Rec me audiobooks and/or geeky stuff!

[oyceter]

I have pretty bad insomnia at times, often because I feel like my brain wants to keep going. I used to try listening to music, especially musicals or ballads, as the narrative thread keeps my brain occupied, but lately I have discovered the joy of audiobooks.

So... rec me stuff!

I am looking for things that are appropriate to fall asleep to. In other words, the audiobook equivalent of a nice, fluffy blanket. Nothing too violent or too depressing, and for this at least, nothing too political. I mean, I am totally up for things that are critiquing the patriarchy or whatnot, but if it makes me want to sit up in bed and pump my fist going, "Yeah!" it will not be helpful for the insomnia! Ditto things with too much fail. I can deal with a little, especially if warned, but again, if I am getting up and trying to strangle my iPod, it is not helpful for the insomnia.

In this case, audiobooks of things I have actually read and enjoyed is a bonus, since I (hopefully) fall asleep in the middle of chapters. I tried listening to Emma, but I kept losing track of the narrative even though I know generally what happens thanks to Clueless.

Apparently the quality of the reading also matters, since I didn't like the narrator of Daughters of Darkness or Mr. Cavendish, I Presume to finish.

So far, I have been greatly enjoying Good Omens.

Also, now that I am most of the way through Mythbusters Collection 3, rec me random geeky stuff! I feel like I have exhausted all of the geeks-in-(awkward-and-adorkable)-love stories on bb_shousetsu, but am kind of up for anything that scratches the adorkable, cute excited geeks, science geekiness, kludging geekiness, or whatnot itch. (I already read Lifehacker and There, I Fixed It.) I think mostly I am looking for stuff with geek personalities being adorkable, as opposed to just plain funny or educational, ergo the question re: fic.

Comments

[cofax7]

If you like him, the Terry Pratchett audiobooks I've listened to have been excellent. Also, Bujold does well in audio form as well.

[oyceter]

I have Wintersmith next in my queue, and then I am trying to see what else is gettable from my library!

Maybe I'll try Bujold... I bounced off her in prose form, but as long as the plot isn't too hard to follow while falling asleep every ten minutes, the audio might work!

[kate_nepveu]

Anything Stephen Briggs is wonderful. And he's done a ton of Pratchett.

I didn't like the Vorkosigan books in audio--I don't know what Miles sounds like, but it isn't that, _to me_--but _The Curse of Chalion_ is one of my comfort books in audio. You can hear a sample here: http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_1?asin=B002V0M5FU&qid=1294496263&sr=1-1

I really love Patrick Tull's readings of the Aubrey-Maturin books, so comforting and growly and well-paced, but if you haven't read those already, way too complicated for insomnia.

Oh! Harry Potter--my sister-in-law & her partner use the UK editions for exactly, exactly this purpose.

Unfortunately my listened-to podfic is mostly in SGA, but if you're browsing http://audiofic.jinjurly.com and see these readers, I've found them good: FayJay (pandarus); aphelant; twilight; general_jinjur; rheanna; reena_jenkins; constance_b; lunate8; jadesfire2808.

Have you read the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency books? Those have lovely audio editions.

Christina Moore's readings of Diane Duane's Young Wizard books are awesome.

Michael Palin's travel books have no plot, basically, and are light and fun. http://www.audible.com/pd/ref=sr_1_6?asin=B002V1CBM6&qid=1294496814&sr=1-6

Neil Gaiman is a good reader of his own work.

The Full Cast Audio adaptations of Tamora Pierce's books are mostly great.

Finally, I have no idea how Car Talk would be to fall asleep to--too much laughing? But I have a ton of their podcasts.

[dhobikikutti]

I second the Neil Gaiman rec. I don't actually like audio books at all, but I downloaded the videos of him reading The Graveyard Book out to a live audience, and listened to them one chapter a night. Warning: sometimes I would come out of half-sleep to see the expressions and gestures he was making because his voice was so expressive.

