Audible's True Crime Audiobook of the Year, 2022

Produced by Kevin Hart and Charlamagne Tha God’s SBH Productions, Finding Tamika doesn’t miss a beat, propelled by a musical track and many moving pieces. As the series explores the family dynamics that anchor Tamika Huston’s life, we learn that the otherwise bright and talented young woman felt darkness looming. Her relationship with her boyfriend deteriorates, she speaks of dying young—and then she goes missing. Actor and activist Erika Alexander guides the series with great passion. She is clearly invested in the fact there are too many missing Black and Brown women and too many people who don’t care. Finding Tamika gives voice to this ugly reality while suggesting a blueprint for families facing such a tragedy: Make so much noise that the media can’t ignore you, and don’t stop looking and suspecting until you find the body. —Yvonne D.

Listeners of a certain age will remember Go Ask Alice, the anonymous diary of a 15-year-old girl’s descent into drug addiction that became a runaway bestseller and infamous cautionary tale. While teenagers like me devoured the seemingly candid journey through ’60s counterculture, many parents and policymakers used the account to stir up a panic that went on to fuel the War on Drugs. With investigative flair, Rick Emerson reveals the truth—far from the found diary of a lost child, Go Ask Alice was the fictional work of a serial con artist and literary fraud whose shocking success exceeded her wildest ambitions. Narrator Gabra Zackman propels the scandal into a truly compulsive listen. Unlike its predecessor, Unmask Alice is a real trip. —Kat J.

Is this a true crime podcast? I kept asking myself that as I listened, and the answer is in the title: Maybe? Each episode introduces you to a young person―mostly, but not all, women―with a shocking story to tell about a toxic date or relationship that nearly went very, very wrong. Host Gabi Conti also brings in legal, psychological, and other experts to add authority and tactical guidance. For anyone who has been young and actively dating, it will summon truths and memories, and for those still in the game, it aims to gives listeners the tools and language to ward off toxic relationships before they get too deep. So, is it true crime? Sometimes, but it was also nostalgic, timely, and fascinating, and I could not stop listening. —Emily C.

DB Cooper. Jack the Ripper. Malaysia Airlines Flight 370. Of all the unsolved mysteries that persistently nag at the collective subconscious, is any as perplexing as the disappearance of an entire commercial aircraft, with 239 people on board, as recently as 2014? Even if you think you know the story of the strangest calamity in aviation history, this eight-episode podcast provides the most compelling account (and persuasive theory) to date, as told by former naval officer Peter Waring, a member of the search effort’s original team, and Australian journalist Jana Wendt. Winner of the Kennedy Award for Outstanding Podcast, Deepest Dive is a twisty, thrilling, and evidence-based investigation into what really happened to the fateful flight. —K.J.

This insightful yet disturbing audio documentary should be required listening for not only queer folks but all allies and those interested in hidden history. In this eye-opening journey, the listener is taken into the dark and true story of a secretive government operation based in an unassuming Australian town. Its single mission is to eradicate society’s “greatest menace”—homosexuality—with a secret prison designed specifically to incarcerate gay men. Emotional and gut-wrenching at times, this listen is also full of uplifting stories around strength and unapologetic authenticity. In addition to making our Best of the Year list, this brilliantly told piece of little-known queer history took home two awards at the 2022 New York Festivals Radio Awards. —Maddie A.

If you’ve spent any time around the true crime boom of recent years, you’ve heard of Paul Holes, the celebrity detective best known for breaking the 40-year cold case of California’s Golden State Killer. Now retired, Holes has used his investigative expertise, I’ll Be Gone in the Dark fame, and considerable charm to propel a successful second career as a storyteller with a string of hit podcasts under his belt—and now, this endearing memoir. Charismatic and self-effacing, Holes gets surprisingly vulnerable in his self-narrated story, and it suits him. Expect insider details of some shocking cases and a revealing look at the personal experiences and moral compass that guided Holes through a legendary career. —K.J.

It was the ultimate viral crime: Two 12-year-old girls brutally stabbed their classmate in a Wisconsin park, claiming they were under the influence of a meme—a tall, faceless character known as Slenderman. The incident ignited a panic about the effects of the internet on kids. Lost in the coverage was the fact that one of the perpetrators suffered from severe early-onset schizophrenia, a condition that worsened after the girls were swallowed up by a criminal justice system that allowed them to be tried as adults. With Slenderman, journalist Kathleen Hale gives the first full account of what really happened, a nuanced and deeply researched narrative that’s somehow even creepier than the headlines suggest. —K.J.

Few acts of mass violence have gripped the public consciousness quite like January 2012’s shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary, where 20 first-grade students and six teachers lost their lives. A decade later, Sandy Hook is not just synonymous with senseless death or a rallying call for gun reform but also with an insidious conspiracy built on the notion that the shooting—a horrific event that upended the lives of so many—never happened. In this excellent, exhaustive work of reporting, journalist Elizabeth Williamson untangles the dark web of falsehoods that persuaded so many, connecting this perpetuation of lies and the communities built upon them with a troubling wide-scale sociopolitical trend of endorsing misinformation. —Alanna M.

Lisa Nikolidakis opens her gutting memoir with a recollection of a phone call that changed her life—on the other end, her brother relays that their father, a violent man whose routine abuse had devastated her childhood, had been killed. When it becomes clear that he had not been the victim of murder but the perpetrator, having shot his girlfriend and daughter before taking his own life, Nikolidakis must contend with her past, confronting the brutality she herself had faced at his hands. The author’s voice shines here, a gentle hum unaffected by pretense, as she ruminates on the lasting impact of her upbringing, rising from a spiral of self-destruction to search for answers and reckon with the trauma of her past. —A.M.

Mix one part Educated and one part I’ll Be Gone in the Dark, and you might get something like With the Devil’s Help—though Neil Wooten’s memoir of poverty, mental illness, and murder is a totally singular story. Digging deep into his background in a poor white community of Northeast Alabama, where his family lived in a shack without running water or much in the way of electricity, Wooten was raised on stories of his grandpa, whose irascible temperament landed him in jail for murder—and ultimately, a daring escape facilitated by Wooten’s father. Read with captivating authenticity by Southern performer Traber Burns, Wooten’s yarn is up there with the best of them—heartbreak, humor, family secrets, and all. —K.J.