Ep. 5: Summer Preview: The Best of the Upcoming Season

Gems across all genres are coming soon to headphones near you. Hear from our editors on the listens that you need to be keeping an eye on.

A Higher Loyalty by James Comey

Shitshow by Charlie LeDuff

The World As It Is by Ben Rhodes

The Restless Wave by John McCain and Mark Salter

Not That Bad by Roxane Gay

Yes We (Still) Can by Dan Pfeiffer

The President is Missing by Bill Clinton and James Patterson

Grant by Ron Chernow

The Final Empire by Brandon Sanderson

Red Rising by Pierce Brown

The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

Legendary by Stephanie Garber

From Twinkle, with Love by Sandhya Menon

War Storm by Victoria Aveyard

Neverworld Wake by Marisha Pessi

Baby Teeth by Zoje Stage

The Perfect Mother by Aimee Molloy

That Kind of Mother by Rumaan Alam

Barracoon by Christina Dalcher

The Outsider by Stephen King

Vox by Christina Dalcher

When Life Gives You Lululemons by Lauren Weisberger

Pops by Michael Chabon

From the Corner of the Oval by Beck Dorey-Stein

Tragedy Plus Time by Adam Cayton-Holland

Chesapeake Requiem by Earl Swift

Strange Case of Dr. Couney by Dawn Raffel

The Briefing by Sean Spicer

©2018 Audible Originals, LLC (P)2018 Audible Originals, LLC

Episode 5

I’m really excited to try a few of the books on this list! They sound so good!

Audicted!

Every time an episode of Audicted is released, I listen to it immediately. I love this podcast. I love hearing what is upcoming in the way of audiobooks because I love them so much, and I also think it has a little bit to do with how I think it must be very cool to be an editor at Audible.

This episode adds a male editor to the group, Kyle. Kyle has a ton of information on the upcoming season's political titles. There are apparently a bunch of them coming in and while I really never listen to nonfiction titles from Audible, the Editors have made them all sound interesting in this podcast. (If only there were enough credits, right?) Of them all, I loved listening to the discussion about James Comey's A Higher Loyalty most. For other listeners that enjoy nonfiction reads, particularly about politics, this episode will be a real treat.

At the end of this episode, a listening party is announced for the next episode and it sounds great. The selection that has been chosen is fairly high on my to-be-read list of books and audiobooks, so I'm hoping to be able to get to it before the next episode becomes available. I like listening to the Editors talk about books that I haven't read, but I particularly love it when I have listened so I can agree/disagree with their comments and observations.

And as always, all of the audiobooks and narrators discussed in this episode can be found at https://www.audible.com/Audicted so there is no need to try to write down everything that is being discussed in real time.

Tweaking the Formula

Story: 4-Stars
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I appreciated the inclusion of the political specialist 'Millennial Kyle.' One of the shortcomings I have felt with the show to date is the somewhat limited genre perspectives. Hopefully, this is a sign of more to come.

The is the second 'looking forward' episode, and I feel the content here is better than the first - there seems to be much more known about the covered titles this time around, with the hosts depending less on purely speculative information from publisher visits.

I'm not sure if it was planned, but the brief aside covering audio speed was really beneficial. I was aware of the feature, but didn't realize its ubiquitous use. I will have fun experimenting with it.

Performance: 3-Stars
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The opening vignette (the coffee machine) was a great way to get started, and it appears the show's intro/outro has received a musical change. Two thumbs up for these innovative tweaks. I hope they stick around.

From a technical perspective, there is a long period during one of Kyle's speaking portions where the distinct sound of heavy breathing somewhat detracts from the experience.

I like this series, BUT...

there are many mystery/thrillers from established authors coming out this summer and only one is mentioned.

My other comment concerns the brief discussion of listening speed. I have an Audible library of more than 2200 books and I listen to all at increased speed, mostly 2X but sometimes 2.5X. As a southerner I do not care for a comment made by one of the Audible editors suggesting that those from the south likely have to listen at slower speeds.