Literary Fiction Audiobooks | Literature

"Winner of the 2023 Nobel Prize in Literature One of Jon Fosse’s most acclaimed novels, Boathouse is told from the perspective of an unnamed narrator leading a largely hermit-like existence until he unexpectedly encounters a long-lost childhood friend and his wife. Told partially in a stream-of-consciousness style and with an atmosphere reminiscent of a gripping crime novel, Boathouse slowly unravels the story of a love triangle leading to jealousy, betrayal, and eventually death."

Jon Fosse (Author), Kåre Conradi (Narrator)

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Aliss at the Fire

"Winner of the 2023 Nobel Prize in Literature In her old house by the fjord, Signe lies on a bench and sees a vision of herself as she was more than twenty years earlier: standing by the window waiting for her husband Asle, on that terrible late November day when he took his rowboat out onto the water and never returned. Her memories widen out to include their whole life together, and beyond: the bonds of family and the battles with implacable nature stretching back over five generations, to Asle's great-great-grandmother Aliss. In Jon Fosse's vivid, hallucinatory prose, all these moments in time inhabit the same space, and the ghosts of the past collide with those who still live on. Aliss at the Fire is a visionary masterpiece, a haunting exploration of love and loss that ranks among the greatest meditations on marriage and human fate."

Jon Fosse (Author), Kåre Conradi (Narrator)

Audiobook

Perfume and Pain: A Novel

""Perceptive and witty—like a Sally Rooney novel set in Southern California." —Star Tribune (Minneapolis) "It's this author's best work yet. A Sapphic roller-coaster ride." —Kirkus Reviews (starred review) A controversial LA author attempts to revive her career and finally find true love in this hilarious nod to 1950s lesbian pulp fiction. Having recently moved both herself and her formidable perfume bottle collection into a tiny bungalow in Los Angeles, mid-list author Astrid Dahl finds herself back in the Zoom writer's group she cofounded, Sapphic Scribes, after an incident that leaves her and her career lightly canceled. But she temporarily forgets all that by throwing herself into a few sexy distractions—like Ivy, a grad student researching 1950s lesbian pulp who smells like metallic orchids, or her new neighbor, Penelope, who smells like patchouli. Penelope, a painter living off Urban Outfitters settlement money, immediately ingratiates herself in Astrid's life, bonding with her best friends and family, just as Astrid and Ivy begin to date in person. Astrid feels judged and threatened by Penelope, a responsible older vegan, but also finds her irresistibly sexy. When Astrid receives an unexpected call from her agent with the news that actress and influencer Kat Gold wants to adapt her previous novel for TV, Astrid finally has a chance to resurrect her waning career. But the pressure causes Astrid's worst vice to rear its head—the Patricia Highsmith, a blend of Adderall, alcohol, and cigarettes—and results in blackouts and a disturbing series of events. Unapologetically feminine yet ribald, steamy yet hilarious, Anna Dorn has crafted an exquisite homage to the lesbian pulp of yore, reclaiming it for our internet and celebrity-obsessed world. With notes of Southern California citrus and sultry smokiness, Perfume and Pain is a satirical romp through Hollywood and lesbian melodrama."

Anna Dorn (Author), Natalie Naudus (Narrator)

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The Hebrew Teacher

"Three Israeli women, their lives altered by immigration to the United States, seek to overcome crises. Ilana is a veteran Hebrew instructor at a Midwestern college who has built her life around her career. When a young Hebrew literature professor joins the faculty, she finds his post-Zionist politics pose a threat to her life’s work. Miriam, whose son left Israel to make his fortune in Silicon Valley, pays an unwanted visit to meet her new grandson and discovers cracks in the family’s perfect façade. Efrat, another Israeli in California, is determined to help her daughter navigate the challenges of middle school and crosses forbidden lines when she follows her into the minefield of social media. In these three stirring novellas—comedies of manners with an ambitious blend of irony and sensitivity—celebrated Israeli author Maya Arad probes the demise of idealism and the generation gap that her heroines must confront."

Maya Arad (Author), TBD (Narrator)

Audiobook

Juja

"In 1953, a teenage girl, Jeanne Saré, jumps in front of a train at the Gare du Nord station. She leaves behind writings that to some are unreadable, but to others tell universal, unspoken truths about the lives and struggles of women. When published in the 1970s, her work triggers a rash of copycat suicides. It is hastily withdrawn from sale and eventually forgotten about. Then, in 2004, two women from opposite corners of the globe—Amsterdam and Sydney—rediscover Jeanne Saré’s book and set out to discover who the author was and what happened to her. Women across the ages have attached their own stories to Saré’s, often with devastating results, but the truth about her may be even stranger than the fictions they have invented."

