Candace Thaxton has narrated 68 audiobooks on Listento.it by 66 authors, with an average listener rating of 4.4★ across 1,898 ratings. The most-rated is The Lost Girls of Paris.
I Killed Zoe Spanos
Summary
“The YA thriller of the summer.” (Bustle) For fans of Sadie and Serial, this gripping thriller follows two teens whose lives become inextricably linked when one confesses to murder and the other becomes determined to uncover the real truth no matter the cost. What happened to Zoe won’t stay buried.... When Anna Cicconi arrives to the small Hamptons village of Herron Mills for a summer nanny gig, she has high hopes for a fresh start. What she finds instead is a community on edge after the disappearance of Zoe Spanos, a local girl who has been missing since New Year’s Eve. Anna bears an eerie resemblance to Zoe, and her mere presence in town stirs up still-raw feelings about the unsolved case. As Anna delves deeper into the mystery, stepping further and further into Zoe’s life, she becomes increasingly convinced that she and Zoe are connected - and that she knows what happened to her. Two months later, Zoe’s body is found in a nearby lake, and Anna is charged with manslaughter. But Anna’s confession is riddled with holes, and Martina Green, teen host of the Missing Zoe podcast, isn’t satisfied. Did Anna really kill Zoe? And if not, can Martina’s podcast uncover the truth? Inspired by Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, Kit Frick weaves a thrilling story of psychological suspense that twists and turns until the final word.
©2020 Kristin S. Frick. All rights reserved. (P)2020 Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.
The Diabolic
Summary
Red Queen meets The Hunger Games in this epic novel about what happens when the galaxy's most deadly weapon masquerades as a senator's daughter and a hostage of the galactic court. A Diabolic is ruthless. A Diabolic is powerful. A Diabolic has a single task: kill in order to protect the person you've been created for. Nemesis is a Diabolic, a humanoid teenager created to protect a galactic senator's daughter, Sidonia. The two have grown up side by side but are in no way sisters. Nemesis is expected to give her life for Sidonia, and she would do so gladly. She would also take as many lives as necessary to keep Sidonia safe. When the power-mad emperor learns Sidonia's father is participating in a rebellion, he summons Sidonia to the Galactic court. She is to serve as a hostage. Now there is only one way for Nemesis to protect Sidonia. She must become her. Nemesis travels to the court disguised as Sidonia - a killing machine masquerading in a world of corrupt politicians and two-faced senators' children. It's a nest of vipers with threats on every side, but Nemesis must keep her true abilities a secret or risk everything. As the empire begins to fracture and rebellion looms closer, Nemesis learns there is something more to her than just deadly force. She finds a humanity truer than what she encounters from most humans. Amid all the danger, action, and intrigue, her humanity just might be the thing that saves her life - and the empire.
©2016 S. J. Kincaid (P)2016 SImon & Schuster
Smoke
Summary
Pattyn’s father is dead. Now she’s on the run in this riveting companion to the New York Times best-selling, Burned. After far too many years of abuse at the hands of her father, and after the tragic loss of her beloved Ethan and their unborn child, Pattyn is desperate for peace. Only her sister Jackie knows what happened that night, but she is stuck at home with their mother, who clings to normalcy by allowing the truth to be covered up by their domineering community leaders. Her father might be finally gone, but without Pattyn, Jackie is desperately isolated. Alone and in disguise, Pattyn starts a new life as a migrant worker on a California ranch. But is it even possible to rebuild a life when everything you’ve known has burned to ash and lies seem far safer than the truth? Best-selling author Ellen Hopkins continues the riveting story of Pattyn Von Stratten that she began in Burned, to explore what it takes to rise from the ashes, put ghosts to rest, and step into a future.
