Listen Up Awards
John Zinsser, Trudi M. Rosenblum and Shannon Maughan -- 1/3/00
The best of the year is the best to the ear -- a salute to 1999's finest
Once again, we roll out the red carpet for an extensive list of spoken audio's shining star titles. The best of 1999, as chosen by PW's audio editors, serves as a reminder of how robust and wide-ranging
the industry has become. Titles have been judged for content, narration, production values, packaging and for the way audio is used as a creative medium in its own right. It's our toast to a remarkable crop.
Fiction:Jewel, Bret Lott (Simon & Schuster); Where the Heart Is, Billie Letts (Brilliance); The Testament (unabridged), John Grisham (BDD); Single & Single, John le Carré (Simon & Schuster); Tortilla Flat, John Steinbeck (Penguin); Toyer (unabridged), Gardner McKay (Brilliance); An Ocean Apart, Robin Pilcher (Dove); Amsterdam, Ian McEwan (Publishing Mills); The Evening News, Marly Swick (Time Warner); Be Cool, Elmore Leonard (BDD); While I Was Gone, Sue Miller (Random); Empress of the Splendid Season, Oscar Hijuelos (Harper); A New Song, Jan Karon (Penguin); Abide with Me, E. Lynn Harris (BDD); Tara Road, Maeve Binchy (BDD); The Ground Beneath Her Feet, Salman Rushdie (Dove); The Drowning People, Richard Mason (Time Warner); Juneteenth, Ralph Ellison (Random); Local Girls, Alice Hoffman (Brilliance); Turn of the Century, Kurt Anderson (Random); Duane's Depressed, Larry McMurtry (Dove); The Handyman, Carolyn See (Publishing Mills); Big Trouble, Dave Barry (Brilliance); Cheaters, Eric Jerome Dickey (Penguin); Blue at the Mizzen, Patrick O'Brian (Random); Personal Injuries, Scott Turow (Random); Voyage of the Narwahl, Andrea Barrett; Timeline, Michael Crichton (Random); Saving Faith, David Baldacci (Time Warner).
Nonfiction:The Age of Spiritual Machines, Ray Kurzweil (Penguin); The Calling, Catherine Whitney (Brilliance); For The Time Being, Annie Dillard (Dove); Confederates in the Attic, Tony Horowitz (BDD); Get A Life!,William Shatner with Chris Kreski (Simon & Schuster); Appointment at the Ends of the World, William Karesh (Brilliance); Home Town, Tracy Kidder (Soundelux); Woman: An Intimate Geography, Natalie Angier (Dove); Faster, James Gleick (Random); The New New Thing, Michael Lewis (Brilliance); The Master of Disguise, Antonio J. Mendez (Brilliance).
Memoir/Autobiography/Biography:Crazy Horse, Larry McMurtry (Penguin); Reporting Live, Leslie Stahl (Simon & Schuster); The Diary of Vaslav Nijinsky, edited by Joan Accocello (Dove); Wake Up, I'm Fat, Camryn Manheim (Soundelux); Reason for Hope, Jane Goodall (Time Warner); Educating Esmé, Esmé Raji Codell (HighBridge); In My Hands: Memories of a Holocaust Rescuer, Irene Gut Opdyke with Jennifer Armstrong (BDD); Been There, Done That, Eddie Fisher with David Fisher (Dove); Faith of my Fathers, John McCain with Mark Salter (Random); John Glenn: A Memoir, John Glenn (BDD); Lost in the Funhouse: The Life and Mind of Andy Kaufman, Bill Zehme (Audio Renaissance).
Mystery:Angels Flight, Michael Connelly (Time Warner); Heartbreaker, Robert Ferrigno (Random); Man of the Hour, Peter Blauner (Time Warner); The First Victim, Ridley Pearson (Brilliance); High Five, Janet Evanovich (Audio Renaissance); Black Notice, Patricia Cornwell (Putnam Berkley); "O" Is for Outlaw, Sue Grafton (Random); Hunting Badger, Tony Hillerman (Harper).
Short Stories:Western Stories Series, Elmore Leonard (Simon & Schuster); Goodbye, Columbus and Five Short Stories, Philip Roth (Dove); Heavy Water and Other Stories, Martin Amis (Dove); Close Range: Wyoming Stories, E. Annie Proulx (Simon & Schuster); The Business & Other Stories, Jay McInerny (Dove); Brief Interviews with Hideous Men, David Foster Wallace (Time Warner); Bagombo Snuff Box, Kurt Vonnegut (HighBridge); Walkin' the Dog, Walter Mosley (Time Warner); Best American Short Stories of the Century, edited by John Updike (Houghton Mifflin); Hearts in Atlantis, Stephen King (Simon & Schuster).
Author Reading:Hannibal, Thomas Harris (BDD); A Girl's Guide to Hunting and Fishing, Melissa Bank (Penguin); The Voice from the Edge, Volume 1: I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream, Harlan Ellison (Dove); Stories from the Italian Country Table, Lynne Rossetto Kasper (Simon & Schuster); Values of the Game, Bill Bradley (HighBridge).
Movie Tie-In:Hideous Kinky, Esther Freud (Audio Partners).