Nino Haratischvili (Author), Helen Day (Narrator)

Audiobook

Inside the Mirror

"In 1950s Bombay, Jaya Malhotra studies medicine at the direction of her father, a champion of women’s education who assumes the right to choose his daughters’ vocations. A talented painter drawn to the city’s dynamic new modern-art movement, Jaya is driven by her desire to express both the pain and extraordinary force of life of a nation rising from the devastation of British rule. Her twin sister, Kamlesh, a passionate student of Bharata Natyam dance, complies with her father’s decision that she become a schoolteacher while secretly pursuing forbidden dreams of dancing onstage and in the movies. When Jaya moves out of her family home to live with a woman mentor, she suffers grievous consequences as a rare woman in the men’s domain of art. Not only does her departure from home threaten her family’s standing and crush her reputation but Jaya also loses a vital connection to Kamlesh. Winner of the AWP Prize for the Novel, Parul Kapur’s Inside the Mirror is set in the aftermath of colonialism, as an impoverished India struggles to remake itself into a modern state. Jaya’s story encompasses art, history, political revolt, love, and women’s ambition to seize their own power."

Parul Kapur (Author), Deepti Gupta (Narrator)

Audiobook

Under a Neon Sun

"Unable to afford rent, Mia—a community college student—lives out of her car, cleaning houses of the well-to-do in the LA area to meet her shoestring budget. Then Covid hits, and everything changes. For people living in houses and apartments, with stay-at-home jobs, the pandemic was inconvenient. For Mia—a student and housekeeper whose budget is so tight she lives in her car—the pandemic destroys the very source of her paltry income. Fortunately, gutsy and funny Mia is a determined survivor. After weeks of cutting her limited spending even further, missing meals along the way, her wealthy employers become desperate for her services again. This time, she’s determined not to let them take advantage of her as they have in the past. Her newfound confidence gives her new hope as she works to escape the shackles of poverty on her own terms. Sally Rooney meets Elizabeth Strout in this brilliant fiction debut."

Kate Gale (Author), Morgan Hallett (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Novices of Lerna

"The Novices of Lerna introduces the enigmatic fictions of Ángel Bonomini to English listeners for the first time. Shot through with wry humor and tender absurdity, these meditations on identity, surveillance, and isolation remain eerily prescient. The collection's central novella follows Ramón Beltra, an unambitious scholar who receives a mysterious invitation to a lucrative six-month fellowship at the University of Lerna in Switzerland. After he reluctantly complies with the unusual qualifying paperwork requiring several pages of detailed measurements and photographs of his entire body, Beltra soon finds himself in the deserted university town of Lerna, together with twenty-three other 'novices' subject to the same undisclosed project—all of them doppelgangers of Beltra himself. At first, Beltra is the only one to bristle at the school's dizzying array of rules and regulations, but this all changes with the onset of an uncontrollable epidemic, and the fellows begin dying off one by one . . . An overlooked master of Argentine fantastic literature, Ángel Bonomini garnered praise among peers and contemporaries like Jorge Luis Borges, before slipping mysteriously into obscurity. Bonomini was forty-three years old in 1972 when he published The Novices of Lerna, the first of four books of short stories he released before his death at age sixty-four."

Angel Bonomini (Author), Paul Woodson (Narrator)

Audiobook

The Glass Bead Game: A Full-Cast BBC Radio Dramatisation

"A full-cast adaptation of the classic novel by Nobel Prize-winner Hermann Hesse, starring Derek Jacobi – plus a bonus short story Originally published in 1943, The Glass Bead Game was Herman Hesse’s last novel. It was hailed as his magnum opus, and was instrumental in securing him the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1946. Set in a utopian future society, it explores themes of knowledge, individualism, creativity and spirituality, and has inspired contemporary thinkers from authors to game designers. Narrated by Derek Jacobi, this two-part radio drama tells the story of Joseph Knecht (Tom Ferguson), plucked from obscurity as a young orphan, admitted to the finest elite school and groomed for greatness in the Castalian Order. This select group of intellectuals live a closeted life of study and devotion to the Glass Bead Game, an elaborate game that is the most complete possible expression of every discipline – from science and mathematics to the arts, music and philosophy. As the years go by, Joseph strives to grasp the innermost meaning of the Game and understand its complexities and possibilities. He becomes a leading light in the Order, and is sent on a diplomatic mission to bridge the gulf between the Catholic Church and Castalia. But he never stops questioning the system that has swept him so quickly and smoothly to high office. And when he achieves the exalted position of Magister Ludi – Master of the Game – he suffers a crisis of conscience, as his deepening doubts about this idealistic and sanitised society threaten to topple its very foundations… Also included is The City, a 15-minute fable about the birth and death of a city taken from Herman Hesse's collection of fairy tales and read by Andrew Hilton. Cast Biographer – Derek Jacobi Joseph Knecht – Tom Ferguson Fritz – Toby Hadoke Music Master – Malcolm Raeburn Van der Trave – Terence Mann Plinio – David Seddon Bertram – Jonathan Keeble Father Jacobus – David Fleeshman Young Joseph – Aidan Parsons Helena – Olwen May President – Terence Mann Tito – Oliver Gomm Dramatised by Lavinia Greenlaw Produced by Charlotte Riches Directed by Susan Roberts First broadcast BBC Radio 4, 18-25 July 2010 The City Read by Andrew Hilton Produced by Sara Davies First broadcast BBC Radio 4, 9 December 2002 © 2024 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd. (P) 2024 BBC Studios Distribution Ltd"

