Grammy Awards Contenders

First round voting begins next week for the annual Grammy Awards, and nominations will be announced in November. Listen to these hopeful Grammy Awards contenders for Best Audio Book, Narration and Storytelling Recording, as well as Best Spoken Word Poetry Album.

Best Audio Book, Narration and Storytelling Recording

The Covenant of Water Oprah Book ClubThe Covenant of Water

Written by Abraham Verghese
Performed by Abraham Verghese
Published by Recorded Books

Oprah’s Book Club Pick • Instant New York Times Bestseller

From the New York Times–bestselling author of Cutting for Stone comes a stunning and magisterial epic of love, faith, and medicine, set in Kerala, South India, and following three generations of a family seeking the answers to a strange secret.

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The Need to be WholeThe Need to Be Whole: Patriotism and the History of Prejudice

Written by Wendell Berry
Performed by Nick Offerman
Published by Recorded Books

“America’s greatest philosopher on sustainable life and living.”—Chicago Tribune

The Need to Be Whole continues the work he began in The Hidden Wound (1970) and The Unsettling of America (1977), demanding a careful exploration of this hard, shared truth: The wealth of the mighty few governing this nation has been built on the unpaid labor of others.

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Did I Ever Tell You ThisDid I Ever Tell You This? A Memoir

Written by Sam Neill
Performed by Sam Neill
Published by Recorded Books

“Sam Neill’s lively, lovely book made me laugh out loud.”—Meryl Streep

In this unexpected memoir, written in a creative burst of just a few months in 2022, Sam Neill tells the story of how he became one of the world’s most celebrated actors, who has worked with everyone from Meryl Streep to Isabel Adjani, from Jeff Goldblum to Sean Connery, from Steven Spielberg to Jane Campion.

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TremendousTremendous: The Life of a Comedy Savage

Written by Joey “Coco” Diaz
Performed by Joey “Coco” Diaz
Published by Recorded Books

New York Times Bestseller

Outsider. Misfit. Criminal. Convict. . . . Movie star. Family man. Comedy legend. Joey Diaz has been called every name in the book (and then some). Now, for the first time, he shares the story of his unlikely rise to fame in his own words—with no punches pulled.

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A Court of Frost and Starlight (A Court of Thorns and Roses, Book 3.5)

Written by Sarah J. Maas
Performed by a full cast
Published by GraphicAudio

Cinematic Music • Sound Effects

A tender addition to the #1 New York Times bestselling Court of Thorns and Roses series by Sarah J. Maas, bridging the events of A Court of Wings and Ruin and upcoming audiobooks. A Court of Frost and Starlight explores the far-reaching effects of a devastating war and the fierce love between friends.

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Best Spoken Word Poetry Album

Trace EvidenceTrace Evidence: Poems

Written by Charif Shanahan
Performed by Charif Shanahan
Published by HighBridge Audio

Longlisted for the 2023 National Book Awards

“A truly magical achievement.”—Ocean Vuong

In Trace Evidence, the urgent follow-up to his award-winning debut Into Each Room We Enter without Knowing, Charif Shanahan continues his piercing meditations on the intricacies of mixed-race identity, queer desire, time, mortality, and the legacies of anti-Blackness in the US and abroad.

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