I used to loathe audio books, but then I had a baby.
Audio books have given me the ability to multi-task when my baby is sleeping whether it be cleaning, walking with a stroller, or playing mind numbing phone games while I relax for bed. Initially, I began listening to audio books from the library on a whim.
However, when my anxiety became particularly bad at night, I went through a phase where I would listen to really funny books so my brain wasn’t concocting up A, B, and C; I found by replacing my inner dialogue with something else, I could take a break for a while and it gave me a reprieve when I needed it. Books have always been my favorite escape and they haven’t let me down the last few months (in any format).
I’m a firm believer that it is important to invest in yourself, but especially as a mama when you’re needed to give to someone else so much of the day. Recently, when talking to friends it turns out everyone else is listening to audio books as well. Here are the last 20 audio books I’ve listened to recently.
20 audio books + what I thought
Inheritance: A Memoir of Genealogy, Paternity, and Love by Dani Shapiro
This is Dani’s memoir about learning a different paternity story because of her ancestry DNA test. Since I took my ancestry tests for paternity questions, I was really intrigued and found a lot of commonality with other parts of her story. I ended up listening to the audio book in less than 24 hours because the book was really compelling.
Bossypants by Tina Fey
Tina Fey is funny, but I don’t think I fully appreciated her memoir because I never watched 30 Rock and she’s more crass than my normal (I tried listening to Amy Poehler’s memoir, but stopped). I liked her thoughts on motherhood, careers as a female and being sassy about it, and her honeymoon story was really hilarious.
Becoming by Michelle Obama
This was a really long audio book and it took me longer than I’d like to admit to finish, however, I was really impressed with Michelle Obama’s memoir. Michelle leads you through her life growing up in Chicago during white flight, describes how labor unions impacted African American males in her family, and other dynamics that I honestly had never considered. Her stories about her father’s struggle with multiple sclerosis and adjusting to life at an ivy league school were touching. I had never heard of these aspects about her so I highlight them in this review, but I really loved learning about her family life and thoughts on motherhood (are you seeing a theme with what I’m gleaning from memoirs here lately?). I think regardless of your political affiliation, Michelle has had a really interesting life and she does a great job vulnerably sharing it.
The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett
This is a children’s book I’ve always wanted to read and I finally committed to it (I listened to it for free off of the LibriVox app). I felt like the book was slow, but I really enjoyed the ending and the overall message of the book.
Big Magic by Elizabeth Gilbert
I started listening to this when Evie was little, but then my checkout expired. I ended up picking it up from the library again a few months later. I really love Gilbert’s thoughts on creativity and I felt she really brought up some new ideas/ paradigms that I had never thought about it.
Cribsheet: A Data-Driven Guide to Better, More Relaxed Parenting, from Birth to Preschool by Emily Oster
I really loved this parenting book! Oster takes recent research and debunks myths and exaggerations about parenting in US culture. The book was research based, easy to listen to, and had a lot of really applicable things to apply in your own parenting. For example, the American Pediatric guidelines suggest having your child sleep in your room until they are a year old; however, SIDS research says the benefit of an infant sleeping in your room stops at 4 months of age. I enjoyed the studies she reviewed on vaccines as well. I would gladly listen to/read another book by Oster.
Everything Happens for a Reason: And Other Lies I’ve Loved by Kate Bowler
This is the memoir of Bowler, a school-trained theologian who studies prosperity gospel. She delves through her studies of what she finds and how she feels about it when she discovers she has stage four cancer. She talks about different hardships she has while reflecting on how it would change her view in God. I thought her novel was interesting, and I completed it, but there was a lot of thinking and less meat to the story (for me).
Stargirl by Jerry Spinelli
This was one I have read before and I wanted to try it again. It was a fast and upbeat read that always makes me reflect on how much you care about what other people think. I think the character Stargirl is really far fetched, honestly, but it doesn’t keep me from riding an emotional roller coaster with her.
Crazy Rich Asians by Kevin Kwan
The movie was funny… and it was actually better than the book. I was really turned off from the book. When I posted about it on instagram, several people said they agreed the book was better too. Also, the book is pretty crass.
Outer Order, Inner Calm by Gretchen Rubin
I haven’t read a book by Rubin in several years and this short one was great. I love listening to podcasts and one of my favorite ones in the past was about cleaning. I liked what Rubin had to say about clutter and how some clutter is past thinking and some is future thinking. Additionally, I loved what she had to say about how sometimes we keep some things around because we think of it as helping portray an image of us (I thought I needed to like crafting after we got married and I didn’t like it. I ended up donating my limited craft supplies when we moved to Virginia).