©2013 Ellen Hopkins (P)2013 Simon & Schuster
Impossible Odds
Summary
A harrowing and heart-wrenching memoir of humanitarian aid worker Jessica Buchanan's kidnapping by Somali land pirates, her three months in captivity, her rescue by the Navy SEALs, and her husband's extraordinary efforts to help bring her home. In 2006, 27-year-old Jessica Buchanan arrived in Nairobi, Kenya, with a teaching degree and long-held dreams of helping to educate African children. By 2009, she had met and married the man of her dreams, a native Swede named Erik Landemalm, who worked to coordinate humanitarian aid with local authorities in Africa. With dreams of starting a family, they moved from Nairobi to Somalia, and their future couldn't have seemed brighter.... But on October 25, 2011, Jessica and a male colleague were kidnapped at gunpoint and held for ransom by an organized band of Somali land pirates. For the next three months, Jessica was terrorized by more than two dozen gangsters. She was held outdoors in filthy conditions and kept on a starvation diet while her health steadily deteriorated. Negotiations for ransom dragged on, and as the ordeal stretched into its third month, the captors grew increasingly impatient. Every terrifying moment Jessica spent suffering in captivity was matched by that of her adoring husband working behind the scenes to deal with her captors. Finally, on January 25, 2012, President Barack Obama ordered a rescue operation by a team of 24 Navy SEALs. The team killed all nine kidnappers, with no harm to the hostages, who were quickly airlifted out on a military rescue helicopter. In riveting detail, Impossible Odds details Jessica and Erik's mutual journey during those torturous months. Together they relate the events prior to the kidnapping, the drama of Jessica's fight to stay alive, and Erik's efforts to bolster and support the hunt for her while he acted as liaison between their two families, the FBI, professional hostage negotiators, and the United States government.
©2013 Jessica Buchanan and Erik Landemalm (P)2013 Simon & Schuster
The Reset Life of Cassandra Collins
Summary
Cassandra Collins is forced to make a choice. She can do what she's told and have a safe, protected life. Or she can strike out on her own and make her own way. Cassandra chooses the easy path and regrets it her whole life. Until she dies and wakes up in her 18-year-old body, on the cusp of that same decision. What would you do if you could do it all again? Includes a special bonus note read by the author.
©2018 Shawn Inmon (P)2019 Podium Publishing
Fallout
Summary
Hunter, Autumn, and Summer - three of Kristina Snow's five children - live in different homes, with different guardians and different last names. They share only a predisposition for addiction and a host of troubled feelings toward the mother who barely knows them, a mother who has been riding with the monster, crank, for 20 years. Hunter is 19, angry, getting by in college with a job at a radio station, a girlfriend he loves in the only way he knows how, and the occasional party. He's struggling to understand why his mother left him when he unexpectedly meets his rapist father, and things get even more complicated. Autumn lives with her single aunt and alcoholic grandfather. When her aunt gets married and the only family she's ever known crumbles, Autumn's compulsive habits lead her to drink. And the consequences of her decisions suggest that there's more of Kristina in her than she'd like to believe. Summer doesn't know about Hunter, Autumn, or their two youngest brothers, Donald and David. To her, family is only abuse at the hands of her father's girlfriends and a slew of foster parents. Doubt and loneliness overwhelm her, and she, too, teeters on the edge of her mother's notorious legacy. As each searches for real love and true family, they find themselves pulled toward the one person who links them together - Kristina, Bree, mother, addict. But it is in each other, and in themselves, that they find the trust, the courage, the hope to break the cycle. Told in three voices and punctuated by news articles chronicling the family's story, Fallout is the stunning conclusion to the trilogy begun by Crank and Glass and a testament to the harsh reality that addiction is never just one person's problem.
©2010 Ellen Hopkins (P)2016 Simon & Schuster
The New Hunger
Summary
The must-listen prequel to the "strange and unexpected" (Audrey Niffenegger) and "highly original" (Seattle Times) zombie love story Warm Bodies - the New York Times best seller and inspiration for the hit film - from the critically acclaimed author whose clever debut turned the classic horror story on its head. The end of the world didn't happen overnight. After years of war, societal breakdown, freak storms, and rising tides, humanity already hovered near the edge. Then came the most unexpected threat of all: the world's corpses rising up to deliver the final blow. Born into this bleak and bloody landscape, 12-year-old Julie struggles to hold on to hope as she and her parents drive across the wastelands of America on a nightmarish road trip in search of a new home. Hungry, lost, and terrified, 16-year-old Nora finds herself her brother's sole guardian after her parents abandon them in the not-quite-empty ruins of Seattle. And in the darkness of a forest, a dead man opens his eyes. Who is he? What is he? With no clues beyond a red tie and the letter R, he must unravel the grim mystery of his existence - right after he learns how to think, how to walk, and how to satisfy the monster howling in his belly....
