The Wild Robot (The Wild Robot #1), by Peter Brown (author), Kate Atwater (narrator)

Hachette Audio, ISBN 9781478909002, April 2016

Roz is a robot, being shipped to her intended destination, when a storm wrecks the ship that she and the other robots bound for the same destination. Their crates sink, or break up on the rocks, and Roz's is the only one that washes ashore on an island.

Some otters find the crate, and, being curious critters, they investigate, and accidentally press the button that turns her on. Roz sees the world for the first time in a place she was never meant to be, with a large database of information, and no instructions on what she's supposed to do. The otters are scared off when she speaks, and are no source of help in figuring things out.

Black Holes: The Key to Understanding the Universe, by Brian Cox (author), Jeff Forshaw (author, narrator)

HarperAudio, ISBN 9780062936721, March 2023

In this book, read by Jeff Forshaw, Forshaw and Brian Cox discuss black holes, and how they affect every part of our universe, and indeed are key to understanding the physics and history of our universe.

Black holes are famously where general relativity and quantum physics meet but can't be made to work together. Is relativity wrong? is quantum physics wrong? So far, they each enable serious discoveries in their fields. They don't seem to be wrong. We most likely are just missing something important.

The House in the Cerulean Sea (Cerulean Chronicles #1), by T.J. Klune (author), Daniel Henning (narrator)

Macmillan Audio, ISBN 9781250264299. March 2020

Linus Baker is a case worker for the Department in Charge of Magical Youth, a..k.a. DICOMY. He's been doing it for 17 years, is carefully attentive to the regulations, and believes what he's doing--including maintaining distance from the children in the orphanages--is helping to keep the children safe. The orphanages are generally rather stark, and often rundown, but Linus's inspection visits help keep them from being abusive. He has not hesitated to recommend closure of orphanages where he finds the children are being mistreated.

Linus isn't popular at work, or for that matter anywhere. He lives a quiet life, is devoted to his work, loves his old record albums played on his even older Victrola, and cares for his rather cranky cat. It's quite a surprise when, at work, he is summoned to a meeting with Extremely Upper Management, to be given a highly classified assignment. He is to visit the Marsyas Island Orphanage, where there are six very dangerous children.

Summon the Keeper (Keeper's Chronicles #1), by Tanya Huff

DAW, 2005 (original publication May 1998)

Claire Hansen is a Keeper, one of the select few charged with ensuring the universe stays properly knitted together and in one piece. She's been summoned to her latest mission, along with her cat, Austin.

Austin is a handsome, dignified, tuxedo cat--who talks. He's very opinionated, and dedicated, firstly to protecting Claire, and secondly, to protecting the continued stable existence of the universe.

The place they've been summoned to is a rundown bed & breakfast called the Elysian Fields Guesthouse, run by an unpleasant old man who grudgingly checks her in and assigns her a room. Dean, the handsome young handyman, takes her luggage up, and, still with no clear idea of where the "hole" she'll need to fix is, she goes to sleep.

The Undermining of Twyla and Frank (Hart & Mercy #2), by Megan Bannen (author), Nicol Zanzarella (narrator)

Hachette Audio, ISBN 9781668642139, July 2024

Twyla Banneker and Frank Ellis lived next door to each other for years, in the town of Eternity, on the island of Tanria. Along with their spouses, they've been friends for years. But Twyla's husband died, and Frank's wife left him, and their children are all grown.

They're still friends, and still living next door. In fact, they are now both Tanrian marshals, Frank with two more years of service than Twyla. They're also regarded as a very cute couple by everyone but themselves.

They are tasked with patrolling the dangerous area that was the former prison of the Old Guards, and they love their rather exciting work. Twyla found it a welcome break from being a mother and perceived as nothing else.

Except it's not so dangerous, or so exciting, anymore. The creatures called drudges have been eliminated, and the old prison territory is much, much safer.

They're spending a lot more time doing, essentially, community outreach.

Galileo: Science, Faith, and the Catholic Church, by Guy Consolmagno (author, narrator)

Now You Know Media, Inc., January 2015

Galileo is the favorite example of how religion generally, and the Catholic Church in particular, hates science. It's trotted out as proof whenever the subject is raised.

Have you ever asked yourself why other, equally impressive, examples of the Catholic Church's hostility to science aren't also used? Yeah, it's because there aren't others. The Church learned from the Galileo mistake. It wasn't Rome that denounce Darwin's theory of evolution. It was some Protestant churches that were scandalized by it. The first pope to speak about evolution was Pius XII, in 1950. He said that there wasn't enough evidence yet to accept it as a proven doctrine, but there was nothing in it that inherently contradicted Catholic doctrine. The Catholic Church has never favored strictly literal reading of the Bible, including Genesis, and this makes flexibility of mind on certain scientific issues and how they interact with faith rather easier.