History:Africans in America, Charles Johnson and Patricia Smith (Audio Renaissance); The Hero with an African Face, Clyde W. Ford (HighBridge); The Endurance, Caroline Alexander (HighBridge); Colder Than Hell: A Marine Rifle Company at Chosin Reservoir, Joseph R. Owen (Naval Institute Press); Galileo's Daughter, Dava Sobel (Random).
Politics:All Too Human, George Stephanopoulous (Time Warner); I Ain't Got Time to Bleed, Jesse Ventura (Random); Bill and Hillary: The Marriage, Christopher Anderson (Soundelux); All the Best, George Bush (Simon & Schuster).
Sports and Adventure:A Golfer's Life, Arnold Palmer with James Dodson (Random); High Exposure, David Breashears (Dove); Adrenaline Series (Listen & Live); River Horse, William Least Heat-Moon (Simon & Schuster).
Humor:Give Me Immortality or Give Me Death, Firesign Theatre (Rhino); Little Green Men, Christopher Buckley (BDD); Rants Redux, Dennis Miller (BDD); Misadventures in the 213, Dennis Hensley (Publishing Mills).
Self-Help:The Right to Write, Julia Cameron (Audio Renaissance); Emily Post's Weddings, Peggy Post (Harper); How to Dump a Guy, Kate Fillion and Ellen Ladowsky (Listen & Live); Beauty Fades, Dumb Is Forever, Judy Sheindlin (Harper); I Don't Have to Make Everything All Better, Gary Lundberg and Joy Saunders Lundberg (Penguin); Word Smart Series (Living Language); If Love Is a Game, These Are the Rules, Chérie Carter Scott (BDD); How to be Your Dog's Best Friend, Monks of New Skete (HighBridge); What Southern Women Know, Ronda Rich (Brilliance).
P try:The Voice of the P t Series, edited by J.D. McClatchy (Random).
Use of Archival Tapes:Best of NPR Series (Time Warner).
Spoken Pop:Thoughts, Tionne "T-Boz" Watkins (Harper).
Celebrity Reading:A People's History of the United States, Howard Zinn, read by Matt Damon (Harper); The Diaries of Adam & Eve, translated by Mark Twain, read by Mandy Patinkin, Betty Buckley and Walter Cronkite (Fair Oaks).
Science Fiction:Star Trek: Deep Space Nine: The 34th Rule, Armin Shimerman and David George; Seeing Ear Theatre: Clive Barker's The History of the Devil (Dove); Dune: House Atreides, Brian Herbert and Kevin J. Anderson (BDD); Star Trek: Spock vs. Q, Alien Voices (Simon & Schuster).
Popular Culture:Buffy the Vampire Slayer: Immortal, Christopher Golden and Nancy Holder (Simon & Schuster).
Packaging/Cover Art:Blood and Smoke, Stephen King (Simon & Schuster).
Dramatization:Dickens' Women, Miriam Margolyes and Sonia Fraser (Audio Partners); Arkangel Complete Shakespeare Series (Penguin); An American Daughter, Wendy Wasserstein (LA Theatre Works).
Inspirational:Martin Luther King on Leadership, Donald T. Phillips (Time Warner); She Said Yes, Misty Bernall (Brilliance); When Pride Still Mattered: A Life of Vince Lombardi, David Maraniss (Simon & Schuster); Friendship with God, Neale Donald Walsch (Audio Literature).
Religion/Spirituality:Buddhism Plain and Simple, Steve Hagen (Harper); Reaching to Heaven, James van Praagh (Penguin); Chuang Tsu: Inner Chapters, translated by Gia-fu Feng and Jane English (Audio Literature); The Four Agreements, Don Miguel Ruiz (Amber-Allen); The Other Side and Back, Sylvia Browne (Penguin).
Fitness:The Tae-Bo Way, Billy Blanks (BDD).
Continuing Series: Smithsonian Series (Publishing Mills); Chicken Soup Series (Health Communications); Naxos Classics (Naxos); Mira Series (DH Audio).
Children's Spoken Word:The Battle of the Mad Scientists and Other Tales of Survival, Bill Harley (Round River Records); The Golden Compass, Philip Pullman (Listening Library/Random); Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, J.K. Rowling (Listening Library/Random); Love from Your Friend, Hannah , Mindy Warshaw Skolsky (Listening Library/Random); Stories to Grow On, Timmy Abel (Upstream Records); Bull Run, Paul Fleischman (Audio Bookshelf); The Dark Frigate, Charles Boardman Hawes (Listening Library/Random); Grandma's Boy, Donald Davis (August House).
Children's Music:World Playground, various artists (Putumayo); Color Me Singing, Susan Salidor (Rounder Kids, dist.); Can a Jumbo Jet Sing the Alphabet?, Hap Palmer (Hap-Pal Music); On the Good Ship Lollipop, The Persuasions (Music for Little People); Victor Vito, Laurie Berkner (Two Tomat s Records).
Best of the Best:Traveling Mercies, Anne Lamott (Random); The Hungry Ocean, Linda Greenlaw (Brilliance); Old Man in a Baseball Cap, Fred Rochlin (Harper); 'Tis, Frank McCourt (Simon & Schuster); A Star Called Henry, Roddy Doyle (Penguin).
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