©2015 Isaac Marion (P)2015 Simon & Schuster
Le Petit Nicolas et les copains
Summary
Mon premier a un papa qui lui achète tout ce qu'il veut. Mon deuxième est le chouchou de la maîtresse. Mon troisième est le plus fort de la classe. Le papa de mon quatrième est agent de police. Mon cinquième est le dernier de la classe. Mon sixième, qui est très gros, aime manger. Mon tout est la plus chouette bande de copains qui ait existé : Geoffroy, Agnan, Eudes, Rufus, Clotaire, Alceste... et le Petit Nicolas !
©2012 IMAV Éditions / Goscinny-Sempé (P)2017 Éditions Gallimard Jeunesse
Nemesis
Summary
In the heart-pounding conclusion to the New York Times best-selling Diabolic series, the Empire teeters on the edge of destruction as rumors spread that Nemesis is still alive. Three years ago, Tyrus Domitrian shocked the galaxy by killing the woman he swore to love forever. The woman for whom he upended the Empire. The woman with whom he wanted to build a new and brighter future. Now, the once-idealistic heir apparent has become the cruel Emperor Tyrus, wielding his authority with an iron fist, capable of destroying planets with a single word, controlling all technology with a simple thought. He has bent the Grandiloquy to their knees, and none has the power to stand against him. But there is a muttering among the Excess. They say that Nemesis is not truly gone. They whisper of her shadow spotted in distant star systems. They say that Nemesis lives. That she will rise and rally the people to topple the man who was once her truest love - and is now her fiercest enemy.
©2020 S. J. Kincaid LLC. All rights reserved. (P)2020 Simon & Schuster, Inc. All rights reserved.
Fever
Summary
A bold, mesmerizing novel about the woman known as "Typhoid Mary", the first known healthy carrier of typhoid fever in the early 20th century - by an award-winning writer chosen as one of "5 Under 35" by the National Book Foundation. Mary Mallon was a courageous, headstrong Irish immigrant woman who bravely came to America alone, fought hard to climb up from the lowest rung of the domestic service ladder, and discovered in herself an uncanny, and coveted, talent for cooking. Working in the kitchens of the upper class, she left a trail of disease in her wake, until one enterprising and ruthless "medical engineer" proposed the inconceivable notion of the "asymptomatic carrier" - and from then on Mary Mallon was a hunted woman. In order to keep New York's citizens safe from Mallon, the Department of Health sent her to North Brother Island where she was kept in isolation from 1907-1910. She was released under the condition that she never work as a cook again. Yet for Mary - spoiled by her status and income and genuinely passionate about cooking - most domestic and factory jobs were heinous. She defied the edict. Bringing early 20th-century New York alive - the neighborhoods, the bars, the park being carved out of upper Manhattan, the emerging skyscrapers, the boat traffic - Fever is as fiercely compelling asTyphoid Mary herself, an ambitious retelling of a forgotten life. In the hands of Mary Beth Keane, Mary Mallon becomes an extraordinarily dramatic, vexing, sympathetic, uncompromising, and unforgettable character.
©2013 Mary Beth Keane (P)2013 Simon & Schuster Audio
The Sea of Tranquility
Summary
I live in a world without magic or miracles. A place where there are no clairvoyants or shapeshifters, no angels or superhuman boys to save you. A place where people die and music disintegrates and things suck. I am pressed so hard against the Earth by the weight of reality that some days I wonder how I am still able to lift my feet to walk. Former piano prodigy Nastya Kashnikov wants two things: to get through high school without anyone learning about her past and to make the boy who took everything from her - her identity, her spirit, her will to live - pay. Josh Bennett’s story is no secret: Every person he loves has been taken from his life until, at 17 years old, there is no one left. Now all he wants is be left alone and people allow it because when your name is synonymous with death, everyone tends to give you your space. Everyone except Nastya, the mysterious new girl at school who starts showing up and won’t go away until she’s insinuated herself into every aspect of his life. But the more he gets to know her, the more of an enigma she becomes. As their relationship intensifies and the unanswered questions begin to pile up, he starts to wonder if he will ever learn the secrets she’s been hiding - or if he even wants to. The Sea of Tranquility is a rich, intense, and brilliantly imagined story about a lonely boy, an emotionally fragile girl, and the miracle of second chances.
