. Note: The designation #OwnVoices is used for titles both written and performed by those with lived experiences of the cultures they reflect. English Language Arts The audiobooks in this section can support English Language Arts courses throughout the high school grades. All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr, read by Zach Appelman. Simon & Schuster, 2014 (16 hours) Anthony Doerr’s multi-award-winning historical novel is animated by Zach Appelman’s voice. This contemporary classic’s inclusion of one character’s blind world makes listening to it all the more affecting for readers who forego reading this one with their eyes. Also applicable to World War II curricula in World History, and to exploring description in Fine Arts classes. Beast by Donna Jo Napoli, read by Robert Ramirez. Recorded Books, 2000 (6.5 hours) Donna Jo Napoli’s ability to retell folk tales from around the world is evidenced in her Persian-flavored version of Beauty and the Beast. Robert Ramirez uses careful pacing to communicate the main character’s emotional life and to keep listeners attentive to each step of the action. Also helpful in theater- and forensics-based high school activities for its modeling of pacing in oral communication. Developed by Francisca Goldsmith and Sharon Grover for the Audio Publishers Association, 2018. 1 www.audiopub.org/sound-learning Bless Me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya, read by Robert Ramirez. Recorded Books, 2004 (11.25 hours) Rudolfo Anaya’s 20th century Latino classic receives an #OwnVoices reading by Robert Ramirez that brings listeners directly into its realistic Mexican-American world of the 1940’s, where American and pre-Christian cultures intersect in one family’s experiences. A necessary selection for Latino and Chicano studies where taught in high schools. Bone Gap by Laura Ruby, read by Dan Bittner. HarperAudio, 2015 (8.25 hours) Laura Ruby’s multi-award-winning novel, with its touch of magical realism, is performed by Dan Bittner in a host of character voices, including those of Midwestern brothers and the Polish woman who is kidnapped while boarding with them, a range of differently agedtownspeople, and the manipulative kidnapper. The Book of Unknown Americans by Cristina Henriquez, read by Christine Avila, Ozzie Rodriguez, Yareli Arizmendi, Gustavo Res, Gabriel Romero, Jesse Corti. Random House, 2014 (9.25 hours) A full cast of six voice actors, many contributing #OwnVoices authenticity to Cristina Henriquez award-winning novel, double the repertory construction of the narrative. Legal and illegal immigrants from an array of countries and Latino cultures weave together their Delaware neighborhood and listeners’ opportunity to recognize the diversity of their community. Dracula by Bram Stoker, read by Nick Sandys. Brilliance Publishing, 2017 (16 hours) Bram Stoker’s classic vampire novel is brought fully and frighteningly to life in Nick Sandys’s narration. Pacing and accents he deploys both serve to heighten the tension, while remaining true to the original’s hyperbole. Developed by Francisca Goldsmith and Sharon Grover for the Audio Publishers Association, 2018. 2 www.audiopub.org/sound-learning Frankenstein, or the Modern Prometheus by Mary Shelley, read by Simon Vance. Tantor Media, 2008 (8.5 hours) Mary Shelley’s tale of the monster and the doctor who created him is served up by narrator Simon Vance in a British accent, well suited to the book’s origins, and pacing that points up the author’s moral investment in her horror story. Great Expectations by Charles Dickens by Charles Dickens, read by Anton Lesser. Naxos AudioBooks, 2007 (19.25 hours) Narrator Anton Lesser helps contemporary teen listeners bridge their appreciation back to Charles Dickens’s world by blending traditional 19th century oral reading with more modern pacing and phrasing. Lord of the Flies by William Golding, read by the author. Listening Library, 2003 (6.5 hours) Nobel Laureate William Golding reads his own realistic novel of social constraints devolving into chaos and violence among a group of students alone on an island. The newscaster tones his performance puts to admirable effect offer another scaffold on which to build discussions of fiction’s capacity to reflect realism. Macbeth by William Shakespeare, performed by Alan Cumming. Simon & Schuster, 2012 (1.75 hours) William Shakespeare’s tragedy is presented as a one-man production in this recording. Alan Cumming, who plays every part in this reimagining of the story as set in a psychiatric hospital, helps listeners to understand the complexity of Macbeth and how Shakespeare made his tragic flaw worthy of archetype both on stage and in history’s treatment of politics. Theater departments may want to use this as exemplary of the power one-person drama productions can present. Developed by Francisca Goldsmith and Sharon Grover for the Audio Publishers Association, 2018. 