Bookshop Santa Cruz

The Refrigerator Monologues

By: Catherynne M. Valente

Narrated by: Karis A. Campbell

Length: 4 hours 48 minutes

Abridged: No

The lives of six female superheroes and the girlfriends of superheroes. A ferocious riff on women in superhero comics.



From the New York Times bestselling author Catherynne Valente comes a series of linked stories from the points of view of the wives and girlfriends of superheroes, female heroes, and anyone who's ever been "refrigerated": comic... Read more

The Book of Lost Things

By: John Connolly

Narrated by: Steven Crossley

Length: 10 hours 59 minutes

Abridged: No

High in his attic bedroom, twelve-year-old David mourns the loss of his mother. He is angry and he is alone, with only the books on his shelf for company. But those books have begun to whisper to him in the darkness, and as he takes refuge in the myths and fairytales so beloved of his dead mother he finds that the real world and the fantasy... Read more

In the House in the Dark of the Woods

By: Laird Hunt

Length: 5 hours 20 minutes

Abridged: No

The eerie, disturbing story of one of our perennial fascinations -- witchcraft in colonial America -- wrapped up in a lyrical novel of psychological suspense.

"Once upon a time there was and there wasn't a woman who went to the woods." In this horror story set in colonial New England, a law-abiding Puritan woman goes missing. Or perhaps she has... Read more

Why Religion?

By: Elaine Pagels

Narrated by: Lynde Houck

Length: 7 hours 11 minutes

Abridged: No

Why is religion still around in the twenty-first century? Why do so many still believe? And how do various traditions still shape the way people experience everything from sexuality to politics, whether they are religious or not? In Why Religion? Elaine Pagels looks to her own life to help address these questions.These questions took on a new... Read more

All You Can Ever Know

By: Nicole Chung

Narrated by: Janet Song

Length: 6 hours 42 minutes

Abridged: No

Nicole Chung was born severely premature, placed for adoption by her Korean parents, and raised by a white family in a sheltered Oregon town. From childhood, she heard the story of her adoption as a comforting, prepackaged myth. She believed that her biological parents had made the ultimate sacrifice in the hope of giving her a better life, that... Read more

Loathe at First Sight

By: Suzanne Park

Narrated by: Greta Jung

Length: 9 hours 46 minutes

Abridged: No

“Bursts with humor, heart, and great energy. I loved it! Park is a hilarious new voice in women’s fiction.”—Helen Hoang, author of The Kiss Quotient “[A] punchy adult debut set in the world of video game design. Park makes tough topics go down easy by couching them in wry humor and lighthearted romance, and her fierce, snarky heroine is... Read more

Zero Sum Game

By: S. L. Huang

Narrated by: Lauren Fortgang

Length: 11 hours 42 minutes

Abridged: No

A blockbuster, near-future science fiction thriller, S.L. Huang's Zero Sum Game introduces a math-genius mercenary who finds herself being manipulated by someone possessing unimaginable power…

Cas Russell is good at math. Scary good. The vector calculus blazing through her head lets her smash through armed men twice her size and dodge every... Read more

Deathless

By: Catherynne M. Valente

Narrated by: Kim de Blecourt

Length: 11 hours 21 minutes

Abridged: No

Koschei the Deathless is to Russian folklore what devils or wicked witches are to western European culture: a menacing, evil figure; the villain of countless stories that have been passed on through story and text for generations. But Koschei has never before been seen through the eyes of Catherynne Valente, whose modernized and transformed take... Read more

The Turquoise Ledge

By: Leslie Marmon Silko

Narrated by: Alma Cuervo

Length: 10 hours 42 minutes

Abridged: No

Leslie Marmon Silko established herself as "the finest prose writer of her generation" (Larry McMurtry) with her debut novel Ceremony, one of the most acclaimed works of the 20th century. Of mixed Laguna Pueblo, Cherokee, Mexican, and white heritage, Silko brings a unique perspective to her powerful works. In this deeply personal and spiritual... Read more

Lalani of the Distant Sea

By: Erin Entrada Kelly

Narrated by: LuLu Lam

Length: 6 hours 34 minutes

Abridged: No

“Fast-paced and full of wonder, this is a powerful, gripping must-read.”—Kirkus (starred review)“A lush and mysterious fable, full of beauty, full of wonder.”—Rebecca Stead, Newbery Medal–winning author of When You Reach MeNewbery Medalist Erin Entrada Kelly’s debut fantasy novel is a gorgeous, literary adventure about bravery, friendship,... Read more

The Book of Joan

By: Lidia Yuknavitch

Narrated by: Xe Sands

Length: 7 hours 10 minutes

Abridged: No

A New York Times Notable Book • BuzzFeed 50 Books We Can’t Wait to Read this Year • New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice • National Bestseller“Brilliant and incendiary.” — Jeff VanderMeer, New York Times Book Review""Stunning. . . . Yuknavitch understands that our collective narrative can either destroy or redeem us, and the outcome... Read more

Wannabe

By: Aisha Harris

Narrated by: Aisha Harris

Length: 7 hours 38 minutes

Abridged: No

BEST READS OF 2023: New York Times Book Review • USA Today • The Skimm • Bookpage • St Louis Post-Dispatch / BEST HOLIDAY GIFTS 2023: Publishers Weekly / MOST ANTICIPATED READS OF 2023: ELLE • The Millions • Essence “Aisha Harris is one of our smartest, most entertaining modern cultural critics (…) which might as well be parlance for, “Read me... Read more

