The Washington Post - USA (2022-05-29)

SUNDAY, MAY 29 , 2022. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ EE E13

Summer Books 2022

BY KATHERINE A. POWERS

D

espite the continued

complications of covid,

one pleasure will not be

quashed: summer

reading. This annual ritual —

all but a few killjoys agree —

means taking up a book not to

improve one’s mind or morals,

but rather to have a good time.

Here are seven truly entertain-

ing books, chosen with an eye

to diverse tastes.

We’ll start with the funny

stuff. David Sedaris’s latest

chronicle of his doings, “Happy

Go Lucky” (7^1 / 2 hours), is marked

by his familiar skewering humor,

off-the-wall observations and

moments of pathos. He covers

the death of his father, the pan-

demic, a squirm-inducing medi-

cal procedure, a trip to a firing

range and any number of very

funny interactions with odd-

balls. Though half of the seg-

ments are recordings of live

performances — annoying to this

listener, who doesn’t like crowds

— Sedaris admits that he’s lost

without an audience, “that un-

witting congregation of fail-safe

editors.” And here they are,

stamping his work with the im-

primatur of laughter.

Mick Herron’s “slow horses,” a

British intelligence unit of mis-

fits and screw-ups, have

achieved deserved renown from

their Apple TV series, but if you

want the genuine article en-

riched by a narrator born to the

job, consider the audio version.

No one conveys the spirit of the

novels better than narrator Ge-

rard Doyle, a gentle-voiced mas-

ter of deadpan irony and rueful-

ness. He is superb again in

Herron’s latest, “Bad Actors”

(10^3 / 4 hours), the eighth novel in

the Slough House series. (If you

are new to this intoxicating

series you might want to begin

with an earlier volume; all, bar

the second, are narrated by

Doyle.)

If the British ever decide to

abolish the monarchy, we Ameri-

cans will lose a source of harm-

less, gossipy entertainment. Tina

Brown serves up the famously

dysfunctional family with tart-

ness and dash in “The Palace

Papers: Inside the House of

Windsor — the Truth and the

Turmoil” (18 hours), narrating

the book herself in the authorita-

tive voice of an old Oxonian. Kind

and respectful where due (to the

Queen and William and Kate),

she softens on Charles and Camil-

la, but takes off the gloves with

that “coronated sleaze machine,”

Andrew — and quite a few others.

Set in 1950 in a century-old,

fuddy-duddy London bookstore,

Natalie Jenner’s “Bloomsbury

Girls” (12^1 / 2 hours) is both a

triple romance and a tale of

determination as three women

band together to establish them-

selves as players in the world of

book-selling and literature.

Jenner’s depiction of a strait-

ened postwar London and baf-

fled male hostility to women’s

aspirations is amusing rather

than rancorous. Juliet Steven-

son narrates the novel in her

lovely, versatile voice, nicely

capturing different personal-

ities including those of the big

guns who show up to play key

roles: Daphne du Maurier, Peg-

gy Guggenheim, Sonia Orwell

and Samuel Beckett.

Though written for children

ages 9 to 12, R.J. Palacio’s “Pony”

(7^1 / 4 hours) is an ideal book for a

family car journey as it can be

enjoyed just as well by people far

gone in years. It is 1860 and

12-year-old Silas and his ghostly

familiar, Mittenwool, are left be-

hind when armed horsemen kid-

nap the boy’s father. Silas, Mit-

tenwool and a pony, who mys-

teriously shows up, track down

the villains through hazardous

terrain — beyond which my lips

are sealed. The novel is beautiful-

ly served by Ian M. Hawkins who

narrates it in a sober, young-

sounding voice with an austere,

old-fashioned manner.

Ben McGrath spent years in-

termittently following the pere-

grinations and disappearance of

Dick Conant, who had aban-

doned the humdrum existence of

life on land and took to America’s

waterways in a cheap red canoe.

“Riverman: An American Odys-

sey” (8^2 / 3 hours) is the result.

Beginning with the discovery of

that canoe, washed ashore with

no sign of Conant, McGrath

backtracks to investigate the na-

ture of this strange but genial

man, his heroic voyages and the

riparian America he encoun-

tered. Adam Verner narrates the

book in an engaging, relaxed

voice at an easy pace that per-

fectly accords with the book’s

temper.

Nikki May’s debut “Wahala”

(10^1 / 3 hours) has a familiar set-

up: Three friends are thrown

into enmity by the inclusion in

their group of a fourth. The

story, however, is far from rou-

tine. Ronke, Boo and Simi are

Anglo Nigerians, professional

women in their 30s living in

London. Their strained senses

of identity, aspirations and per-

sonal lives are all richly ex-

plored by May — and in time

become targets of the machina-

tions of Isobel, a woman of

ingenious malice. Still, the book

is more comedy of manners

than tragedy. It is greatly en-

hanced by a tremendous per-

formance by Natalie Simpson,

who has an astonishingly wide

palette of voices and an extraor-

dinary ability to convey under-

currents of tension.

Katherine A. Powers reviews

audiobooks every month for The

Washington Post.

You’ll be hanging on every word

These entertaining audiobook selections cater to diverse tastes

JENTWO (JANEJIRA TAECHAKAMPU)/ILLUSTRATION FOR THE WASHINGTON POST

LITTLE, BROWN AND

COMPANY

RECORDED BOOKS

RANDOM HOUSE AUDIO

MACMILLAN AUDIO

PRH AUDIO

PRH AUDIO

HARPERAUDIO