3 www.audiopub.org/sound-learning Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka, translated by Richard Stokes, read by Martin Jarvis. Naxos AudioBooks, 2002 (1.25 hours) Franz Kafka’s parable of the man who woke up to realize he’d become a beetle, translated here by Richard Stokes, receives a lively narration from British actor Martin Jarvis. Jarvis reawakens the element of humor Kafka included and violin interludes in the recording further transport listeners away from preoccupation with other matters to sink into fully engaged listening. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde, read by Stephen Crossley. Recorded Books, 2011 (9 hours) Oscar Wilde’s morality tale receives a narration by Steven Crossley that makes helpful use of altering pace and tone as the central character ages from flamboyant youth through the terror he feels upon recognizing his loss of vitality. Hearing the author’s intentional repetition of a key line throughout the story’s progress can further aid teens in recognizing how refrains can be used effectively in prose as well as poetry. The Red Badge of Courage by Stephen Crane, read by Scott Brick. Listening Library, 2002 (5.5 hours) Narrator Scott Brick varies his pace as he moves through Stephen Crane’s Civil War novella from passages of reflection to the fierce pitch of battle. Brick also supplies appropriate accents and enunciates the slang of the time and place with ease, giving listeners greater access to entering the story nearly two centuries after its action. American history courses may find this helpful as well. The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson, read by Martin Jarvis. Blackstone Audio, 2010 (3 hours) Robert Louis Stevenson’s story of the two personas inhabiting one man arrives through Martin Jarvis’s performance with such details as the relevance of gossip and innuendo to the plot’s development available to contemporary listeners for better appreciation. Jarvis maintains a range of character intonations to differentiate among them and further unsettles listeners by increasing the volume of his reading at key and appropriate passages. Developed by Francisca Goldsmith and Sharon Grover for the Audio Publishers Association, 2018. 4 www.audiopub.org/sound-learning Sula by Toni Morrison, read by the author. Random House, 2007. (5.75 hours) Nobel Laureate Toni Morrison performs her own language-drenched and evocative novel about friendship and betrayal, small town secrets, race, class, and stories themselves as important to culture and personal affirmation. This is an #OwnVoices title. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee, read by Sissy Spacek. HarperAudio, 2014 (12.25 hours) Actress Sissy Spacek performs Harper Lee’s contemporary classic with its multiracial, class- conscious cast of characters locked in various battles of good and evil in the Jim Crow South in a voice well-suited to young Scout, from whose viewpoint the novel is written. From our original Sound Learning APA high school audiobook list. Treasure Island by Robert Louis Stevenson, read by Alfred Molina. Listening Library, 2007 (7 hours) Narrator Alfred Molina supports and expands on Robert Louis Stevenson’s rhythmic phrasings in his storyteller’s approach to the classic pirate novel. Personalities are clarified by the variety of intonations invested in the large cast of colorful characters. History and Social Studies The audiobooks on this part of the list augment and support high school level coursework in American history and government, world history, and areas of social science addressed in high school curricula. American Night: The Ballad of Juan Jose by Richard Montoya and Culture Clash. L.A. Theatre Works, 2014 (1.5 hours) Richard Montoya and the performance group Culture Clash wrote and acted for a listening audience the account of one immigrant’s nightmare as he tries to sleep before the big citizenship test. His dream is a parade of episodes from American history featuring the heavily accented voices of Theodore Roosevelt, Sacajawea, Bob Dylan, Jackie Robinson, Violet Pettus, Emmett Till, and Harry Bridges. Developed by Francisca Goldsmith and Sharon Grover for the Audio Publishers Association, 2018. 5 www.audiopub.org/sound-learning Astray by Emma Donoghue, read by Khristine Hvam, James Langton, Robert Petkoff, Suzanne Toren, and Dion Graham. Hachette Audio, 2012 (6.5 hours) Each member of a full cast reads the length of one or more short stories in a collection Emma Donoghue developed from old newspaper stories. Events include an attempt to hold Lincoln’s corpse for ransom, gold mining in the Klondike, and a slave who escapes with his mistress.