Wednesday, March 09, 2011

Free Audio Downloads from the Library -The Best Thing Ever

Without audio books, I'd never get the dusting done.  Or the yard work. Or the ironing.  I'd work at them for a few minutes and then sit down to read.  The selection is not great, but I never have any problem finding something I've been meaning to read.  Or reread.

I recently listened to 1984, which I read so long ago, that my memory of it had become quite dim.  It's a must read if you follow conservative bloggers. I've seen all these references to it in the past week: The memory hole, the two-minutes hate, we've always been at war with East Asia, we thank the party for increasing the chocolate ration from 20 grams to 15 grams.

I just finished The Weed That Strings the Hangman's Bag from the Flavia De Luce series by Alan Bradley.  Flavia is an 11 year-old amateur chemist and sleuth from 1950's England.  Although the protagonist is 11, these are not children's books.  They contain gruesome murders and adult situations.  Having said that, I laughed out loud more than once.  Highly recommended particularly if you enjoyed:

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.  I couldn't imagine the point of this book when I first heard of it, but since everyone else seemed to be reading it, I downloaded it.  And it was hilarious. I presumed that the shtick of the Bennet sisters fighting the undead would wear off before the book ended, but I snickered all the way through.

Update: Sure enough, the shtick of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies did wear off.  I tried Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters, but I didn't make it through the first chapter.  Cute, but not compelling.

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