Good Prose

By: Tracy Kidder & Richard Todd

Narrated by: Sean Pratt

Length: 5 hours 50 minutes

Abridged: No

Good Prose is an inspiring book about writing—about the creation of good prose—and the record of a warm and productive literary friendship. The story begins in 1973, in the offices of the Atlantic Monthly, in Boston, where a young freelance writer named Tracy Kidder came looking for an assignment. Richard Todd was the editor who encouraged him,... Read more

Never Met a Duke Like You

By: Amalie Howard

Narrated by: Mary Jane Wells

Length: 10 hours 31 minutes

Abridged: No

Clueless meets Bridgerton in this spicy opposites-attract Regency romance told with “self-assured style, wit, and energy” (Lisa Kleypas, New York Times bestselling author). Lady Vesper Lyndhurst is beautiful, clever, and popular. Afforded every luxury as a duke’s daughter, she fills her days with friends, intrigues, and a self-professed knack... Read more

Your Heart Is a Muscle the Size of a Fist

By: Sunil Yapa

Narrated by: Aaron Landon

Length: 8 hours 40 minutes

Abridged: No

This electrifying novel from an award-winning author follows a grieving father and son as they find themselves on opposite sides of a protest during an important moment in history.

Grief-stricken after his mother's death and three years of wandering the world, Victor is longing for a family and a sense of purpose. He believes he's found both... Read more

River of Stars

By: Guy Gavriel Kay

Narrated by: Simon Vance

Length: 20 hours 49 minutes

Abridged: No

“River of Stars is a major accomplishment, the work of a master novelist in full command of his subject.”—Michael Dirda, in The Washington Post

“Game of Thrones in China.”—Salon.com

Ren Daiyan was still just a boy when he took the lives of seven men while guarding an imperial magistrate. That moment on a lonely road changed his life in entirely... Read more

Killing Commendatore

By: Haruki Murakami

Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne

Length: 28 hours 24 minutes

Abridged: No

The epic new novel from the internationally acclaimed and best-selling author of 1Q84

In Killing Commendatore, a thirty-something portrait painter in Tokyo is abandoned by his wife and finds himself holed up in the mountain home of a famous artist, Tomohiko Amada. When he discovers a previously unseen painting in the attic, he unintentionally... Read more

Sophie's Squash

By: Pat Zietlow Miller

Narrated by: Elizabeth Morton

Length: 7 minutes

Abridged: No

On a trip to the farmers' market with her parents, Sophie chooses a squash, but instead of letting her mom cook it, she names it Bernice. From then on, Sophie brings Bernice everywhere, despite her parents' gentle warnings that Bernice will begin to rot. As winter nears, Sophie does start to notice changes.... What's a girl to do when the squash... Read more

The Souls of Yellow Folk

By: Wesley Yang

Narrated by: David Shih

Length: 6 hours 35 minutes

Abridged: No

One of the most acclaimed essayists of his generation, Wesley Yang writes about race and sex without the jargon, formulas, and polite lies that bore us all. His powerful debut, The Souls of Yellow Folk, does more than collect a decade's worth of cult-reputation essays—it corrals new American herds of pickup artists, school shooters, mandarin... Read more

The Book of Madness and Cures

By: Regina O'Melveny

Narrated by: Katherine Kellgren

Length: 10 hours 24 minutes

Abridged: No

Dr. Gabriella Mondini, a strong-willed, young Venetian woman, has followed her father in the path of medicine. She possesses a singleminded passion for the art of physick, even though, in 1590, the male-dominated establishment is reluctant to accept a woman doctor. So when her father disappears on a mysterious journey, Gabriella's own status in... Read more

The Marriage Pact

By: Linda Lael Miller

Narrated by: Jack Garrett

Length: 10 hours 2 minutes

Abridged: No

The women of Bliss County are ready to meet the men of their dreams! See how it all begins in this enthralling new series by #1 New York Times bestselling author Linda Lael Miller Ten years ago, Hadleigh Stevens was eighteen and this close to saying "I do," when Tripp Galloway interrupted her walk down the aisle. Now that she's recovered from... Read more

Enchantments

By: Mya Spalter

Narrated by: Mya Spalter

Length: 4 hours 48 minutes

Abridged: No

A wise, witchy, and welcoming guide to living life magically

Mya Spalter has spent years among candles, herbs, cats, and spells as an employee at New York City’s oldest occult shop, Enchantments. Since it would get crowded in there if all of you visited, this audiobook will be your guide to its secrets and stories; in the process, Mya will... Read more

Believing

By: Anita Hill

Narrated by: January LaVoy

Length: 10 hours 43 minutes

Abridged: No

“An elegant, impassioned demand that America see gender-based violence as a cultural and structural problem that hurts everyone, not just victims and survivors… It's at times downright virtuosic in the threads it weaves together.”—NPR

Winner of the 2022 ABA Silver Gavel Award for Books 

From the woman who gave the landmark testimony against... Read more

You

By: Austin Grossman

Narrated by: Will Collyer

Length: 13 hours 15 minutes

Abridged: No

When Russell joins Black Arts games, brainchild of two visionary designers who were once his closest friends, he reunites with an eccentric crew of nerds hacking the frontiers of both technology and entertainment. In part, he's finally given up chasing the conventional path that has always seemed just out of reach. But mostly, he needs to know... Read more