Spotify Premium’s Audiobooks

Hi pals,

I made a blog post a while back before spotify officially had an audiobook section of their app/catalogue. None of what I wrote then applies at all now! And there are all new rules and issues to deal with…

This post contains affiliate links to the Bookshop. If you purchase the books through the links provided, Artie gets 10% of each sale but also you are supporting independent bookshops and helping them stay open.

How does it work now?

To start, there’s two versions of the spotify audiobook program, one is you get some perks if you pay for general spotify premium. The other is you buy the books (which you also have to do with premium if the book isn’t included in premium??)

With basic premium you get 15 hours of listening time of select books per month. This only works for single memberships or the plan owner if you have duo or family memberships.

What are the drawbacks?

I have a lot of problems with the Spotify set-up of audiobooks.

One is, there is no audiobook only subscription that allows you access to ALL titles. This is odd to me.

Another is generally the fact you don’t get to access all audiobooks in the catalogue with premium when there isn’t an audiobook only plan. Makes it feel like an obvious cash grab really…

The fact you can only listen to audiobooks if you are the original account owner and payer with duo or family plans… just?? why?

The interface they created for audiobooks is awful??? It makes no sense and is so hard to use. I’d like to see everything under one tab rather than separated like it is. My immediate thought is if I click on audiobook on my homepage, I’ll find everything here including my liked/saved books… nope. You have to go to ‘my library’ and then audiobooks for that.

I don’t like the algorithm style to the homepage for audiobooks either. It mostly just recommends me the same 5 super popular books I’ve either already read or have no interest in. (insert every book by Alice Oseman and Stephen King) It starts to feel like adverts rather than recommendations.

Are there any positives?

There are some bonuses from my POV.

I have spotify premium anyway for music and podcasts, so having some hours of audiobook play is pretty decent to add as someone who likes to read but sometimes struggles to read and finds audiobooks more accessible. It’s at little to no extra (I say this as Spotify upped their costs again recently so it’s like you paid a little more for the upgrade)

There’s no waiting lists like on Libby or other library like or linked apps. You can pick up the book whenever as long as you have reading time, and you don’t have to return it if you haven’t read it within 2 weeks.

There’s books available on premium I’ve not found on Libby at any of my libraries I have memberships with. Newer books, queer books, non-fiction books within my areas of interest.

Do you have any book recs?

Here are some books I’m interested in that are available with premium:

Episode Thirteen by Craig DiLouie: A booktuber I love watching (books and Lala) made is seem appealing to me! Fade to Black is the newest hit ghost hunting reality TV show. Led by husband and wife team Matt and Claire Kirklin, it delivers weekly hauntings investigated by a dedicated team of ghost hunting experts. Episode Thirteen takes them to every ghost hunter’s holy grail: the Paranormal Research Foundation. This brooding, derelict mansion holds secrets and clues about bizarre experiments that took place there in the 1970s. It’s also famously haunted, and the team hopes their scientific techniques and high tech gear will prove it. But as the house begins to reveal itself to them, proof of an afterlife might not be everything Matt dreamed of. A story told in broken pieces, in tapes, journals, and correspondence, this is the story of Episode Thirteen-and how everything went terribly, horribly wrong.

The Black Guy Dies First: Black horror cinema from Fodder to Oscar by Robin R. Means Coleman and Mark H. Harris: Another read from Books and Lala! This is a media analysis text. The Black Guy Dies First explores the Black journey in modern horror cinema, from the fodder epitomized by Spider Baby to the Oscar-​winning cinematic heights of Get Out and beyond. This eye-opening book delves into the themes, tropes, and traits that have come to characterize Black roles in horror since 1968, a year in which race made national headlines in iconic moments from the enactment of the 1968 Civil Rights Act and Martin Luther King Jr.’s assassination in April. This timely book is a must-read for cinema and horror fans alike.

Howl’s Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones: Deciding she has nothing more to lose, Sophie makes her way to the moving castle that hovers on the hills above her town, Market Chipping. But the castle belongs to the dreaded Wizard Howl, whose appetite, they say, is satisfied only by the souls of young girls… There Sophie meets Michael, Howl’s apprentice, and Calcifer the fire demon, with whom she agrees a pact. Her entanglements with Calcifer, Howl and Michael and her quest to break her curse come alive with Diana Wynne Jones’s unique combination of magic, humour and imagination. From one of the most beloved, bestselling and award-winning fantasy writers of all time.

