2017 Odyssey Award

2017 Odyssey Award

For best audiobook produced for children and/or young adults.

Winner:

Anna and the Swallow Man

by Gavriel Savit

narrated by Allan Corduner

Krakow, 1939.  A million marching soldiers and a thousand barking dogs.  This is no place to grow up.  Anna Lania is just seven years old when the Germans take her father, a linguistics professor, during their purge of intellectuals in Poland.  She's alone.

And then Anna meets the Swallow Man.  He is a mystery, strange and tall, a skilled deceiver with more than a little magic up his sleeve.  And when the soldiers in the streets look at him, they see what he wants them to see.

The Swallow Man is not Anna's father - she knows that very well - but she also knows that, like her father, he's in danger of being taken, and like her father, he has a gift for languages: Polish, Russian, German, Yiddish, even Bird.  When he summons a bright beautiful swallow down to his hand to stop her from crying, Anna is entranced.  She follows him into the wilderness.

2017 Odyssey Award Honor Recording:

Ghost

by Jason Reynolds

narrated by Guy Lockard

Dream On, Amber

by Emma Shevah

narrated by Laura Kirman

Nimona

by Noelle Stevenson

narrated by Rebecca Soler, Jonathan Davis, Marc Thompson, January LaVoy, Natalie Gold, Peter Bradbury and David Pittu

What did you think about "Anna and the Swallow Man"?  Did you enjoy it?  What did you like about it?  Do you think one of the other books should have won?

Leave your thoughts in the comments section below!