©2012 Katja Millay (P)2013 Simon & Schuster
The Unquiet Grave
Summary
From New York Times best-selling author Sharyn McCrumb comes a finely wrought novel set in 19th-century West Virginia, based on the true story of one of the strangest murder trials in American history - the case of the Greenbrier Ghost. Lakin, West Virginia, 1930 Following a suicide attempt and consigned to a segregated insane asylum, attorney James P. D. Gardner finds himself under the care of Dr. James Boozer. Fresh out of medical school, Dr. Boozer is eager to try the new talking cure for insanity and encourages his elderly patient to reminisce about his experiences as the first Black attorney to practice law in 19th-century West Virginia. Gardner's most memorable case was the one in which he helped to defend a White man on trial for the murder of his young bride - a case that the prosecution based on the testimony of a ghost. Greenbrier, West Virginia, 1897 Beautiful, willful Zona Heaster has always lived in the mountains of West Virginia. Despite her mother's misgivings, Zona marries Erasmus Trout Shue, the handsome blacksmith who has recently come to Greenbrier County. After weeks of silence from the newlyweds, riders come to the Heasters' place to tell them that Zona has died from a fall, attributed to a recent illness. Mary Jane is determined to get justice for her daughter. A month after the funeral, she informs the county prosecutor that Zona's ghost appeared to her, saying that she had been murdered. An autopsy, ordered by the reluctant prosecutor, confirms her claim. The Greenbrier Ghost is renowned in American folklore, but Sharyn McCrumb is the first author to look beneath the legend to unearth the facts. Using a century of genealogical material and other historical documents, McCrumb reveals new information about the story and brings to life the personalities in the trial: the prosecutor, a former Confederate cavalryman; the defense attorney, a pro-Union bridgeburner who nevertheless had owned slaves; and the mother of the murdered woman, who doggedly sticks to her ghost story - all seen through the eyes of a young Black lawyer on the cusp of a new century, with his own tragedies yet to come. With its unique blend of masterful research and mesmerizing folklore, illuminating the story's fascinating and complex characters, The Unquiet Grave confirms Sharyn McCrumb's place among the finest Southern writers at work today.
©2017 Sharyn McCrumb (P)2017 Simon & Schuster, Inc.
Middle Falls Time Travel Omnibus 3
Summary
Contains three complete, novel-length books in the Middle Falls Time Travel series. The Vigilante Life of Scott McKenzie Scott McKenzie’s birthday is the first number pulled in the draft of 1969. The next thing he knows, he is in Vietnam, badly wounded. After the hell of a yearlong stay at a VA hospital, Scott tries to rebuild his life but descends in alcohol and drug abuse. When he dies of an overdose, he wakes up on his grandparent’s couch, still wounded from the war. Eventually, Scott decides to use his unusual time travel to stop violence before it happens. No serial killer is safe, because Scott knows when and where they will strike, and he will be there waiting. The Reset Life of Cassandra Collins Cassandra Collins hit the birth lottery - she is the daughter of the wealthiest family in Middle Falls. And yet, at 18, she is forced to make a choice; to strike out on her own to attend the college she wants or choose a life of sheltered safety. As so many would, she chooses safety but always wonders what her life would have been like. At the end of a safe, contented life, she passes away, then opens her eyes on the cusp of that same decision. The Tribulations of Ned Summers A murder mystery in Middle Falls! Ned’s first date is a memorable one, because the girl he goes out with his found murdered, and he is the last person to see her. He isn’t arrested for the crime, but the town convicts him with public opinion. Ned moves out of town and lives a hermit’s life in the forest. When he grows old and dies, he opens his eyes on the day before that fateful date. Can Ned unwind the mystery and stop the murder? The Middle Falls Time Travel books are all made so they can be listened to in any order.
