A great audiobook narrator, besides delivering words on a page, must be able to distinguish between character voices. Often times a full-cast production of an audiobook is quite expensive, and so when a book gets a narrator that can do the work of many, they go to the hall of fame as one of the best. Another great mark of the best audiobook narrators is how immersed they are able to keep you in the story through variations in their voice, tone, or style. This also nicely complements the third mark of a great narrator: how closely they keep up with the pacing of the work. Surely you do not want levity at a time when an intense psychological thriller is coming to its climax. Keeping all this in mind, here are some of the best audiobook narrators, who in my opinion, have been able to achieve all of the above. This is an entirely subjective list broken down by genre. A good narrator can make or break a story for the reader, and with many exceptional narrators, the yardstick for what constitutes best is sure to expand. Until then, you have this list to peruse to get your next great read. Just use Audible? Check out our list for the best audiobook narrators on Audible!
David Pittu
Something I have often seen male narrators do is be incredibly generic about the voices of women and children. I am never sure if this is intentional or if the narrator does not know better. Pittu does not fall into this trap.
Robin Miles
I have a rule of thumb in my life that has not let me down: if Robin Miles narrates it, then I am going to read it. Her narration transforms whatever she narrates. From historical fiction to nonfiction, there is little that she can read and not succeed at holding us all still. That is the true power of Juliet Stevenson as a narrator. Everything is fair game, from hefty classics like Middlemarch by George Eliot to historical fiction tomes like The Signature of All Things by Elizabeth Gilbert. There have been reads like Once Upon A River by Diane Setterfield, that I previously had no interest in reading, and Stevenson’s narration has made me give up my life to finish the book in one day. His narration of Deacon King Kong by James McBride was truly exceptional, making you feel like you are watching a movie without having to turn on the TV. He has also narrated works by Eric Jerome Dickey and Yaa Gyasi. Some of my favorites by her include Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens and Dark Places by Gillian Flynn. Where she truly shines, though, is in her narration of Turnout by Megan Abbott. Abbott’s works are 90% tense, and there is no one better to make it hop off the page than Campbell’s voice. Her narration of works like Persuasion by Jane Austen is superb, but one that I am excited to read are the Bridgerton novels. From what I have sampled, her narration is fantastic, and I cannot wait to hear more to corroborate this. Her narration is whimsical but measured. She definitely does different voices for different characters and does an excellent job at it. Her narration for The Other Mother by Rachel M. Harper has hints of horror to it (don’t all honest books about motherhood?) and lo and behold, January LaVoy is there to narrate it. One of my recent favorites by her is The Cartographers, in which Zeller is part of a multi-cast production. The story is about a daughter and her estranged relationship with her late father and her journey to getting to the bottom of how he died. It has heavy details around cartography and map-making and Zeller’s narration is spectacular in making you remember all the details. From narrating John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars, a story about existential angst if there was any, to Maureen Johnson’s Truly Devious series, about murderers and serial killings, nothing is off the table.
