E.R. Fightmaster’s performance is an example of the unique magic that happens when a great narrator is paired with the perfect book. Host Jo Reed and AudioFile contributor Kendra Winchester discuss Cory McCarthy’s young adult novel chronicling a nonbinary athlete’s coming of age. River McIntyre spends every spare moment practicing for the swim team as a means to escape their internal struggle with gender identity — but when they meet and fall in love with another nonbinary teen, they begin to imagine a better future for themself. Fightmaster expertly captures River’s intense internal conflict with their gender and queer identity, voicing the complex emotional depth of River’s experience.
Read the full review of the audiobook on AudioFile’s website. Published by Listening Library.
Find more audiobook recommendations at audiofilemagazine.com
Listen to AudioFile’s fourth season of Audiobook Break, featuring the Japanese American Civil Liberties Collection.
Support for AudioFile’s Behind the Mic comes from Naxos AudioBooks. This week is Banned Books Week. Controversial for its depiction of adultery and redemption, Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter has been challenged as recently as 1977. It is one of the great classics of American literature. Set in the harsh Puritan environment of 17th-century Boston, it describes the plight of Hester Prynne, an independent-minded woman who stands alone against society. Having given birth to a child after an illicit affair, she refuses to name the father and is forced to wear the letter ‘A’, for Adulteress, embroidered on her dress. Listen to Adam Sims’s Earphones Award-winning performance.
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