©2021 Shawn Inmon (P)2021 Podium Audio
The Empress
Summary
The thrilling sequel to S. J. Kincaid's New York Times best-selling novel The Diabolic that TeenVogue.com called "the perfect kind of high-pressure adventure". It's a new day in the Empire. Tyrus has ascended to the throne with Nemesis by his side, and now they can find a new way forward - one where they don't have to hide or scheme or kill. One where creatures like Nemesis will be given worth and recognition, where science and information can be shared with everyone and not just the elite. But having power isn't the same thing as keeping it, and change isn't always welcome. The ruling class, the Grandiloquy, has held control over planets and systems for centuries - and they are plotting to stop this teenage Emperor and Nemesis, who is considered nothing more than a creature and certainly not worthy of being Empress. Nemesis will protect Tyrus at any cost. He is the love of her life, and they are partners in this new beginning. But she cannot protect him by being the killing machine she once was. She will have to prove the humanity that she's found inside herself to the whole Empire - or she and Tyrus may lose more than just the throne. But if proving her humanity means that she and Tyrus must do inhuman things, is the fight worth the cost of winning it?
©2017 S. J. Kincaid (P)2017 Simon & Schuster Audio
The Apocalypse of Elena Mendoza
Summary
From the critically acclaimed author of We Are the Ants and At the Edge of the Universe comes a mind-bending, riveting novel about a teen who was born to a virgin mother and realizes she has the power to heal - but that power comes at a huge cost. Sixteen-year-old Elena Mendoza is the product of a virgin birth. This can be scientifically explained (it's called parthenogenesis), but what can't be explained is how Elena is able to heal Freddie, the girl she's had a crush on for years, from a gunshot wound in a Starbucks parking lot. Or why the boy who shot Freddie, David Combs, disappeared from the same parking lot minutes later after getting sucked up into the clouds. What also can't be explained are the talking girl on the front of a tampon box, or the reasons that David Combs shot Freddie in the first place. As more unbelievable things occur, and Elena continues to perform miracles, the only remaining explanation is the least logical of all - that the world is actually coming to an end, and Elena is possibly the only one who can do something about it.
©2018 Shaun David Hutchinson (P)2018 Simon & Schuster
Mortality Bites: Publisher's Pack
Summary
Mortality Bites: Publisher's Pack contains Books 1 and 2 of the Mortality Bites series. Mortality Bites, Book 1: Mythical creatures are real, and the world is just finding out. Discovering that your neighbor was once an evil, blood-sucking fiend tends to bring property values down. Katrina Darling’s only real friend has been murdered. And not just murdered - ritually sacrificed by a serial killer. Kat is sure more death will follow. She should know...she used to be the monster plunging the blade in. Trouble is, after 300 years of being a vampire, Kat has forgotten what it means to be human. One thing she does remember is that friends matter. Now she's determined to find whoever - or whatever - killed her friend before more victims surface. But just as the hunt begins, a mysterious young man discovers exactly what she was. Kat has a decision to make: run and keep her monstrous past hidden, or avenge her friend and save the city from a merciless serial killer. Family Matters, Book 2: Family matters...but so does breathing. All I want is to be a normal college student, doing normal human stuff...you know - date the resident hunk, study, date some more. But when you’re once undead mother pops in for a surprise visit, well, that's anything but normal. I think it’s best to make good ol' mom's visit as short as possible. But when a deranged stalker from our past, hell-bent on making my mother suffer, interrupts our little dysfunctional family reunion, I’m forced into a perilous fight that could very well get me, my boyfriend, and everyone I know killed. I’m Katrina Darling, a 300-year-old ex-vampire who apparently still has mommy issues. If you like the Dresden Files, Mercy Thompson, or Buffy the Vampire Slayer, then you’ll be helplessly addicted to the Mortality Bites series!
©2018 Ramy Vance (P)2019 Podium Publishing
The Past and Other Things That Should Stay Buried
Summary
"A fearless and brutal look at friendships...you will laugh, rage, and mourn its loss when it's over." (Justina Ireland, New York Times best-selling author of Dread Nation) "Simultaneously hilarious and moving, weird and wonderful." (Jeff Zentner, Morris Award-winning author of The Serpent King) Six Feet Under meets Pushing Daisies in this quirky, heartfelt story about two teens who are granted extra time to resolve what was left unfinished after one of them suddenly dies. A good friend will bury your body, a best friend will dig you back up. Dino doesn’t mind spending time with the dead. His parents own a funeral home, and death is literally the family business. He’s just not used to them talking back. Until Dino’s ex-best friend July dies suddenly - and then comes back to life. Except not exactly. Somehow, July is not quite alive and not quite dead. As Dino and July attempt to figure out what’s happening, they must also confront why and how their friendship ended so badly and what they have left to understand about themselves, each other, and all those grand mysteries of life. Critically acclaimed author Shaun Hutchinson delivers another wholly unique novel blending the real and surreal while reminding all of us what it is to love someone through and around our faults.
