Kay

non-binary geek fantasy heaven!

Reviewed: 07-23-21 Listener received this title free

So, Foxfire in the Snow satisfies me on multiple fronts. First, the protagonist, Sorin, is neither male nor female ― and, despite their world being barely on the cusp of industrialization, it is quite enlightened about sexuality in some ways, but has no category for Sorin's place on the spectrum. Also, in a matrilineal society, Sorin's the putative heir to their mother's master-woodworker business concern, but (a) they're not a girl, dammit! and (b) they want to be an alchemist instead. This is just at the onset of the story, which includes an odyssey across a glacier with the love interest, queen's daughter (NOT princess) Magda, and a long-lost, hostile brother, in search of their missing mothers, and to solve the mystery of disappearing guild masters (which may spell the economic downfall of their country). Sound confusing? If so, that's my fault, not the story's, which is spelled out clearly and in rich detail, full of witches, alchemists, master crafters, magic and science juxtaposed, red herrings and twists ― combined to create a rich tapestry (or maybe parquet in this instance?) of plot and character, and with the bonus of a protagonist who models both courage and very human confusion as they come to terms with their identity internally and in the real world. *Such* a good YA story, but, like Harry Potter, great for us grownups, too.

Narrator Lynn Norris is splendid here. Her Sorin is a work of art, with all the ambivalent bravado and sometimes faltering nuance of adolescence (they're 17) balanced with strength, intelligence, wit and resourcefulness, so that their struggle to be understood and accepted as non-binary is seamlessly blended into the character as a whole ― as opposed to a discrete polemic on societal shortcomings. All Norris's characterizations are three-dimensional and fully distinct, her accents are deliciously intriguing (particularly those of Sorin's mother and the queen), and she carries us across ice, into forest, and through intricacies of plot and scientific concept with energy and elan.

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Meowy WOWIE!!!!!

Reviewed: 12-11-20

OK, cats and kittens: I was already a die-hard fan of Journi, her wack and witchy family, and the rollicking ride of magical melodrama that pervades Columbus, Ohio of all places. But now? This little Santa snack of a sleigh ride has landed me smack in the holiday spirit. (Spirits?) (Though, I do adjure thee, dear listener: it may not be ideal for the kiddies, mkay? Language; not a lot, but too much for tiny tots. Nefarious goings-on with St. Nick, no less. Like that.) Christmas is saved in the end (yeah, spoiler alert), so you get a satisfying cortisol rush with a happy (if lightly sardonic) ending.


Thanks to the comical, nay brilliant vocal stylings of the always mind-blowing ☆LYNN NORRIS☆, this Yuletide magic is delivered at appropriately breakneck speed with sparkly, tinselly (that's what I said) aplomb, with multiple characters and situations delivered to your elf ears in such a deft way that your wine will be extra-mulled, your tree super-piney, your Nat Cole ever so three-Kingly. It's an audio present to cut the sweet in them sugarplums. Ho-ho-hocus pocus to all!

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wise, witty, w/perfect piano interludes to match

Reviewed: 12-08-20

Mr. Trillin! Delectable as always, sir! And with interludes conceived and played by ☆Harry Huff☆ (AUDIBLE: take note! He's uncredited here, and deserves to have his scintillating partnership celebrated!) as a perfect foil to Trillion's always acerbic and astute observations, stories, and pronouncements, this is a deeply satisfying way to spend a few hours with a justly celebrated wit. Trillin's delivery is Gobi-dry, an inimitable combo of Midwestern reserve and NYC cynicism. I guarantee multiple snickers and at least one good snort every 10 minutes or so. (Beware of consuming beverages here, gentle listener. Be ever vigilant of your windpipe.) And as a bonus, try to name that tune in Harry Huff's brilliantly apropos variations, which add compact, lively and sophisticated punctuation to each piece.

Recorded before the interwebs were more than a gleam in Mr. Gore's eye, this audiobook will shower you with both timeless and era-particular vignettes to gladden the heart and sharpen the regard for this comic paragon.

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fierce fantasy!

Reviewed: 01-07-20

The Sage is the third book in the Witch's Ambitions trilogy, and it was worth the wait! As with any good series, the author has deepened character development with each book, even as she weaves the threads of several mysteries together to complete a rich and vibrant tapestry.

Technically, I suppose this trilogy would fall under the umbrella of YA fantasy, but thanks in large measure to the stunning voice work of ✫LYNNNORRIS✫, a favorite narrator who brings a wide-ranging cast of characters to vivid. three-dimensional life, I find that the series more than rose to a level worthy of grown-up attention and enjoyment. In short, if you relish a good fantasy yarn, this'll do the trick for you. Though The Sage could possibly stand on its own, I think you'll savor it much more if you start with the first two books (The Council and The Elemental Coven), which will surely enrich your experience of the last one. I'd heard the first two before I listened to The Sage, but I plan to go back and enjoy all three in quick succession, to get the biggest possible bang out of the series as a whole.

