Sarah Ungerleider

Audible Editor

Sarah Ungerleider

Sarah discovered Agatha Christie at the tender age of 8, kicking off a voracious appetite for all things mystery. Along with the latest hard-boiled whodunits, she loves surrealist fiction, true crime, and literary journalism. When she’s not reading or listening, you can find her playing her tenor sax, knitting sweaters, or snuggling with her toothless cat pal, Wiggles.

Sarah's Recent Reviews

Product list
    • A Novel
    • Written by: Catherine Steadman
    • Narrated by: Catherine Steadman
    • Length: 11 hrs and 32 mins
    • Release date: 2020-01-07
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 269 ratings
    • A new master of mystery subverts the sophomore slump
    • She can act. She can write. And now, Catherine Steadman, of Downton Abbey fame and author of the 2018 breakout thriller hit Something in the Water, has delivered a taut, subversive literary thrill ride in her sophomore effort, Mr. Nobody. A man in a fugue state washes up on a beach, with no idea of who he is. The only person he recognizes is his neurologist, who's desperately trying to forget her own past. Can she help him remember his? Come for the twists, and stay for Steadman's expertly paced self-narration.
    • My Mother, Her Secret, and Me
    • Written by: Adrienne Brodeur
    • Narrated by: Julia Whelan, Adrienne Brodeur
    • Length: 8 hrs and 19 mins
    • Release date: 2019-10-15
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 163 ratings
    • A family story that gives new meaning to the word ''drama''
    • I'm particularly fascinated by memoirs starring eccentric parents, perhaps because mine are so...normal? That's certainly not the word I'd use to describe Malabar, the larger-than-life mother at the center of Adrienne Brodeur's extraordinary memoir Wild Game. Beginning at 14, Adrienne was her mother's sole confidante and sometimes-facilitator of a decades-long affair between Malabar and a family friend. It's a shocking, unputdownable story of a daughter's hopeless love for an irredeemably narcissistic parent.
    • Written by: Keigo Higashino, Alexander O. Smith Translated by
    • Narrated by: David Pittu
    • Series: Detective Galileo, Book 1
    • Length: 9 hrs and 2 mins
    • Release date: 2011-02-01
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 44 ratings
    • A twist even diehard thriller fans won’t anticipate
    • You may think you've figured out the jaw-dropping twist in Keigo Higashino's taut thriller about an abusive husband’s murder amongst the sprawl of Tokyo, but believe me, you'll never see it coming. Just make sure you've cleared your calendar before you start listening. The debut book in the Detective Galileo series, The Devotion of Suspect X is a true nail-biter as well as a surprisingly moving story of what ordinary people will do for true love.
    • Written by: Elizabeth Hand
    • Narrated by: Carol Monda
    • Series: Cass Neary, Book 1
    • Length: 9 hrs and 21 mins
    • Release date: 2019-06-18
    • Language: English
    • 4 out of 5 stars 18 ratings
    • A hard-living female sleuth who stands alone
    • Former punk rock photographer Cass Neary does her best to be unlikeable, and it’s the genius of Elizabeth Hand that makes this drifter-turned-unwilling-detective impossible to resist. In the kickoff book to Hand’s crime series, Neary is aimless in the Big Apple—until she gets the opportunity to travel “down east” to the wilds of Maine to interview a reclusive photographer. What she finds up there would make the rest of us turn and flee, but Cass is one tough cookie…and completely unforgettable. Stick around for books two and three in the series: Available Dark, and Hard Light.
    • A True Story of Murder and Memory in Northern Ireland
    • Written by: Patrick Radden Keefe
    • Narrated by: Matthew Blaney
    • Length: 14 hrs and 40 mins
    • Release date: 2019-02-26
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 467 ratings
    • Narrative nonfiction that breaks the silence
    • ''Watch the children until I come back.'' This is the last thing Jean McConville says to her eldest son before being ''disappeared'' by the Irish Republican Army in 1972. The secrecy following McConville's abduction and murder and its lifelong, devastating effects on her 10 children acts as the backdrop of Say Nothing, an essential account of the brutal sectarian conflict that tore apart Northern Ireland for 40 years.

