🎧Have You Heard?🎧Audiobooks For Your Listening Pleasure🎧The Best of January🎧

#southernman #gregiles #scottbrick #memoriesofthelost #barbaraoneal #sarahzimmerman

January’s Best is going to begin with excuses. No … I haven’t already broken all my New Year’s resolutions because I never make them. The reason I’m starting off with a “mea culpa” is because the holidays were more of a distraction than usual, we had a history-making weather event called snow here in the Florida Panhandle, one of my listens was probably the longest single book I’ve ever undertaken, and now here comes February, the shortest month of the year.  After mulling over possible solutions, I found that, time-wise, the long book does qualify as three books, so this month we have one extra-long book that may or may not be the last of a series and one book with mystical overtones that is a much-needed palate cleanser after the length and subject matter of the long book.

Memories of the Lost

By Barbara O’Neal 

Narrrated by Sarah Zimmerman 

Memories of the Lost is one of those books that relies heavily on the mystical quality that keeps all of us believing in fate or destiny or karma or whatever you want to call the thing that reminds us we are not completely in control. After her mother’s death, Tillie Morrisey slowly begins to uncover secrets that have long been hidden. Tillie has spent her life as an artist, so it’s no surprise when the subject matter of a painting in a gallery is responsible for a chance encounter with the man who will become the love of her life. At the same time, the painting triggers something deep inside her and she begins to paint mysterious subjects from memory as she questions her past and why her recollection of it is so vague. Barbara O’Neal is a master at infusing her work with a certain air of mystery bordering on the supernatural, and as Tillie looks for the key to her past accompanied by her new love Liam, she finds long-hidden truths she never knew. Sarah Zimmerman has the perfect voice for this mystical storyline.

Southern Man

By Greg Iles

Narrated by Scott Brick

When I chose to listen to Southern Man, it was for two reasons: from the reviews, I got the impression this might be the last of the series about Penn Cage who is a favorite fictional character of mine; the second is because any book by Greg Iles is going to be well-written and with Scott Brick as the narrator, you can’t go wrong. What I failed to notice was the length of the book which is an ear-popping 45 hours and 43 minutes! For those of us who listen to audiobooks, this is quite a time investment even if we cheat a bit and speed it up. Another factor was the season of the year – don’t ever start a long listen during the Christmas holidays! Never the less, I forged ahead. The storyline is emotional, compelling, and a bit frightening. Many of the characters will be familiar if you’ve read or listened to other books in the series. There will also be new characters, some of whom are darker than any of the many dark characters who have appeared with Penn Cage in other books. If this is your first  book in the series, Mr. Iles fills in the background adroitly so you don’t feel lost. The book is well-written as expected, but I’m still not sure if it’s the last in the series. I’ll leave it to those of you who chose to listen to form your own conclusions.

Two observations:

1. Mr. Brick’s performance is brilliant – maybe his best yet.
2. The length of this book is unjustified from my perspective because there is considerable redundancy in support of certain political views. Whether you agree with them or not, the constant repetition doesn’t necessarily advance the storyline. Unless you are very broad-minded, you might want to skip this one.

Thank You For Following Us at Literati Literature Lovers and Happy Listening in February!