[oyceter]

He is a really charming reader in person; I should look up his audio stuff!

Haha, I had the same problem when I tried to just listen to the DVD of "Into the Woods" and not watch it... I kept spring up to see what was going on.

[oyceter]

Yay Pratchett! I don't always agree with his politics, esp. re: gender and race, but he is so comforting. I put the Going Postal audiobook on hold at the library because it's one of my favs.

I have never read the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency books! Do you think it's one of those things that's easier to read first and then listen to?

(Also, because of your SteelyKid post and the Yuletide fic, I borrowed the audiobook of Goodnight Moon from the library, haha.)

[kate_nepveu]

So, like, three minutes long, then?

No. 1 Ladies: http://www.steelypips.org/weblog/books/mystery/no_1_ladies_det/

Amelia Peabody: http://www.steelypips.org/weblog/books/mystery/amelia_peabody/

_To Say Nothing of the Dog_: http://www.steelypips.org/weblog/2007/10/willis_dog.php

[troisroyaumes]

Hm, would you be interested in podfic?

Need to watch this thread for adorkable geekiness recs. XD

[oyceter]

YES! I just don't have any idea where to start! I think I browsed the one audiofic archive I found a while ago for chromatic stuff, but I haven't read fic for so long that I had no idea where to even begin.

I am hoping adorable geekiness recs come in! I can't believe this is the first time I've felt fannish for a while, and it's about... Mythbusters.

[troisroyaumes]

Chromatic podfic is really hard to find! Anime/manga fandoms are easiest. There's a whole bunch of Hikago podfic at ihikago, though I have to warn you that the pronunciation of character names is very, uh, US-ian. I recommend aiwritingfic's podfics since she actually knows Japanese. ^^ I also enjoyed some Naruto podfics (White Wedding, Telephone), though the pronunciations are a little strange for those as well.

I also liked this Psych podfic, Gus Makes a Match.

via_ostiense recorded Love's the Burning Girl, which is all about Zoe Saldana.

[oyceter]

Gah, pronunciation! I cheer on your chromatic podfic challenge even more now!

Also, eheh, maybe this will prompt me to actually finish Hikago!

[vass]

My favourite comfort reread is Kerry Greenwood, who writes detective novels set in Melbourne, Australia. She has two main series: Phryne Fisher, set in the 1920s, and Corinna Chapman, set in the present day.

Phryne is a private detective who has adventures and drove ambulances in the war and a refreshing lack of sexual shame.

Corinna is a baker, and mysteries just happen around her, and she ends up solving them. She is also fat, and has a refreshing lack of shame about that.

I feel the need to warn you that Phryne has a new beautiful boyfriend most books, and in a book about halfway through the series so far, the new boyfriend is Chinese Australian, and he's painted a bit thick. He sticks around and gets less pointedly Exotic Oriental and develops a lot more personality, but yeah, it's something to be aware of. (She gets more serious about the utter shittiness of white Australian treatment of Chinese Australians in The Castlemaine Murders, though.)

[oyceter]

Oh awesome! Is this an audiobook? I know obviously mysteries rely on that whole plot thing (ahaha, or: why I could not read mysteries the entire time I was in grad school), but do you think this one has enough atmosphere and character to make up for me falling asleep every chapter or so?

[vass]

They're available as audiobooks.

The first Phryne Fisher book is Cocaine Blues.
The first Corinna Chapman book is Earthly Delights.

By the way, you might already know this, but I didn't until yesterday: some community libraries let their members download audiobooks from their websites.

Edited to answer your question: they're very character driven. And the atmosphere's great - it's all about the city of Melbourne.

[oyceter]

I actually found out about most of the audiobooks via my library! I would get annoyed by trying to check out an ebook to discover that the newest books there were usually only audiobooks.

Also, awesome. Character driven and atmosphere and general good-naturedness sounds perfect.

[vom_marlowe]

I second many of Kate's recs (the rest I snaffle for my aubible queue...)

