Thom Rivera has narrated 46 audiobooks on Listento.it by 58 authors, with an average listener rating of 4.2★ across 205 ratings. The most-rated is The House of the Spirits.
The Best Science Fiction of the Year, Volume 2
Summary
The second volume of a new best-of-the-year science fiction short story anthology edited by Hugo Award-winning editor Neil Clarke. First contact with a mysterious race of aliens reveals an unusual request; a family's pet dog comes to grips with the newly bestowed gift of human-like intelligence; a poet, in danger and alone on a distant world, makes unlikely allies; hundreds of years in the future, a famous hermit lives in the sea above the now-underwater Harvard University; former friends navigate unsteady peace between human refugees and the technologically superior race that saved them; in a future where human life can be infinitely extended through cybertronic rebirth, one woman declines immortality. For decades, science fiction has compelled us to imagine futures both inspiring and cautionary. Whether it's a warning message from a survey ship, a harrowing journey to a new world, or the adventures of well-meaning AI, science fiction inspires the imagination and delivers a lens through which we can view ourselves and the world around us. With The Best Science Fiction of the Year: Volume Two, award-winning editor Neil Clarke provides a year-in-review and 27 of the best stories published by both new and established authors in 2016. Table of contents: "The Visitor from Taured" by Ian R. MacLeod (Asimov's, September 2016) "Extraction Request" by Rich Larson (Clarkesworld, January 2016) "A Good Home" by Karin Lowachee (Lightspeed, June 2016) "Prodigal" by Gord Sellar (Analog, December 2016) "Ten Days" by Nina Allan (Now We Are Ten, edited by Ian Whates) "Terminal" by Lavie Tidhar (Tor.com, April 2016) "Panic City" by Madeline Ashby (CyberWorld, edited by Jason Heller and Joshua Viola) "Last Gods" by Sam J. Miller (Drowned Worlds, edited by Jonathana Strahan) "HigherWorks" by Gregory Norman Bossert (Asimov's, December 2016) "A Strange Loop" by T.R. Napper (Interzone, January/February 2016) "Night Journey of the Dragon-Horse" by Xia Jia (Invisible Planets, edited by Ken Liu) "Pearl" by Aliette de Bodard (The Starlit Wood, edited by Dominik Parisien and Navah Wolfe) "The Metal Demimonde" by Nick Wolven (Analog, June 2016) "The Iron Tactician" by Alastair Reynolds (Newcon Press) "The Mighty Slinger" by Tobias S. Buckell and Karen Lord (Bridging Infinity, edited by Jonathana Strahan) "They All Have One Breath" by Karl Bunker (Asimov's, December 2016) "Sooner or Later Everything Falls Into the Sea" by Sarah Pinsker (Lightspeed, February 2016) "And Then, One Day, the Air was Full of Voices" by Margaret Ronald (Clarkesworld, June 2016) "The Three Lives of Sonata James" by Lettie Prell (Tor.com, October 2016) "The Charge and the Storm" by An Owomoyela (Asimov's, February 2016) "Parables of Infinity" by Robert Reed (Bridging Infinity, edited by Jonathana Strahan) "Ten Poems for the Mossums, One for the Man" by Suzanne Palmer (Asimov's, July 2016) "You Make Pattaya" by Rich Larson (Interzone, November/December 2016) "Number Nine Moon" by Alex Irvine (F&SF, January/February 2016) "Things with Beards" by Sam J. Miller (Clarkesworld, June 2016) "Dispatches from the Cradle: The Hermit-Forty-Eight Hours in the Sea of Massachusetts" by Ken Liu (Drowned Worlds, edited by Jonathana Strahan) "Touring with the Alien" by Carolyn Ives Gilman (Clarkesworld, April 2016)
©2017 Neil Clarke (P)2020 Recorded Books
The Story of My Teeth
Summary
The story of "Highway" Sanchez - bon vivant, world traveler, auctioneer - and his teeth is like Johnny Cash meets Robert Walser in Mexico. "I was born in Pachuca, the Beautiful Windy City, with four premature teeth and my body completely covered in a very fine coat of fuzz. But I'm grateful for that inauspicious start because ugliness, as my other uncle, Euripides Lopez Sanchez, was given to saying, is character forming." Gustavo "Highway" Sanchez is a late-in-life world traveler, yarn spinner, collector, and legendary auctioneer. His most precious possessions are the teeth of the "notorious infamous", like Plato, Petrarch, and Virginia Woolf. Written in collaboration with the workers at a Jumex juice factory, The Story of My Teeth is an elegant, witty, exhilarating romp through the industrial suburbs of Mexico City and Luiselli's own literary influences.
©2015 Valeria Luiselli (P)2015 Blackstone Audio, Inc.
