Alcatraz Versus The Evil Librarians [Dramatized Adaptation]

Alcatraz, Book 1

By: Brandon Sanderson

Narrated by: Alejandro Ruiz, Chris Genebach, Carolyn Kashner, Zeke Alton, Marni Penning, Bradley Smith, Richard Rohan, Peter Holdway, David Jourdan, Colleen Delany, James Lewis, Michael John Casey, Scott McCormick, Chris Stinson, full cast

Length: 5 hrs and 34 mins

Publisher's summary

Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians is the first adventure in a fantasy series for all ages by the number one New York Times best-selling author Brandon Sanderson.

On his 13th birthday, foster child Alcatraz Smedry gets a bag of sand in the mail - his only inheritance from his father and mother. He soon learns that this is no ordinary bag of sand. It is quickly stolen by the cult of evil Librarians who are taking over the world by spreading misinformation and suppressing truth. Alcatraz must stop them, using the only weapon he has: an incredible talent for breaking things.

Performed by Alejandro Ruiz, Chris Genebach, Carolyn Kashner, Zeke Alton, Marni Penning, Bradley Smith, Richard Rohan, Peter Holdway, David Jourdan, Colleen Delany, James Lewis, Michael John Casey, Scott McCormick, Chris Stinson, Ken Jackson, Sasha Olinick, Terence Aselford.

©2007 Dragonsteel Entertainment, LLC (P)2017 Graphic Audio, LLC

Lots of fun and my kids love it.

Alcatraz is silly and fun. The splashes of reference to sanderson's other works are fun to listen for.

Converted a tiny skeptic!

We've tried over and over again to have a book that the entire family (9/7/4) could listen to, and never succeeded. Ad soon as we started this, the entire family couldn't stop. It's funny, fast paced, and packed full of graphic audio goodness. An easy choice for all readers, Sanderson fans or not.

Creative, Fun, and quirky

This was my first dramatized audio book. It took some time for me to get used to the format, but it made for fun listen. As for the story, it is creative, fun, and quirky. I especially enjoyed the tangents Alcatraz goes on periodically through out the narrative. The story comes off typical for the genre, but Sanderson knows just how to spice things up to keep the story interesting even for an adult reader.

Also, Rutabaga.

The best!!!!

I absolutely love these books!!!!!🥰 They make you feel as though you are part of the book and include you in the book. Just as a suggestion if you do listen to these books, wearing headphones makes it even better because you can hear every little background noise.

Breaking the Fourth Wall

The main character talks to the reader as often as he talks to other characters.

Credits ugh

Why are they at the beginning they belong at the end when you won’t miss anything if you skip them ugh why whyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!

Great story, teaches along the way too

My kids loved this book! They loved the story, I loved what it taught them.

Enjoyable, despite worries

Getting an audio version of this book has been a pain, actually. And I was worried when I got the audio cast version because my experience with audio books that have character voices has not been good. So, I was pleasantly surprised by the performances which were perfectly melodramatic, giving the whole thing a fun made-for-radio feel. Plus, I liked the story a lot. Sanderson does YA very well; he avoids some of his worst tropes and the stories are always snappy, with good lessons that he doesn’t feel the need to drive home like other YA books. Also, unlike other books of his, this one actually made me laugh out loud. All-in-all, I’m really pleased and looking forward to hearing the rest of these.

Greatest book EVER!

Brandon Sanderson is one of my mom and dad’s favorite authors, and I can see why! I absolutely LOVE Alcatraz’s snark, kinda reminds me of my CARROT weather app. The voice cast is amazing, can’t believe that they got Scott McCormick to voice a character (he wrote the Rivals series, as well as some similar audiobooks). My favorite characters are Alcatraz and Bastille!

Masterwork

This work is superior in its quality on all fronts. I expected brilliance coupling the grand master writer Brandon Sanderson with a team of master narrators, yet this production emerged into something far greater then my expectations. I can not wait to listen to the rest of the series.

The writing is both free and sublime in structure. Bending cliches into humorous plot twists that mess with the readers head in a way previous writers have only attempted and failed at. It is truly the first time I have seen meta writing shine. I blame Sanderson's quirky sense of humor for making this taboo work.

The narrators are top notch. Their voices both interesting and well trained. To say the characters are distinct would be a severe understatement. They litteraly all have their own voice actor. The most amazing thing about this is that they are all solid professionals who understand things like inflection, tone, tèmbre, annunciations and accents. The stage play like format used makes the story come alive in a way no other team of narrators has done so far. Well not as well anyway. I enjoyed not having to listen to all the "she says" and he said" additives that are often so superfluous when using character voices in narration. It made the story flow in a much more actionable way.

Special mention for the music and sound effects. I have seen these aspects ruin an otherwise well produced piece often enough. No such violation here. These people went for tried and tested musical themes and instruments. No awkward experiments. My ears recognised what the music was trying to add to the scene without effort or distraction. Let that be a lesson: it is not about you, effect abd music people, you are in service to tge scene! Props to this team of sound engineers.
The volume was adequate. A bit much in the higher pitch which made the sound effects and certain instruments somewhat sharp here and there but adjusting the volume down just a bit took care of that. I think the music and effects might have been mastered more for heavier speakers then in ear headphones. Something to look into perhaps.

Have I said Brandon Sanderson is a grand master?
May you live long and bring us plenty more of what is still floating around in that beautiful brain of yours. And thank you for this work.