Scrappy Little Nobody by Anna Kendrick
Anna has had a pretty interesting life- I had no idea that she was a child actress on Broadway, but it totally makes since with her amazing singing voice. I loved hearing about her growing up experience, but I couldn’t really relate to her much after that. I’ve been on Kendrick’s twitter feed a few times and her book has a similar vein of humor. I finished the book, but it wasn’t really my cup of tea content wise.
Coyote Sunrise by Dan Gemeinhart
This was a very sweet and emotional book about a girl named Coyote. Coyote and her father live abroad a renovated school bus and travel the country following the passing of her mother and sisters. This book surprised me when I started crying, but there are some insanely touching and really sad parts. The content is family friendly and I would gladly recommend it to anyone that needs a great feel good novel.
The Dark Descent of Elizabeth Frankenstein by Kiersten White
I was gearing up for Halloween reading when I saw this and it DID NOT disappoint. I think it may be one of my favorites I’ve read in a long time. Frankstein has always been one of my favorite books and being able to hear back story and more plot development to add to that was amazing. I am definitely interested in reading more by this author.
The Path Made Clear: Discovering Your Life’s Direction and Purpose by Oprah
This book is a collection of interviews that Oprah did with many people on what their life purpose is and how they found it. I think the book would be inspiring to a wide variety of people and I found a lot of the sentiments touching, even if I don’t find the book life changing. However, the book was a quick listen and very uplifting.
Reading People: How Seeing the World through the Lens of Personality Changes Everything by Anne Bogel
I have followed Anne Bogel on social media for years! Listening to her book felt like listening to her podcast. She is warm, down to earth, and great at summarizing several personality tests in basic terms. The book is very rudimentary as far as personality test approaches, but I related to her in going back and forth about what I am in different systems and having to buckle down and really understand systems to go forward with them. This is a great read for anyone who loves all things personality tests.
The Good Neighbor : The Life and Work of Fred Rogers by Maxwell King
I have always been a huge fan of Fred Rogers, but I never actually knew much about his life beyond urban legends I see circulate on social media. I loved hearing about Rogers childhood and how his giving altruistic family helped shape him into the person he is. Rogers was a very sensitive child and man in a time where it wasn’t considered traditionally masculine. He studied at a music conservatory, wrote operas, and became a champion of children’s television and providing developmentally appropriate material. The novel discusses his being bullied as a child, briefly about him seeing a psychiatrist throughout his career for anxiety, and his rocky relationship with one of his sons at one point. There is a lot of behind the scenes about how the TV show he became famous actually came about; I’m really looking forward to the movie coming out soon played by Tom Hanks.
The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek by Kim Michele Richardson
This book is really unlike anything else I have ever read. The novel follows a woman named Bluet, who is a Kentucky blue, a person who by genetic coloring is raspberry in colored. Bluet becomes a depression-era library woman on horseback and delivers book in eastern Kentucky. Her father is a coal miner who is ill and marries her off as quickly as he can, but it leads to tragic results for Bluet (there is a short scene with assault in the beginning of the book and a few throughout the book too). This book was heartbreaking in because of how much Bluet was marginalized for being blue, but it follows her through her journey of also accepting her unusual coloring despite the challenges it brings her. While there are happy endings in the book, Richardson packs some tear jerking moments that don’t shy away from what depression-era Kentucky was like. I’d recommend this book, but I’d recommend reading a feel good book with it or after it.
The Husband’s Secret by Liane Moriarty
This is a popular author so I wanted to try her out, but I just had a hard time getting into the novel. The book connects three women back to a Catholic high school as it unravels a crime that happened in the community three decades earlier. I was able to piece together the mystery as it unfolded which meant I felt the story had great planning. The book definitely makes the reader think a lot about how people decide justice has been served or not.
All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr
This is probably one of my favorite World War II fiction novels I’ve ever read. I don’t really want to say much and risk giving the book away, but it was charming and a little hard to explain because there are so many plot lines and interesting characters. The book is centered in France while it is being occupied and the main character is a girl who is blind named Marie-Laure LeBlanc. Doerr does an excellent job at weaving a story around a central meeting point where characters have to decide who they really are, and what it means to them: will they accept what they’ve been told or forge a path of their own?
Talking as Fast as I Can by Lauren Grahm
I’ve been on a memoir kick here lately and since I loved Gilmore Girls as well as Parenthood, I decided I needed to listen to Lauren Grahm’s autobiography. Grahm is charming and I had no idea she was married to her costar from Parenthood. This is one of the most family friendly memories I’ve read and I’d recommend it to any person who is a fan of series she has been in. She does make the comment several times though: Gilmore Girls definitely ended on a note where it would be a great place to start up again.