The First Fossil Hunters: Paleontology in Greek and Roman Times, by Adrienne Mayor (author), Donna Postel (narrator)

Tantor Media, ISBN 9781705276761, February 2021 (original publication April 2000)

I'm not sure it should really surprise me, but the Greeks, Romans, and other ancient cultures did a fair amount of paleontology.

Now, they didn't have our dating techniques, so while they had a good sense that Earth was old, and that the bones they found were from creatures that existed before us and were now gone, they had no idea how old, and didn't necessarily have a good sense of what came before what.

They also couldn't reliably tell what bones belonged with which other bones in the more jumbled and confused fossil sites. Earthquakes exposed a lot of fossils, but also jumbled them together.

Constituent Service: A Third District Story, by John Scalzi (author), Amber Benson (narrator)

Audible Audio, October 2024

Ashley Perrin is the fresh out of college new hire as the community services liaison for the city's Third District--the only district where the human citizens are the minority. The majority are aliens from a wide variety of alien worlds.

This includes all her coworkers in the Third District office, one of whom is a potted plant, whose assistant is very froglike in appearance. Oh, and she and her coworkers will go out for karaoke night. She'll have to sing. It's the traditional initiation.

But first, there's her first round of complaints and service requests.

Translation State (Imperial Radch), by Ann Leckie (author), Adjoah Andoh (narrator)

Orbit, ISBN 9781549164835, June 2023

Qven is a junior, that is, not yet full adult, Presger translator. His only purpose is to learn human ways and language, match with an older, more experienced translator, and be an intermediary between the impossibly dangerous Presger and the human worlds. He's the pride of his Clade--until he starts to wonder if there might be a different life possible.

Enae has been hir grandmaman's household manager and aide, until grandmaman dies, and leaves hir not the house and the wealth believed to go with it, but a position as a junior diplomat, which includes the mission of finding the Presger translator who disappeared two centuries ago. That translator must be found, or at least returned to the Presger if found, because Presger translators are too dangerous to wander unsupervised through human societies.

The Dragon's Den (Warders #3), by Armen Pogharian (author), Michelle Babb (narrator)

Armen Pogharian, ISBN 9798868720390, November 2023

The Warders, the secret protectors of the city of Eridan, are facing a new danger. It's alarming enough when an agent working in another city is killed, and a magical artifact stolen. When the local head of the Thieves' Guild contacts the Warders, the message, and one of the messengers, is even more alarming.

The unexpected messenger is a rogue Shaulan assassin, Khelan, and the message concern a plot whose roots are in a centuries-old conflict between two groups of elves. A Chaotic Order sorceress is determined to gain control of the long-suppressed elven magic, and use it to seize power over the entire Federation of which Eridan is a part. 

My Teacher Flunked the Planet (My Teacher is an Alien: Book #4) by Bruce Coville (author, narrator), Rueby Wood (narrator), Full Cast Audio crew (narrators)

Full Cast Audio, ISBN 9781955324052, January 2023 (original publication June 1992)

Seventh-grader Peter Thompson and his friends, Susan Simpson and Duncan Dougal, have had some pretty startling experiences over the past year. For instance, several of their teachers have turned out to be aliens, on Earth to investigate our species and our culture. Along the way, they've experienced some pretty weird effects of the aliens' technology first-hand. Now they've been kidnapped by the aliens, and learned where all this has been headed.

The alien are trying to decide whether it's safe to let humans continue to advance our technology and emerge into the galaxy, or whether it would be the safer and wiser choice, given how violent we are even towards each other, to destroy us now before we can do any damage outside our own system. The consensus is tilting pretty heavily toward "wipe them out now."

The Counterfeit Count (Warders #2), by Armen Pogharian (author), Michelle Babb (narrator)

Armen Pogharian, September 2023

Adara is undergoing her field trial test, the final step in completing her preparation to become a full-fledged member of the Warders, the secret organization that protects Eridan. Geren has assigned her to secretly follow the coach of the Count of neighboring Cruese. She's shocked when she hears sword striking sword, and comes into view of the coach to see Geren fighting the Count's personal guard. Has he gone mad? Has he gotten sucked into Cruese's complex political conflicts? Is it the trickiest part of her test? Instead of finishing up her field trial, she now has a dangerous mystery to untangle.

How to Resist Amazon and Why: The Fight for Local Economies, Data Privacy, Fair Labor, Independent Bookstores, and a People-Powered Future! Danny Caine (author, narrator)

Pear Press, ISBN 9781732380394, April 2021

Danny Caine runs an independent, employee-owned bookstore, Raven Book Store, in Lawrence, Kansas. He's also an active small business advocate, and makes an excellent case that Amazon is destructive of small businesses, local economies, and fair business regulation and practices.