Did you enjoy To Say Nothing of the Dog? It's my favorite Willis, quite light-hearted romance in Victorian England with time traveling historians, and many light-hearted moments. The reader is excellent and it's nice and long.

I'm a big fan of Audible, because it's easy and cheap (I think it's twenty bucks a month for two new books, even if they normally cost a fortune). They have a huge selection.

I can't follow Austen before going to bed. I get lost. lol

[oyceter]

I, uh, actually bounced off all the Willis I've tried, but I haven't tried To Say Nothing of the Dog or Doomsday Book yet. It sounds like a really good thing to fall asleep to though!

I can't follow Austen either! I was thinking of trying S&S or P&P, since those are the ones I'm most familiar with, but the prose is too complicated for my sleepy brain! Maybe P&P would work because I'm SO familiar with it...

[laurashapiro]

I've very much enjoyed these audiobooks:

The Hungry Tide (Amitav Ghosh)
The Professsor (Charlotte Brontë)
O Pioneers! (Willa Cather)

..and a number of Doctor Who audiobooks. I definitely recommend seeing if any of your fandoms have audiobook tie-ins -- it's a great way to get more of what you love.

[oyceter]

Oooo, Amitav Ghosh! Is that the one about the marine biologists?

I sadly suspect most of my fandoms are too tiny to have actual audiobook tie-ins, except Vampire Diaries, and so far LJ Smith doesn't seem to get the best readers for her books =(. Also, prose is so bad!

.... although hrm. I should ask my mom to see if I could get something like wuxia books in Chinese! It might a) improve my language skills, b) cool stories!, and c) give me something to talk about with my mom.

[laurashapiro]

Yep, that one features a marine biologist. Great characters, great big ideas, great reader. I really enjoyed it.

And hey, I like your idea. Hope you (or your mom) can find something like that.

[tieleen]

For a book, I'd recommend The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society, which is my favorite comfort read atm (though not actually geeky).

Also, I used to fall asleep to An Utterly Impartial History of Britain for a long while; it has some fail in places, but the mix of facts and humor did pretty well by me - I was engaged enough to be focused on it, but it didn't get in the way of my falling asleep. (The only problem is that the chapters are long enough that I mostly always heard the beginnings only - I suspect my knowledge of British history is pretty confused by now.)

[tieleen]

I should mention the first one also has a length problem - the version I have, at least, is all one long chunk, so if you fall asleep and it keeps playing it's pretty impossible to find your place.

[oyceter]

(The only problem is that the chapters are long enough that I mostly always heard the beginnings only - I suspect my knowledge of British history is pretty confused by now.)

HEE! That is my experience with Good Omens right now! It's good that I've read it so often so that I generally know what's going on, but it was so confusing with Emma!

[estara]

I have no idea if these are on audible, but I really enjoy British-American monologuist Joyce Grenfell (and the collections of her work read by Maureen Lipman). She's a product of her times (she entertained troops in the 2nd world war) but her characters are mostly British or American, only rarely does she have a funny sketch or bit where colonialism comes in.

She was a Christian Scientist as well, but doesn't preach on that. I find her love for family and people, while seeing them quite clearly a great thing to fall asleep to.

I got her self-read autobiography via Overdrive mp3 (although I think I'll get a CD eventually, the bit-rate isn't all that great).
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Joyce-Grenfell-Requests-Pleasure-Collection/dp/0563494751/

And I really like this collection of various scraps of her work read by Maureen Lipman
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Kind-Magic-BBC-Radio-Collection/dp/0563527749/

And this is a recording of her very last live performance in the year she died:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Evening-Joyce-Grenfell/dp/B0001XQFVE/

Here's a favourite sketch of mine of hers: English Lit
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i1xTQAGG8rw

And here's a general retrospective to introduce her
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kRs0y5PD8s

[oyceter]

Yay Overdrive! That is how I have been getting most of mine (or just the CDs from the library). The beginning of the Eng. Lit one was pretty fun! (Didn't listen to the whole thing, as I have a terrible attention span, which is why audiobooks only work for me as a falling asleep thing.)

