The correct answer to the question "do #audiobooks count as reading?" is not a simple yes or no. It's "yes, now please stop gatekeeping".
audiobooks
I'm canceling my Audible subscription and have a few final credits to use. Seeking recommendations for #audiobooks .
Kinds of things I'm looking for:
* History, especially of places, people, and perspectives I didn't get in school in the USA
* Science fiction / fantasy
* Light reads for when everything is just too much
* Anything you think is extra remarkable
THE EYE OF THE WORLD Chapter 3: The Peddler
I've been putting away clothes that were LONG overdue for being put away (including a garbage bag of clothes from the move) and listening to The Hills of Tanchico (from #WheelOfTimeTVshow) on repeat bc it's been stuck in my head, when I suddenly realized: I could be listening to my audiobook!
Padan Fain you horrible creep, let's meet you!
@bookstodon #TheWheelOfTime #WheelOfTime #bookstodon #audiobookstodon #audiobooks #AmReading #AmReadingFantasy
I've finished: A Half-Built Garden by Ruthanna Emrys
A Half-Built Garden is the most Fediversial novel I've read.
The anarchists have won. The corporations and nation states have been sidelined. Most of the world is under the control of egalitarian communities that use an alternative network to achieve consensus and work to rehabilitate the climate change ravaged earth.
This is very much a slice of life novel in the vain of Becky Chambers, centered around a communal lgbtqia+ household. But as opposed to most slice of life novels there is a major crisis, and it falls upon this community to save the day.
Aliens have made first contact and they insist that the only way for technological species to survive is to leave their biospheres behind and build Dyson Swarms.
As their way of life comes under threat from without and within, Will the dandelion network survive? Will the power of decisions through discussion and consensus overcome manipulation and coercion.
A special aspect of the aliens is the importance they place on the place of children in society.
PS:
I didn't expect this novel to be so Jewish, what a delight.
@bookstodon @audiobooks
#ScienceFiction #FirstContact #Anarchism #lgbtq #Jewish #ClimateChange #bookstodon #AudioBooks
I've finished: Drunk on All Your Strange New Words by Eddie Robson
First of all, this is a wonderful mystery, lead by an amateur detective. Her flaws and awkward pursuit of the truth are what kept me glued to this novel.
While this is a novel about an alien embassy to earth, it is more a study of human culture than alien culture.
A climate change destabilized humanity deals badly with the soft power of an alien embassy's cultural attache.
Robson contrasts the aliens that are disinterested in digital media and humanity that is consumed by it. The telepathic aliens that find it hard to lie and obfuscate and the humans that can't stop.
https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/62f8f66e-e912-4afc-bd8e-efc4b38eecaa
@bookstodon @audiobooks
#ScienceFiction #mystery #AudioBooks #books
OMG! Kevin R Free is finishing recording the Pass the Salt Audiobook! The publisher said I can send people over for reviews! I'm gonna do that tomorrow so join my mailing list in the meantime. So excited! https://buttondown.com/weirdwriter #Audible #Free #Audiobook #Audiobooks #Books @bookstodon @bookstadon
more changes that I don't mind/that make sense:
in the books, we follow Mat and Rand from Whitebridge¹ to Caemlyn, and see their journey in farm chores, juggling/flute playing in inns for room and board, and Darkfriends trying to kill them (with a sprinkling of Rand reacting to using the One Power)
it definitely makes sense to elide all of that into doing chores at one inn and one Darkfriend trying to kill them and one instance of channeling (but no reactions), but I didn't realize until I read the book that the inn and the Darkfriend were inventions of the TV show ...
like I guess it makes sense not to do the Four Kings in Shadow story, if you're also introducing Thom Merrilin (and additionally doing the Aiel in a cage thing), bc that story was already kinda involved
1/x
¹ which is where Thom Merrilin tells them to run as a Fade is bearing down on him
@bookstodon #WheelOfTimeOnPrime #WheelOfTime #audiobookstodon #audiobooks #AmReading #AmReadingFantasy
Edited 67d ago
ELYAS!!!
@bookstodon #WheelOfTimeOnPrime #WheelOfTime #audiobookstodon #audiobooks #AmReading #AmReadingFantasy
Edited 68d ago
I've finished: City of Stairs by Robert Jackson Bennett
After I finished A Drop of Corruption, I was looking for more Robert Jackson Bennett.
City of Stairs is similar enough to the Shadow of the Leviathan Series to feel very familiar yet not so similar you feel like your reading the same story in a different location.
This time the female is the lead, but she isn't infallible, and the male partner is an uncannily capable muscle.
Like in the Leviathan novels, The story begins with a murder investigation that then reveals more and more about the world, the gods, the old imperial power and the new. Neither political system is admirable but our heroine intends to try and change things for the better.
The premise is also quite unique, What if the rebels found a way to kill the empire's gods? What would an empire that has lost not only its gods but everything that was powered by their miracles look like after decades of occupation?
https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/b092604c-3cdd-4088-9691-e3ce2d6d577d
@bookstodon @audiobooks
#fantasy #amReading #RobertJacksonBennett
#bookstodon #AudioBooks
📖 📻 **Does listening to an audiobook count as reading?**
🔗 https://www.boisestatepublicradio.org/2025-07-12/does-listening-to-an-audiobook-count-as-reading.
_What do you think?_
#Reading #Audiobooks #Books #Bookstodon @bookstodon
#Image attribution: Raysonho @ Open Grid Scheduler / Grid Engine, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons. Page URL: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:AudiobookLibrary.jpg.