The Summer House
Summary
Accustomed to being used, a jack-of-all-odd-jobs is torn between desire and duty in a short story about loneliness and wounded love by Cristina Henríquez, the author of The Book of Unknown Americans. Alberto has been alone for the majority of his life, making his way as a restaurant worker and at the beck and call of wealthy and entitled Don Antonio. This time for hire, Alberto arrives at Antonio’s summer house prepared to attend to its regular maintenance. Instead he finds only Antonio’s heartbroken wife, Lola, and a task that could alter his loyalty to his employer forever. Cristina Henríquez’s The Summer House is part of Currency, a compounding collection of stories about wealth, class, competition, and collapse. If time is money, deposit here with interest. Read or listen in a single sitting.
©2021 Cristina Henríquez (P)2021 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.
Hipster Death Rattle
Summary
Hipsters are getting slashed to pieces in the hippest neighborhood in New York: Williamsburg, Brooklyn. While Detectives Petrosino and Hadid hound local gangbangers, slacker reporter Tony Moran and his ex, Magaly Fernandez, get caught up in a missing person’s case - one that might just get them hacked to death. Filled with a cast of colorful characters and told with sardonic wit, this fast-moving, intricately plotted novel plays out against a backdrop of rapid gentrification, skyrocketing rents, and class tension. New Yorkers and anyone fascinated with the city will love the story’s details, crafted like only a true native could. Entertaining to the last, this rollicking debut is sure to make Richie Narvaez a rising star on the mystery scene.
©2021 Richie Narvaez (P)2021 Dreamscape Media, LLC
November 22, 1963
Summary
As the fiftieth anniversary of President Kennedy's assassination draws near, the events of that fateful day will undoubtedly be on the minds of many throughout the world. Here Dean Owen curates a fascinating collection of interviews and thought-provoking commentaries from notable men and women connected to that notorious Friday afternoon. Those who worked closely with the president, civil rights leaders, celebrities, prominent journalists, and political allies are among the nearly one hundred voices asked to share their reflections on the significance of that day and the legacy left behind by John F. Kennedy. A few of the names include: Tom Brokaw, a young reporter in Omaha in 1963. Letitia Baldrige, former Chief of Staff to First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy. Congressman John Lewis, sole survivor of the "Big Six" black leaders who met the president after the March on Washington in August of 1963. Cliff Robertson, Academy Award - winning actor who portrayed JFK in PT 109. Rev. Billy Graham, evangelist. Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.; Walter Mondale, U.S Sentaor in 1984; Bob Schieffer, CBS News reporter.
©2013 Dean R. Owen. Foreword Copyright 2013 by Helen Thomas (P)2013 Audible, Inc.
Currency
Summary
Inequality. Influence. Fraud. Sabotage. These are the themes of great fiction and our modern economy. In this collection of short stories by some of today’s most scintillating writers, the rich get poorer and the poor get richer. Yeah, right! From the heartbreaking to the hilarious, here are eight instantly classic battles over currency, class, privilege - and social distance. SIMPLEXITY by Kiley Reid, read by Arden Cho A twenty-eight-year-old entry-level worker at a design firm navigates the microaggressive corporate landscape in a quick and delicious satire by Kiley Reid, the New York Times bestselling author of Such a Fun Age. I WOULD BE DOING THIS ANYWAY by Jia Tolentino, read by Kelly Marie Tran A razor-sharp short story about anonymity, mutual deception, and the perils of overexposure—debut fiction by Jia Tolentino, the New York Times bestselling author of Trick Mirror. REWARDS by Emma Cline, read by Helen Hunt Two women reflect on the value of their lives in a wry short story of male privilege and undeserved rewards by Emma Cline, the New York Times bestselling author of The Girls. CREWELWORK by Justin Torres, read by Wilson Cruz Poised between his lush introversion and the brutal realm of his every day, a young artist considers the price of precarity in this powerful short story by Justin Torres, the author of We the Animals. THE TOMORROW BOX by Curtis Sittenfeld, read by Eric Dane An unnervingly funny and sharply observant story about the privilege, class division, and purposeful lives of old friends by Curtis Sittenfeld, the New York Times bestselling author of Rodham. IF YOU ARE LONELY AND YOU KNOW IT by Yiyun Li, read by Malcolm Hillgartner He tends to his garden and bees. He keeps quiet. He avoids drama. Until one transgression causes an emotional adventure in this heartfelt short story by Yiyun Li, a PEN/Hemingway Award-winning author. ME AND CARLOS by Tom Perrotta, read by Jackson White A darkly comic short story about American class divides and coming-of-age regrets by Tom Perrotta, the New York Times bestselling author of Election and The Leftovers. THE SUMMER HOUSE BY Cristina Henríquez, read by Thom Rivera Accustomed to being used, a jack-of-all-odd-jobs is torn between desire and duty in a short story about loneliness and wounded love by Cristina Henríquez, the author of The Book of Unknown Americans.
©2020, 2021 Simplexity © 2021 by Kiley Reid. I Would Be Doing This Anyway © 2021 by Jia Tolentino. Rewards © 2020 by Emma Cline. Crewelwork © 2021 by Justin Torres. The Tomorrow Box © 2021 by Curtis Sittenfeld. If You Are Lonely and You Know It © 2021 by Yiyun Li. Me and Carlos © 2020 by Tom Perrotta. The Summer House © 2021 by Cristina Henríquez. (P)2020, 2021 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.