[estara]

Well, then it is fulfilling its purpose ^^. The autobiography and the collection of scraps of her work have the advantage that there is hardly any of her songs in there, so it's even easier to fall asleep to it.

[jesse_the_k]

As for radio shows, Radio Lab has goofy hosts combined with beautiful audio production. They produce about 6 hour-long segments and a spattering of shorts each year. It's sorta Bill Nye the Science Guy meets This American Life.

http://radiolab.org

If you still have a cassette recorder, the then-available Bujold was recorded, wonderfully, by "The Readers' Chair" in Los Angeles in the 80s and early 90s.

[oyceter]

OMG Radio Lab looks like the best thing ever!! Geekiness + audio stuff, thank you!

[telophase]

RadioLab is awesome onna stick!

[heavenscalyx]

Barbara Rosenblat is a brilliant, brilliant reader. Alas, she mostly reads meh mystery novels. But she also reads the Amelia Peabody books by Elizabeth Peters, and it is worth it to get ANY of those; my wife has read and reread the Peabodys in book form, but she always loves to hear the audio versions because Rosenblat's reading brings a whole new level of interest. Her Emerson is perfect.

While hardly comforting, there is also a really wonderful audiobook version of Parable of the Sower, read by the amazing Lynne Thigpen. Anything Thigpen reads is fabulous, but she does read difficult stuff (like Morrison's Jazz).

[veejane]

I don't know a thing about audiobooks, but Lynne Thigpen's voice is wonderful. That's how she got her big break in film, did you know? As the radio announcer in The Warriors, on the strength of her voice. I was so sad when she died.

[oyceter]

Oooo... do you think there's enough in the Peabody books for someone to enjoy it even if they can't follow the plot at all? (I.e. I'm fine with five minute bursts of characters being charming and/or funny and then me falling asleep.) Also, how did you think the treatment of Egypt was? I've kind of been skirting around that series b/c of the setting, but I also know a lot of people enjoy them.

Haha, sadly, I think Parable of the Sower would be too serious =(. Maybe some time for a long car ride or something!

[heavenscalyx]

Firstly, her history is pretty accurate, her Victoriana doesn't make Akycha want to scream, and her Egyptology is also accurate (and her depiction of the various real people of the time is pretty amusing).

Peters really wants to be good at dealing with race. She has several pretty decent characters of color (Abdullah, the reis, and a number of his relatives). She tackles Victorian racism in various ways -- for instance, Amelia begins to refer to their "Egyptian family" fairly early on, and one of Abdullah's grandchildren marries one of Amelia's nieces eventually, so there's that little round of difficulty too. Amelia's son Ramses thinks about racism more openly and critically than his mother and gets involved in the cause of Egyptian independence. The Emersons, when finding a lost world kind of lace, try to get the dark-skinned slaves of the lighter-skinned nobles freed. But the solutions are too neat, the worshipful treatment the Emersons (along with their romantical nicknames) get from the Egyptians does get cloying, and Ramses frequently passes as an Egyptian without any real consequence (and there's no apparent questions about his parentage despite his ability to pass as Egyptian).

So, yeah, there are problems. I try to think of it (and can because of my white privilege, alas) as part and parcel of the body of literature she's reacting to (H. Rider Haggard, et al), as well as Peters' own problems with perceiving certain things as racist, but it does come down to racism being a problem in the books. There are a couple of the books, I think, that occur primarily in England that might be more tolerable (The Deeds of the Disturber looks like one of the ones I'm thinking of).

Peters also has problems with depictions of women (other than Amelia, who really, I think, took the bit in her teeth and ran away with Peters) and fatphobia. So, yeah, problematic. But I expect some of these things show up in her other works as Barbara Michaels.

[(Anonymous)]

Also, yes, there's enough to keep you going -- the characters are charming and funny pretty consistently.