Without giving too much away, I'll just say that our young protagonist, Lilith, is a supremely gifted witch (though, for reasons I won't reveal here, her discovery of her powers comes later than most) with beautiful intentions, but a lot of childhood pain that makes her mistrustful both of her own judgment and of the people in her life. She's smart, she's angry, and she's deeply loyal and loving once you've gained her hard-won trust. These nuances are fully realized in Lynn Norris's splendid portrayal of this complicated girl, not to mention the people in her life — also wounded and flawed, also brave and kind — and those who wish harm to the Elemental Coven of which she's now a member. She and her friends and family are fighting for survival against the proverbial dark forces, who've left her increasingly unsure of what is real and true. But her coven's survival is in her hands, and she must come to terms with her past before she can lead them to safety and freedom.

So worth your time. And narrator Lynn Norris brings pacing, humor, pathos, and a vast capacity for characterization to the table, to keep you fully immersed to the last syllable.

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1 person found this helpful

No matter who you are, read this.

Reviewed: 09-20-19

"Raw" doesn't begin to encompass this book; though raw it surely is, it's also tender, rageful, nuanced, erudite, wide-awake aware, bringing you right into the life of this beautiful, lacerated, truthful man. Informed by a searing intelligence, born from rich and painful experience? —oh yeah. True, down to the last cell, as much as deep, ruthless, and finally compassionate introspection allows a brilliantly perceptive, hurting human constrained by inescapable subjectivity to be? —yep. A fathoms-deep dive into a world that no one who isn't native-born and raised as a black child of the South can possibly comprehend (though I have to believe that those who know the terrain will holler Yes! a hundred times before they're done), this is a once-in-a-generation gift to all of us, written and here delivered by a man with profound intellectual and literary (and, by the way, oral interpretive) gifts to bring to telling the pain of growing up young, gifted and black in Jackson, Mississippi, and carrying that experience into the larger world.

I am the clichéd liberal white woman, born in Mississippi in the late '50s, but then moved to Ireland at age four, where the only black people I even saw were Africans attending Trinity College in Dublin, till we moved to Tuscaloosa, Alabama when I was nine. I lived mostly in the South, mostly in Louisiana, till I took myself to New York City at age 20, where I lived for the next 28 years. Like the author, my mother went to Millsaps College, in her case when Eudora Welty was hovering around the edges before becoming a writer-in-residence several years later. —All to say that I both am and am not a Southerner, a provisional cardholder with an outsider's perspective. I complacently thought reading Wright, Baldwin, Hurston and Coates, and having long talks with black friends, hanging with them and their families, conferred a fairly deep and even immersive understanding of their life experience. Well, Ha.

One big takeaway for me was that, when listening with admiration to any given passionate, articulate black intellectual who could bring deep understanding to a social issue in this country, I could easily miss, hidden in plain sight, the serious-ass suffering behind those wise and illuminating observations and flawless presentation — suffering generated by the simple pervasive fact of growing up poor and black in this country. The brilliance, strength, and discipline essential to plow through that particular anguish in order to achieve stature in one's profession is beyond my powers to imagine. Or was, till I heard Laymon's words. And attaining professional fulfillment and a lifelong dedication to liberating one's people, as well as their oppressors, is only a small part of the opulence on offer here. How hard it is to penetrate the layers of lies encoded in one's DNA just to survive in the white world and to live with the hurt people in one's own — well, I don't know if even this great, great book can do more than indicate. Here, it's an act of purest love.

Laymon's gifts as a narrator were hugely important to my experience of his book. Don't get me wrong: HEAVY stands fully on its own, the words intrinsically empowered to convey its message. But this man is a freaking brilliant narrator. I felt blessed by his mordant, mellifluous voice, bringing emotional immediacy and intimacy to his work. I was grateful for the accent, the inflections, the music that infused his words and brought them to lucid life. His students are so damn lucky to experience the full measure of his presence.

Kiese Laymon is a genius. But infinitely more than that, he's a seeker, a seer, a man who has learned to bring *both* truth and compassion to his own experience. Which helps to clear some of the unconscious (and conscious) racist assumptions that litter *my* path, for sure, to bring pride and knowing to people of color, to enlarge any reader's world view through scrupulous particularity — that last being a hallmark of the greatest art, y'ask me.

HEAVY is a classic. For the ages. A mile marker for our evolution, if we're wise enough to evolve. I'd like to say, from my heart and mind and gut, thank you, Kiese Laymon. You're a life changer.

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Truly. Jaw-Droppingly. Awful.

Reviewed: 09-20-19

Can we return terrible audiobooks? This is simply, spectacularly, godawfully incompetent. Is it the performers' (and I use this word with total irony) first time behind a mic? If not, why hasn't someone gently suggested a career change? Accents are horrible. Inflections are wooden and just WRONG in the most basic ways. ("Blahblahblah [says the guy reader]," "Larry Added. [intones the girl reader, as though it were an independent, utterly unrelated declamation]." Again. And again. And yet again. (At least she's consistent.) And the writing is so flat that it cannot remotely withstand this laughably bad treatment.

