Armchair Audies Category Report: Literary Fiction

Time for me to get all judgemental for the Armchair Audies! Herein is my opinion about the Audies 2013, Literary Fiction category. The nominees are:
(note: if you click the "Read the review" links below, you'll get to a site with a sound sample of the book, too.)

REMEMBER BEN CLAYTON Stephen Harrigan Read by George Guidall (Recorded Books) Read the review
HEFT Liz Moore Read by Kirby Heyborne, Keith Szarabajka(Blackstone Audiobooks) Read the review
BRING UP THE BODIES Hilary Mantel Read by Simon Vance (Macmillan Audio) Read the review
THE REMAINS OF THE DAY Kazuo Ishiguro Read by Simon Prebble (Tantor Media) Read the review
THE END OF THE AFFAIR Graham Greene Read by Colin Firth (Audible, Inc.) Read the review

Last year when I participated in this fun venture for the Teens and Narration by Author categories, I set this as my criteria: The Audies site says only that the awards recognize "distinction in audiobooks and spoken word entertainment," which is a pretty broad basis for judging. Production values, narrative technique, ability to engage the listener, preferably in a way that makes listening to a title even better than reading it would be - it's all part of the package, in my opinion. Balancing that, is just that ephemeral thing: what I like. 

So it's easy for me to say: NOT Remember Ben Clayton. This is the first book in, oh, ages and ages that I haven't finished. I did give it 5 discs (out of 14) before I gave up, so I listened to about as much of Guidall's narration as I did of the shorter books in this category. I can say that I wouldn't have gotten further in the print book - it wasn't the narration that failed. The book is not interesting. It tries, and it fails, to sweep me into a grand historical setting with wars and travel and artists and lonesome cowboys with mysterious kidnapped-by-Comanches pasts. (See, so many elements! And yet they just didn't speak to each other, or to me.) Guidall handled it all just fine, but he never seemed any more enthusiastic about the material than I was, and it was neither distinctive nor entertaining, if I'm using the APA's criteria. 

4th place in this category, but leaps and bounds and tall buildings and maybe a couple of complete cityscapes above the Harrigan is Heft. I definitely enjoyed Moore's tale which gradually - delightfully gradually - pulls together two unlikely recluses. Kel and Arthur are both intriguing characters, and Heyborne and Szarabajka (in particular) bring a lot of life to them. There's something, though, and I'm annoyed with my inability to articulate it, that was just enough 'off' for me about the book that I opted against writing about it at the time I read it. And for months afterwards - even though it was highlighted in my spreadsheet as one that I intended to review. I think it's the fact that I heard so much buzz about Moore's novel, lots of positive noise, so I was expecting to be wowed. I wasn't wowed. I LIKE it. I'd encourage you to pick it up - I know Arthur will stick with you and alter your brainwaves a little - but I wasn't wowed. So as distinctive as Szarabajka was, and as proficient as Heyborne was, they didn't elevate the book beyond the text. I could read this in print and not always have their voices in my head, which I just can't do with the top 3 in this category.

Since I can't decide, and it's my blog and I'll do what I want, I'm declaring a 2nd place tie between The End of the Affair and The Remains of the Day. I reviewed both of these here in March, so I won't rehash too much, but I'll tell you this: YUM! Both of these older books are so well-written, and you should all read them right now. Or better yet, listen to them, because Firth and Prebble both bring such life to their narrations. Distinctive? Check! (I definitely can't read either of these without hearing the narrators' voices in my head.) Entertaining? Double check! (Firth is sneakily calm about the emotions in Greene's novel, and Prebble just revels in the reserve and fish-out-of-waterness of Ishiguro's butler.) These are both real treats to listen to, and I wouldn't have without the Armchair Audies project, so I'm very glad to be able to tell you how great they are.

And that means the winner, by another little hop over a skyscraper, is Bring Up the Bodies. (And I do NOT know what is wrong with me, not to have blathered on and on about Mantel's novels here. I blather on about them elsewhere - both of her Cromwell novels won the Booker, and I was very into them for the past couple Tournament of Books. Somehow I never mentioned them here. So, first of all, such gorgeous language, such complex but fascinating characters with tricks and twists and an amazing grasp of Cromwell's times. Mantel writes the HELL out of her subject, and I will devour the third as eagerly as I did the first two, I'm sure. And as long as Vance is the narrator, I'll devour it via audio, too. He is a magician with this material - and no, I'm not just saying that because of my long-standing devotion to the guy's voice! This narration just proves how right I am to follow Vance from genre to genre - he has that quality that makes the listener eager to hear what else he's done. The voice differentiations here were particularly well-done, each person not only distinct, but perfectly suited to the character. I was distinctively entertained, and 24 hours of listening flew by. This is the clear winner, and I do hope that the APA agrees come awards night.

Introspective Narration and Perfect Butlers

The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro
(Originally published 1989, this version Tantor Media, 2012)
Format: Audio download via library (narrated by Simon Prebble)

From Goodreads: "The Remains of the Day is a profoundly compelling portrait of the perfect English butler and of his fading, insular world in post-war England. At the end of his three decades of service at Darlington Hall, Stevens embarks on a country drive, during which he looks back over his career to reassure himself that he has served humanity by serving 'a great gentleman.' But lurking in his memory are doubts about the true nature of Lord Darlington's 'greatness' and graver doubts about his own faith in the man he served."

Claim to fame: The hubby and I went to the same grad school writing program as Ishiguro. (Probably this means one of us will at least be shortlisted for the Man Booker soon.) (Not me, though - darn Americanness. But Robert is in with a chance.) Anyway, I love his work, and devoured The Remains of the Day a couple of decades ago. It stuck with me, and I found it just as fresh and engaging listening to Prebble's narration, which is up for an Audies award in Literary Fiction. 

Prebble is the second Simon in my audio-loving-heart, but it's not a large leap between the two. He's got quite the aristo quality to his voice, which suits all of the Stephanie Laurens Regency romances he reads to me, as well as this tale of Stevens the butler who wants, above all things, to be the paragon of his trade. (Indeed, Stevens goes into some detail about cultivating his accent, which differentiated him from his butler father, whom he otherwise held up as a shining example of the role.) This is one of those books where a hell of a lot more happens inside the protagonist's head than in his actions, although it is due to the journey Stevens undertakes that he is finally reflecting on some aspects of his life and career.

It is 1956, and Stevens has been butling at Darlington Hall for several decades. His new employer is an American gentleman, but most of his service was to Lord Darlington, who was a big name on the international political stage between the wars. Unfortunately for Stevens, his sympathies weren't the ones that the rest of the country ended up holding. One of the things Stevens has to negotiate within himself is the extent to which he can feel that he was a Great Butler, given the ignominious cloud under which Lord Darlington died. Stevens also struggles with recollections about his relationship with his father, and with the former housekeeper he's on his way to visit. Very small moments resonate for years, and as Stevens begins to understand them in a different light, he also begins to settle into some new ideas about himself. It's absolutely full of subtle tension and heartbreak.

Prebble imbues each moment with those quiet emotions, carrying us along Stevens's road all the way. I loved how fully inhabited he was in Ishiguro's voice, how completely present he was in the narrative. This was a great pairing of book with narrator, and I'd recommend it to, like, everyone.