Honey & Spice by Boly Babalola: As host of radio show Brown Sugar, Kiki Banjo’s mission is to protect her listeners from heartbreak. Which puts Whitewell College’s newest student, handsome ‘player’ Malakai Korede, at the top of her hitlist. But when Kiki’s dream summer internship in New York depends on finding a fresh angle for her radio show, she must make an unlikely bargain with Malakai himself – to put their simmering clashes aside to form a fake relationship, something sweet and spicy enough to win over the whole campus. However, close proximity to the notorious heartbreaker brings everything Kiki thought she knew about her own heart into question. Why does throwing out her stringent romantic rulebook suddenly so tempting? Will she find it in her to resist?

I Kissed Shara Wheeler by Casey McQuiston: A month before graduating, the principal’s perfect daughter, prom queen Shara Wheeler, kisses Chloe Green – and vanishes. On a furious hunt for answers, Chloe discovers she’s not the only one Shara kissed. There’s also Smith, Shara’s long-time sweetheart, and Rory, Shara’s bad-boy neighbour with a crush. Thrown into an unlikely alliance, Chloe, Smith and Rory follow Shara’s trail of annoyingly cryptic clues, and Chloe starts to suspect that there might be more to this small town – and to Shara – than she thought . . .

Decolonising Wellness by Dalia Kinsey RD LD: The lack of BIPOC and LGBTQ representation in the fields of health and nutrition has led to repeated racist and unscientific biases that negatively impact the very people they purport to help. Many representatives of the increasingly popular body positivity movement actually add to the body image concerns of queer people of color by emphasizing cisgender, heteronormative, and Eurocentric standards of beauty. Few mainstream body positivity resources address the intersectional challenges of anti-Blackness, colorism, homophobia, transphobia, and generational trauma that are at the root of our struggles with wellness and self-care. In Decolonizing Wellness: A QTBIPOC-Centered Guide to Escape the Diet Trap, Heal Your Self-Image, and Achieve Body Liberation, registered dietitian and nutritionist Dalia Kinsey will help readers to improve their health without restriction, eliminate stress around food and eating, and turn food into a source of pleasure instead of shame. A road map to body acceptance and self-care for queer people of color, Decolonizing Wellness is filled with practical eating practices, journal prompts, affirmations, and mindfulness tools. Ultimately, decolonizing nutrition is essential not only to our personal well-being but to our community’s well-being and to the possibility of greater social transformation. This is a body positivity and food freedom book for marginalized folks. It’s a guide to throwing out food rules in exchange for internal cues and adopting a self-love-based approach to eating. It’s about learning to trust our bodies and turning mealtime into a time for celebration and healing.  It’s also a love letter to those of us who struggle with our bodies and a gentle plea for us to do the work it takes to accept, trust, and love ourselves.

Ready Player One by Ernest Cline: (finished reading, review will come) It’s the year 2044, and the real world has become an ugly place. We’re out of oil. We’ve wrecked the climate. Famine, poverty, and disease are widespread. Like most of humanity, Wade Watts escapes this depressing reality by spending his waking hours jacked into the OASIS, a sprawling virtual utopia where you can be anything you want to be, where you can live and play and fall in love on any of ten thousand planets. And like most of humanity, Wade is obsessed by the ultimate lottery ticket that lies concealed within this alternate reality: OASIS founder James Halliday, who dies with no heir, has promised that control of the OASIS – and his massive fortune – will go to the person who can solve the riddles he has left scattered throughout his creation. For years, millions have struggled fruitlessly to attain this prize, knowing only that the riddles are based in the culture of the late twentieth century. And then Wade stumbles onto the key to the first puzzle. Suddenly, he finds himself pitted against thousands of competitors in a desperate race to claim the ultimate prize, a chase that soon takes on terrifying real-world dimensions – and that will leave both Wade and his world profoundly changed.

Chain-Gang All-Stars by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah: I liked the sound of it but was struggling Welcome to Chain-Gang All-Stars, the popular and highly controversial programme inside America’s private prison system. In packed arenas, live-streamed by millions, prisoners compete as gladiators for the ultimate prize: their freedom. Fan favourites Loretta Thurwar and Hamara ‘Hurricane Staxxx’ Stacker are teammates and lovers. Thurwar is nearing the end of her time on the circuit, free in just a few matches, a fact she carries as heavily as her lethal hammer. As she prepares for her final encounters, as protestors gather at the gates, and as the programme’s corporate owners stack the odds against her – will the price be simply too high?