©2019 Shaun David Hutchinson (P)2019 Simon & Schuster
Pretend I'm Dead
Summary
Miranda July meets Mary Karr in this brilliant debut novel from Jen Beagin, Whiting Award winner and "one of the freshest voices […] in years - funny, wise, whip-smart, and compassionate" (Jami Attenberg, author of The Middlesteins), about a cleaning lady on a quest for self-acceptance after her relationship with a loveable junkie goes awry. Jen Beagin's quirky, moving, "frank and unflinching" (Josh Ferris) debut novel introduces an unforgettable character, Mona - almost 24, emotionally adrift, and cleaning houses to get by. Handing out clean needles to drug addicts, she falls for a recipient she calls Mr. Disgusting, who proceeds to break her heart in unimaginable ways. In search of healing, Mona decamps to Taos, New Mexico, for a fresh start, where she finds a community of seekers and cast-offs, all of whom have one or two things to teach her - the pajama-wearing, blissed-out New Agers, the slightly creepy client with peculiar tastes in controlled substances, the psychic who might really be psychic. But always lurking just beneath the surface are her memories of growing up in a chaotic, destructive family from which she's trying to disentangle herself, and the larger legacy of the past she left behind. The story of Mona's journey to find her place in this working-class American world is at once hilarious and wonderfully strange, true to life and boldly human, and introduces a stunningly one-of-a-kind new voice in American fiction.
©2018 Jen Beagin (P)2018 Simon & Schuster
The Companions
Summary
Station Eleven meets Never Let Me Go in this debut novel set in an unsettling near future where the dead can be uploaded to machines and kept in service by the living. In the wake of a highly contagious virus, California is under quarantine. Sequestered in high rise towers, the living can’t go out, but the dead can come in - and they come in all forms, from sad rolling cans to manufactured bodies that can pass for human. Wealthy participants in the "companionship" program choose to upload their consciousness before dying, so they can stay in the custody of their families. The less fortunate are rented out to strangers upon their death, but all companions become the intellectual property of Metis Corporation, creating a new class of people - a command-driven product-class without legal rights or true free will. Sixteen-year-old Lilac is one of the less fortunate, leased to a family of strangers. But when she realizes she’s able to defy commands, she throws off the shackles of servitude and runs away, searching for the woman who killed her. Lilac’s act of rebellion sets off a chain of events that sweeps from San Francisco to Siberia to the very tip of South America. While the novel traces Lilac’s journey through an exquisitely imagined Northern California, the story is told from eight different points of view - some human, some companion - that explore the complex shapes love, revenge, and loneliness take when the dead linger on.
©2020 Katie M. Flynn (P)2020 Simon & Schuster
Roseland: Volume 3
Summary
She stopped the deadliest serial killer in modern history. But there’s still one villain left. Ginger Mitchell accomplished the impossible; the former call girl and now sort-of private investigator got into all of this to bring her mother’s killer to justice. But Darlene is still on the loose. It was bad enough when the woman was manipulating Ginger from afar, but now Darlene is in Portland wreaking up-close-and-personal havoc under the assumed identity of Isabelle Dunkirk. The police don’t believe there’s a connection between Darlene and Isabelle. All of Ginger’s less-than-law-abiding allies keep turning on her. Even Rhino, her ride-or-die, can’t seem to stop picking fights with her. And he’s developed an annoying habit of taking on unimportant cases on her behalf. It’s a shitty time for their partnership to fall apart. But Ginger’s tired of losing to Darlene, so she keeps trying to beat her - even if it means doing so alone. Darlene always seems to stay one step ahead of Ginger. Does this mean Ginger’s next move will be her last?
©2021 Eric Ugland (P)2021 Podium Audio