Audiobook Listeners — Log into the library catalog ASAP and request Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman (pronounced GAY-mun). It is performed to pitch-perfect perfection by Lenny Henry, an English comedian and actor.
In Anansi Boys, dull Fat Charlie Nancy is engaged to be married and has a boring office job in London. When his estranged father dies, strange things start happening. Fat Charlie’s charismatic brother Spider shows up unexpectedly with his odd, inexplicable powers of suggestion and creation. For Fat Charlie, his brother’s arrival is like an entrance to another world — one that includes creatures out of African folklore and ghosts.
According to the library’s Biography Resource Database, audiobook reader Lenny Henry won the 2003 British Comedy Awards Lifetime Achievement Award, among many others. His male and female voices are all immediately distinguishable from each other and complement Gaiman’s dry wit and writing style. On a side note, he recently appeared as a shrunken head in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.
Preview the audiobook at HarperCollins here.
[…] 2009, was when I posted my first book review. Fittingly for June (June Is Audiobook Month), it was a review of the absolutely amazing audiobook, Anansi Boys by Neil Gaiman, narrated by Lenny Bruce. It was so good that I had to tell people about it and I […]
Just finished this today! LOVED it and thought that you were the one that also enthusiastically endorsed it to me oh-so-long ago.
It’s still my # 1 for best audiobook ever, even all these years later!