Oh! I just remembered: Rosenblat also narrates at least the first two Tales of the City books! And she's wonderful at it.

[heavenscalyx]

Feh, that was me.

[oyceter]

Oooo, thanks so much for all the details! Stuff is usually less head-explodey for me when forewarned.

Eh, what's Tales of the City? Also Elizabeth Peters books?

[heavenscalyx]

Tales of the City is a series by Armistead Maupin. It was originally published serially in the SF Chronicle, and the series starts in the 1970s in the Bay Area and trundles on through today. Gay life, transfolk in the 70s, the start of AIDS -- all done in a remarkably light-hearted way with really compelling characters. I'd heard of one of the big characters -- Michael "Mouse" Tolliver -- for years before actually reading the books. I adored all the historical notes -- pop culture things I recognized from my childhood, news items I remembered from my junior high years (like Jamestown). I expect that someone living in the Bay Area might find it even more fun.

He makes some interesting comments on racism, though he doesn't have many COCs. (One note: there's a storyline that involves one of the white characters having a fling with a Chinese delivery boy and getting pregnant. I think that, for writing in the 1970s-1980s, Maupin handled it all right: we see the whole thing through the point of view of some privileged white folks, and he's showing their intolerance in a very nonsympathetic light.) The only thing he doesn't really handle particularly well are lesbians, alas. There's one book I haven't dared read because it involves a women's music festival and, eurgh, I'm a little worried about how a gay man who already has some issues with dykes will present such an animal.

[heavenscalyx]

And even better, the early Tales of the City books are written in short, episodic chunks. Might be very good to fall asleep to!

[oyceter]

Oooo gotcha, thanks! I will definitely look for this!

[telophase]

You should be made aware of the Teaching Company, if you're not yet familiar with them. :) Awesome college-level courses taught by master professors available in audio and video. They look expensive at first, but (a) every course goes on a huge sale at least once during the year, at 70% off or so, and (b) if you go for downloadable audio, it costs less than the CDs. Create an account there and they'll send you email about their sales.

Highly recommended from there: Bob Brier's History of Ancient Egypt, and John McWhorter's Story of Human Language (McWhorter is a PoC, so bonus!), and pretty much anything over in Music by Robert Greenberg. But they're all a cut above your typical professor.


Podcasts:

The Skeptic's Guide to the Universe is often interesting (and sometimes not).

If you like reading books about the mechanics of writing, you might like the Writing Excuses podcast.

I advise checking KERA's Think podcast every week or so: it's a Dallas NPR staion production and Krys Boyd is one of the best interviewers I've ever heard (especially because she actually reads the books before interviewing the authors, unlike a lot of talk show hosts). It's 45-minute-long interview with someone interesting, an author of fiction or nonfiction, an artist, a scientist, someone who's giving a talk in town, etc. They only keep the past 10 podcasts online, but they frequently post shows from the archives, when Boyd is taking a break.

Dan Carlin's Hardcore History is fascinating. Warning: I did spend all of Show 32 thinking "Huh. I wonder what oyceter has to say about that?" but if you avoid that one -- it's been almost a year so I can't remember anything he said in it -- he should be fine.

I also like Skeptoid: Critical Analysis of Pop Phenomena.

My SEEKRIT WEAPON for falling asleep, when my brain is whirling and I can't stop long enough to fall asleep .... Mark Crislip's Persiflagers Infectious Disease Puscast. It's a review of the literature in infectious disease for the past two weeks, and if you can't fall asleep while listening to that ... well, maybe you'll learn something. :) Crislip also has a snarky podcast called QuackCast that rails against homeopathy and other alternate medicine (you might have noticed I have a strong skeptic streak!), which you may or may not like depending on your attitude towards the subject matter, but that's mostly kept out of the literature review. Although he does crack bad jokes periodically.

[oyceter]

Oooo, I hadn't realized McWhorter was POC! excellent!

All those things sound excellent and geeky, yay!