📖 📻 **Does listening to an audiobook count as reading?**
🔗 https://www.npr.org/2025/07/12/nx-s1-5454723-e1/does-listening-to-an-audiobook-count-as-reading.
_What do you think?_
#NPR #Reading #Audiobooks #Books #Bookstodon @bookstodon
#Image attribution: Raysonho @ Open Grid Scheduler / Grid Engine, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons. Page URL: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:AudiobookLibrary.jpg.
I've finished: City of Blades by Robert Jackson Bennett
General Mulaghesh, the grizzled veteran is at the center of this Divine Cities novel.
This one is about the horrors of war, and the harm it does to the perpetrators as well as the victims.
As ancient and modern warfare come to ahead, can the cycle of violence be broken?
https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/a32241fc-48cd-499f-9192-1a631294f6da
@bookstodon @audiobooks
#fantasy #RobertJacksonBennett #amReading #bookstodon #AudioBooks
I've finished: Calypso by Oliver K. Langmead
This is a generation colony ship sci-fi novel.
One of the first scenes introduces a Terra-formed Mars. The technological hurdles have been solved. Overcoming technical issues inherent in such a grand project is not the subject of this novel.
It is not nature but human nature Calypso struggles with.
What form should such a colony take? What toll will such a project take on its crew?
Calypso is also a literary experiment, giving different view point characters different literary styles. Including a view point written entirely in verse. I enjoyed this aspect and applaud the audiobook Producers for using distinct narrators for the different viewpoints.
https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/3fa3baaf-5616-4dca-b251-affb0cc05a00
@bookstodon @audiobooks
#ScienceFiction #Colonization #books #bookstdon #AudioBooks
Most of you probably don't know that I narrate audiobooks, so I should probably bring that up more often, hmm?
I am not taking new contracts at this time as AI scrapes up public voices and destroys the field. But I still have a catalogue of past work that pays royalties. I narrate(d) romance as Eden Cavell (with a one-off novel as Alana Thicke), as well as non-fic under my own name.
Sales help me & my lovely indie authors. Check them out!
https://adaraastin.kit.com/223e08bb72
1/2 @audiobooks #Audiobooks
Edited 51d ago
I've finished: Raising Stony Mayhall by Daryl Gregory
A wonderful zombie novel for people that don't like the killing fest that is most zombie media.
Written in sections, each part explores new ideas about zombies, exploring their nature and treating them like an extreme type of marginalized people.
Each turn the story takes supplies an interesting new twist that takes you on a new path away from the cookie cutter version of the Zombie Apocalypse story.
I never expected to encounter a 5-Star Zombie novel.
https://app.thestorygraph.com/books/f9f7d019-aee2-4726-bdc3-8e69ffc78a15
@bookstodon @audiobooks
#SFF #zombies #amReading #bookstodon #AudioBooks
This reviewer on Audible knows the way to an audiobook narrator's heart! 🥰
@audiobooks @bookstodon
#Audiobook #Audiobooks #AudiobookNarrator #Review #Bookstodon
It's almost the end of the month & you know what that means!
It's a great time to boost your fave indie artists by buying from us, subscribing to our newsletters, reviewing our work, leaving a tip, etc.
Your support lets us keep making art for you. Thank you! 💋
PS You can find my audiobooks (and all my links) here: https://adaraastin.ck.page/87de3a4c9f
If you are an Audible member and you have credits leftover at the end of the month, why not treat yourself to a steamy audiobook? 💋
* Boosts appreciated *
@art @bookstodon @audiobooks
I've finished: The Book of Love by Kelly Link
What if one of those stupid YA scary movies about a bunch of teens finding an ancient artifact and waking an eldritch horror, was turned into an in depth slow-paced masterpiece.
Kelly Link spends so much time with each of the characters, we learn to know them and love them as people with their admirable and their annoying traits.
We see them through their own eyes and through the eyes of others.
We see them grow and make their own choices despite all of the magical interference.
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/208506916-the-book-of-love
@bookstodon @audiobooks
#fantasy #bookstodon #AudioBooks #AmReading
If you have never listened to my audiobooks before and don't know where to start, allow me to recommend The Giantess Slave by Amber Collins.
A female mad scientist kidnaps two party girls to create the ultimate instrument of her revenge: a 200-foot tall woman!
It's a scifi story with a light sapphic vibe that's the lowest heat of all my books -- it's far more suggestive than explicit and barely registers as PG-13.
It's also as campy as a 1950's drive-in movie.
And I had more fun than I know how to tell you doing the sexy mad scientist voice!
Bonus: for reasons I absolutely do not understand, several listeners have told me that they love to listen to this book to fall asleep to. Maybe my MILF-y Mad Scientist voice is soporific?
It's available through Amazon, Audible and Apple Books. You can hear a quick free sample in any of the listings!
@audiobooks @bookstodon @lgbtqbookstodon @scifi @sizestodon @smutstodon
#Audiobook #Audiobooks #Bookstodon #LGBTQbookstodon #Scifi #SizeFantasy #Macrophilia
In the mood for some high heat audiobooks? Check out the the erotica I narrate as Adara Astin. 💋
You can find them all on Amazon and Audible.
They are also on Apple Books, searchable by title (not by narrator name).
Content Advisory: These audiobooks are extremely spicy!
@audiobooks @smutstodon