Cemetery Boys by Aiden Thomas: I haven’t re-read this in a long time and didn’t know there was an audiobook. In an attempt to prove himself a true brujo and gain his family’s acceptance, Yadriel decides to summon his cousin’s ghost and help him cross to the afterlife. But things get complicated when he accidentally summons the ghost of his high school’s resident bad boy, Julian Diaz – and Julian won’t go into death quietly. The two boys must work together if Yadriel is to move forward with his plan. But the more time Yadriel and Julian spend together, the harder it is to let each other go.

My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh: This is the story of a woman with no name. Young, thin, pretty, a recent Columbia graduate, she lives in an apartment on the Upper East Side of Manhattan paid for, like everything else, by her inheritance. Yet she longs to lose herself completely.

Frontier by Grace Curtis: (completed) In the distant future, climate change has reduced Earth to a hard-scrabble wasteland. Saints and sinners, lawmakers and sheriffs, gunslingers and horse thieves abound. Folk are as diverse and divided as they’ve ever been – except in their shared suspicions when a stranger comes to town. One night a ship falls from the sky, bringing the planet’s first visitor in three hundred years. She’s armed, she’s scared . . . and she’s looking for someone.

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn: Who are you? What have we done to each other? These are the questions Nick Dunne finds himself asking on the morning of his fifth wedding anniversary, when his wife Amy suddenly disappears. The police suspect Nick. Amy’s friends reveal that she was afraid of him, that she kept secrets from him. He swears it isn’t true. A police examination of his computer shows strange searches. He says they weren’t made by him. And then there are the persistent calls on his mobile phone. So what really did happen to Nick’s beautiful wife?

Loveless by Alice Oseman: (the one book I haven’t read by them and I need to check out more ace rep books) It was all sinking in. I’d never had a crush on anyone. No boys, no girls, not a single person I had ever met. What did that mean? Georgia has never been in love, never kissed anyone, never even had a crush – but as a fanfic-obsessed romantic she’s sure she’ll find her person one day. As she starts university with her best friends, Pip and Jason, in a whole new town far from home, Georgia’s ready to find romance, and with her outgoing roommate on her side and a place in the Shakespeare Society, her ‘teenage dream’ is in sight. But when her romance plan wreaks havoc amongst her friends, Georgia ends up in her own comedy of errors, and she starts to question why love seems so easy for other people but not for her. With new terms thrown at her – asexual, aromantic – Georgia is more uncertain about her feelings than ever. Is she destined to remain loveless? Or has she been looking for the wrong thing all along? This wise, warm and witty story of identity and self-acceptance sees Alice Oseman on towering form as Georgia and her friends discover that true love isn’t limited to romance.

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams: (a classic I have never read) It’s an ordinary Thursday lunchtime for Arthur Dent until his house gets demolished. The Earth follows shortly afterwards to make way for a new hyperspace express route, and his best friend has just announced that he’s an alien. At this moment, they’re hurtling through space with nothing but their towels and an innocuous-looking book inscribed, in large friendly letters, with the words: DON’T PANIC. The weekend has only just begun . . .

Strong Female Character by Fern Brady: I read the text but would like to check out the audiobook as well, I think Fern narrated it herself. A summary of my book: 1. I’m diagnosed with autism 20 years after telling a doctor I had it. 2. My terrible Catholic childhood: I hate my parents etc. 3. My friendship with an elderly man who runs the corner shop and is definitely not trying to groom me. I get groomed. 4. Homelessness. 5. Stripping. 6. More stripping but with more nervous breakdowns. 7. I hate everyone at uni and live with a psycho etc. 8. REDACTED as too spicy. 9. After everyone tells me I don’t look autistic, I try to cure my autism and get addicted to Xanax. 10. REDACTED as too embarrassing.

The Body Keeps The Score by Bessel van der Kolk: There’s a lot of reasonable criticism about this book and the author, but I still feel like it’s an important text I haven’t gotten round to reading coz I usually don’t like these books in text so maybe audiobook with suit better. The effects of trauma can be devastating for sufferers, their families and future generations. Here one of the world’s experts on traumatic stress offers a bold new paradigm for treatment, moving away from standard talking and drug therapies and towards an alternative approach that heals mind, brain and body.

I hope this blog post was as helpful as my last one on Spotify and Audiobooks (until they changed things!) let me know if you have any questions in the comments! Like the post, subscribe to the blog (you can also do this via email if you don’t have a wordpress account) and use the links provided if you want to buy any of the books in physical form to support me as a creator, help me run this blog, and support independent bookshops! If you’re interested in other audiobook apps, you should read my post about Libby!

~ Artie

they/them

January 2024