Herman Hesse (Author), Derek Jacobi, Full Cast, Tom Ferguson (Narrator)

Audiobook

Treasure [Movie Tie-in]: A Novel

"SOON TO BE A MAJOR MOTION PICTURE STARRING LENA DUNHAM AND STEPHEN FRY. A ''haunting, riotously funny, and deeply touching'' (Publishers Weekly) novel about a woman and her father's journey to Poland to revisit her family history This book was previously published under the title Too Many Men Ruth Rothwax finds order and meaning in the words she writes for other people, but she can’t find words to understand the loss her family experienced during World War II. She becomes obsessed with the idea of returning to Poland with her father, Edek, making sense of her family’s past, and visiting the places where her beloved parents lived and almost died. But there’s more to this trip than Ruth can plan for. By facing Poland and the past, she might be able to confront her own future. Treasure is the gripping story of a woman’s search for memory and meaning, and the reconciliation of present and past within the complicated fabric of family. Acclaimed bestselling author Lily Brett explores the reverberations of loss through this remarkable and unforgettable journey of the heart. ''[Brett] has an incredibly ability to explain the Jewish experience, and the human experience.'' — LENA DUNHAM ''[Brett's] such an easy writer to read... beautifully funny, complex, and delightful as well.'' — STEPHEN FRY"

Lily Brett (Author), Katherine Littrell (Narrator)

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Fly Away Summer: A Delightful, Heartwarming Summer Romance

"From the newest sensation in contemporary romance comes a delightfully heartwarming beach read that’s perfect for fans of RaeAnne Thayne, Denise Hunter, and Debbie Macomber. After losing her beloved family’s Cape Cod inn right after culinary school, chef Lana Kelly converts her late father’s old fish market next door into a successful restaurant. However, over the years, she’s kept her eye on the inn with dreams to expand. She also hopes she can acquire the property for her grandad, so he’ll know it’s back in the family before his dementia causes the memory to vanish for good. When the inn goes up for sale, she rushes to put in an offer, only to have it denied immediately. The inn was already snapped up by Hunter Graham, of Graham Property Development in New York City who plans to transform it into an event venue with his new purchase. With competition on the Cape continuing to rise, Lana finds herself worried about how to keep her little restaurant growing. And she isn’t so thrilled about her new neighbor. Beside the lapping waters of the bay and the summer breezes, Lana is forced to face the truth. But will that truth be losing the inn forever or finding something more… A heartwarming summer romance that will sweep you away to the sparkling New England coast. An incredible story that you will not be able to put down, full of healing, family ties, and best of all, love."

Lindsay Gibson (Author), Kimberly Austin (Narrator)

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The Summer Book

"On a pristine island in the Gulf of Finland, six-year-old Sophia is awakening to life, while her wise yet cranky grandmother is contemplating its end. This unlikely duo becomes each other's perfect companions for a season of unforgettable adventures. From crafting boats out of bark to creating their own miniature Venice, they explore their island world with youthful curiosity and aged wisdom. Along the way, they tackle the universal questions that captivate young and old: What is life and death? What is the nature of love and God? In this enchanting tale, Jansson crafts a world that is a microcosm of life's joys and sorrows, making 'The Summer Book' a season you'll never want to end. © 2024 Tove Jansson, Moomin Characters™ Published in the English language by arrangement with Rights & Brands Finnish-Swedish writer and artist Tove Jansson (1914-2001) is globally cherished for creating the Moomin universe. Born in Helsinki, her tales of the Moomins captivated readers worldwide. Beyond Moominvalley, she penned profound adult novels, most notably 'The Summer Book'."

Tove Jansson (Author), Julie Walters (Narrator)

Audiobook

Literary Fiction Audiobooks in Literature