Some of the stories in here are funny and delightful; others are horrifying.

The Poisoned Princess (Warders #1), by Armen Pogharian (author), Michelle Babb (narrator)

Audiobooks Unleashed & Blackstone Publishing, ISBN 9798212152945, January 2022

Toran is a half-elven, half-barbarian young man, who has been raised by his elven uncle. It's only when an accident in a war game with friends briefly unleashes his barbarian battle rage that his uncle tells him the full truth of his heritage. It becomes important then because the elf supremacists (no, Pogharian doesn't use this loaded phrase; that's me) succeed in banishing him. Aside from contributing to his banishment, it also means he has a really useful inheritance from his dead father. 

His uncle sends him off to the city of Eridan, where elves and elf mixes are fairly common and accepted, with a letter of introduction to an old friend.

Chasm City (Revelation Space #0.5), by Alastair Reynolds (author), John Lee (narrator)

Tantor Media, ISBN 9781400179565, October 2009

Chasm City is set in Reynolds' Revelation Space universe, a century or so after the events of The Prefect and Elysium Fire. Or, put another way, some years after the end of the Belle Epoch, the golden age of the height of human civilization in the Yellowstone system, where Chasm City on the planetary surface, and the Glitter Band, made up of thousands of orbital habitats, offered the near-idyllic life of your choice, until the Melding Plague brought it crashing down.

The City Born Great (Great Cities #0.5), by N.K. Jemisin (author), Landon Woodson (narrator)

Macmillan Audio, ISBN 9781250773302, May 2020 (original publication 2016)

The process of a great city being born as a living city starts sooner than we might realize from just the birth itself. Living cities, actual and potential have enemies, and they need protectors.

This is a short story about one of New York's midwives, a young man about a decade earlier than the actual birth, coached--and coaxed--by Paolo, the avatar of San Paolo. He's a street painter, and a singer, and he'd really rather not have the responsibility, but the city calls to him, and enemy needs to be stopped.

The narration is wonderful, and the story is a lovely addition to the two books so far in the Great Cities series.

I bought this audiobook.

James Moriarty, Consulting Criminal, by Andy Weir (author), Graeme Malcolm (narrator)

Audible Studios, June 2017

I had no idea Andy Weir had written three short stories about Sherlock Holmes' nemesis, Professor James Moriarty. But here they are, narrated quite competently by Graeme Malcolm.

The stories themselves are also well-written and fun. At least, as long as you're okay with James Moriarty is, in fact, a very bad guy, and a cold-blooded killer.

It Takes Two to Tumble (Seducing the Sedgwicks #1) by Cat Sebastian(author), Joel Leslie (narrator)

HarperAudio, ISBN 9780062967190, August 2019

Ben Sedgwick, after an unconventional upbringing, is a country vicar in Regency England. He doesn't find this dull; he finds it comfortable and reassuring, allowing him to bring some order into the lives of the villagers he serves. Providing both spiritual comfort, and practical assistance and guidance when needed, gives a stability and a sense of usefulness to his life that life in his father's home didn't provide. He's also betrothed to his very good friend, Alice, who is lively, interesting, kind, helpful, and, since a bout of scarlet fever in the spring, unable to walk. This is a concern.

A Song of Comfortable Chairs (No.1 Ladies' Detective Agency #23), by Alexander McCall Smith (author), Lisette Lecat (narrator)

Recorded Books, ISBN 9781705047989, September 2022

There are signs of trouble in Mma Ramotswe's normally peaceful world. Mr. J.L.B.Matekoni made the disturbing suggestion that, with equality between the sexes now, there's no reason for her detective agency to be called the No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency. Mma Makutsi has ordered new stationery for the agency, with the letterhead redone in a way that could suggest to some that Mma Makutsi has somewhat higher qualifications than Mma Ramotswe. She also appears to be ordering a new, larger desk.

Lies Sleeping (Rivers of London #7), by Ben Aaronovitch (author), Kobna Holdbrook-Smith (narrator)

 

Penguin Audio, ISBN 9781984890757, November 2018

Lies Sleeping picks up after The Hanging Tree, and it's a continuation of that story, essentially the second half of the story. As much as you've been told not to read this series out of order, really don't read these two out of order. 

They've identified the Faceless Man; his name is Martin Chorley. Lesley May is his--assistant? Apprentice? She may have some residual loyalty to Peter Grant, but it may be only words, and if it isn't, he still can't trust it because she'll apply it in her own way.

Peter has also made some career progress. He's now Detective Constable Peter Grant, no longer a mere Patrol Constable.