Are you on the road this summer? If you commute to work, or are taking a road trip, one of the best ways to pass the time is audiobooks!

Anna and the Swallow ManSchool Library Journal just issued a list of author-narrated books. Some of my favourite audiobooks are on this list, including Libba Bray’s Beauty Queens, which you can download from OverDrive. Beauty Queens is laugh-out-loud funny and will make you snort coffee out your nose (so be careful). Another of my all-time favourite audiobooks is Feed, by M.T. Anderson, narrated by David Aaron Baker. It is a chilling near-future story that feels a bit too real. A new book out this year is The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas. This ripped-from-the-headlines story puts you right into the head of a teen girl dealing with racism and inner-city life. Bahni Turpin gives voice to the characters. These three books are all YA (Young Adult), or Teen books, but adults can listen too. The Odyssey Award is a great place to find high-quality audio suggestions. Don’t miss last year’s winner, Anna and the Swallow Man.  And there are still a few weeks left of FREE audiobook downloads from AudioBooks SYNC — two free books each week that you get to keep as long as you want. Grab them while they last!

I’ve created a list of audiobooks that might work well for car trips with the family. Read the description to see if any of these would be interesting for your family! There are a couple of classics on that list that really stand out, including Charlotte’s Web read by the author himself, and a collection of Beatrix Potter tales read by the fabulous Katherine Kellgren.

Boys in the boatIf you are a mystery fan, we’ve got Louise Penny audiobooks on CD, as well as Ian Rankin, Ann Cleves, Jo Nesbo, and many more. We have non-fiction on audio, too, such as The Boys in the Boat, a surprisingly interesting tale about the 1936 Olympic rowing team. Just about any genre you can imagine is available to listen to.

To find audiobooks on CD in our catalogue, limit your search under FORMAT, and click on Audiobook-CD. To find downloadable audiobooks, head to Overdrive with your library card in hand and start listening today! You can limit the search to what is currently available and grab a book for the drive home.

—Angela Reynolds, Community Engagement Coordinator