Keep moving. Unless you're looking for something straight-up camp to laugh at. And even that novelty will wear off so damn quick. I tried to hang in for a while, but life's too short.

Can you give a negative rating? I'd go for minus five stars. Makes me mad to've spent perfectly good money on it. Where's your quality control, Audible?

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3 people found this helpful

don't you love a good back story?!

Reviewed: 07-02-19

Ain't these little prequel tidbits tasty?

If you're thinking about this title, chances are good you've read/heard Raven Thrall, the novel that took me humming down the Ceo San road. Once again narrated by the wonderful ☆LYNN NORRIS☆, this little gem fills us in on the origin story of Shira, the human-to-bear Ceo San whose daring exploits and juicy character made her anything but a sidekick in Raven Thrall. Now we learn what her parents, their friends, and her grandfather gave up to keep that precocious little bear cub/baby safe, so she could play a pivotal role in the liberation of the Ceo San 20 years later.

Just makes the stew that much richer! You'll be glad you went there, not least to get another taste of Lynn Norris's vocal gifts. Have fun!

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magical thrill-ride quickie!

Reviewed: 03-20-19

Did you listen to CRAZY CAT LADY? (If not, do yourself a solid.) That romp left me wanting more, and here it is: a prequel novella that introduces us to Journi, our indomitable and wisecracking goth (or goth-adjacent) soothsayer heroine making her way in a world full of magic since the Rise brought out magical talents, and beings, in eye-popping numbers and variety in her hometown of Columbus. Here, Journi's battling "Middling" (non-magical human) supremacists in a plot line that's hair-raisingly timely, redolent of our Charlottesville-tainted world but without direct political discourse. This is funny and hair-raising, sharp and scary (but not terribly so) — pretty much a PG-13 experience.

The delicious LYNN NORRIS reprises her narrator role in this series with unerring instincts for character and plot development, and razor-sharp comedic timing and inflection that always deliver and satisfy.

Get rrrrready to rrrrumble! (And giggle, and snort, and gasp). Enjoy!

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"

Reviewed: 12-24-18

So the always incredible vocal artist ☆LYNN NORRIS☆ has attained a new level of *wow* on this one. Varied, bang-on pacing (and timing on specific dialog that'll stop your heart, it's so good), characters absolutely mind-blowing in their exquisite, layered, discrete detail (check out the pivotal Black prisoner, cameos such as the postman, and the *villain*, to name a tiny handful), a dazzling array of vocal effects and dialects, emotional authenticity — it's the work of a mature master who knows her business, and gives you the enormously pleasurable gift of relaxation (you know you're gonna have a luxury ride with a crystal-clear view of the scenery) punctuated by defibrillator shocks to the system that are the hallmark of first-rate suspense. Deeply, deeply satisfying.

Author MacDonald has written an evocative piece (and, as a denizen of the Poconos, where the story's set, I should know) — atmospheric, with natural dialog, dimensional characters, and a pretty tight story line that feels plausible and, while it delivers on the shock value front, never feels contrived for the purpose of gratuitous violence or formulaic, cartoonish "*thwack!* *kaBOOM!*-type effects. Rooted in reality and believability, 's what I'm trying to say here.

A truly enjoyable listen. Recommended highly.

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haunting, harrowing, humanizing

Reviewed: 11-22-18

So, Nancy Springer has a gift for description. Not just of physical surroundings, though her capacity to convey the visual is put to fine use in this narrative. But also of ambience, of character/persona, and of mental/emotional state. Which the always able narrator ☆LYNN NORRIS☆ brings into sharp focus with her exceptional gifts of characterization and dialect. It's an intense story, not for listeners in a particularly vulnerable (much less raw) state. It addresses the terrible reality of the abuse of children by wholly unconscious parents, and the unspeakable result of that abuse is the hub of this tale. How a slightly bitter artist, an older woman who feels she's never reached her full potential, is shaken from an atheist world view, mild self-obsession, and artistic stagnation by the energetic residue of a horrifying event that took place in her home long ago, makes for an absorbing story with well drawn characters brought to vivid life through Lynn Norris's sublime vocal talents.

My fussy little Southern-born pedant has to point out, though, that Southerners do NOT use ''y'all'' in the singular. Not ever. We address single individuals as ''you,'' just as the rest of our English-speaking compadres do. And the overwhelming number of times various characters used ''y'all'' in second person singular made me nuts. That's the kind of research that any self-respecting writer should do, and confirm, as a bare-bones (forgive the expression in this context) exercise. If you ain't from the parts you've set your book in, make damn sure you get the conversational usage right, at a bare minimum.

That said, this is a moving mystery, with complex interrelationships that make for compelling listening - though the Floridian characters were by and large less layered (bordering on stereotypes) than their Northern counterparts. Disappointing, but the book is still well worth the listen, not least because Lynn Norris always brings emotional intelligence, precision, and excitement to her work.

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2 people found this helpful