      With the depth of a history book and the pacing of a true crime nail-biter, Keefe's excellent storytelling gives overdue recognition and justice to all those silenced during ''the Troubles.''
    • Written by: André Alexis
    • Narrated by: André Alexis
    • Series: Quincunx, Book 5
    • Length: 7 hrs and 37 mins
    • Release date: 2019-03-13
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 64 ratings
    • The latest from Giller winner André Alexis
    • Botanist Alfred Homer is out of sorts. In the space of a year, his parents have died in a tragic car accident, and his partner has broken off their engagement. When eccentric literary scholar Morgan Bruno invites him on a quest to find a vanished poet, Alfred leaps at the chance to break the mundanity and heartbreak of his present life. And yet, in the tradition of all great road trips, he gets much more than he bargained for.

      A Gulliver's Travels-esque epic set in southern Ontario, Days by Moonlight hooked me with its whimsical celebration of the province's natural wonders, as well as its sobering reflections on death, religion, race, and society in modern Canada. Alexis’ mellifluous narration is also the perfect vehicle for the philosophical ponderings and absurdist scenarios that light up his work.
    • The Dark Star Trilogy, Book 1
    • Written by: Marlon James
    • Narrated by: Dion Graham
    • Series: The Dark Star Trilogy, Book 1
    • Length: 24 hrs and 2 mins
    • Release date: 2019-02-05
    • Language: English
    • 4 out of 5 stars 119 ratings
    • The most original listen I've heard all year
    • You may have heard Marlon James’ rich, ambitious fantasy epic referred to as an ''African Game of Thrones.'' While I’m a huge fan of George R. R. Martin’s now-classic saga, listening to the first book in James’ Dark Star Trilogy convinced me of its absolute originality.

      Combining myth, mystery, fantasy, and African history into an almost undefinable genre listen, Black Leopard, Red Wolf follows the story of a superhuman tracker hired to find a missing boy. Blessed with a keen sense of smell, Tracker is lauded for his skills in locating the lost. But dark forces stand in the way of finding the child, and he starts to suspect the mission has a deeper, more sinister intention.
    • Written by: Stephen King
    • Narrated by: Michael C. Hall
    • Length: 15 hrs and 41 mins
    • Release date: 2018-03-27
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 1,197 ratings
    • Stephen King's most horrifying tale (according to Stephen King)
    • Did you know that King, who has consistently produced some of the most nightmare-inducing stories around, once wrote a book that he initially deemed too terrifying to publish? That book is Pet Sematary, and with a new film adaptation in theatres, I decided to brave the audiobook, creepily (and expertly) narrated by Dexter alum Michael C. Hall.

      Without sharing spoilers (of which it has many), I’ll say that Pet Sematary has quickly become one of my favorite King novels ever. There are hallmarks of horror throughout this bleak tale, including an ancient burial ground with a dark secret, and an unsettling old cat named Church. Yet the scariest monster in this story is grief, and how far people will go to thwart it in the face of death.
    • Written by: Jane Harper
    • Narrated by: Stephen Shanahan
    • Length: 11 hrs and 3 mins
    • Release date: 2019-02-05
    • Language: English
    • 4.5 out of 5 stars 99 ratings
    • A scorching Aussie whodunit
    • Deep in the outback of Queensland, dozens of kilometres from the nearest sheep station, Cameron Bright, a successful cattleman with everything to live for, lies dead beneath the skin-blistering sun. How he got there is the central mystery to Jane Harper's standalone thriller, The Lost Man.

      I loved the twists and turns of Harper's debut The Dry, also set in the remote Australian wilderness, but nothing could prepare me for the slow burn and shocking reveals of this expertly plotted whodunit. Initially, it appears that the scorching outback is the prime antagonist of the story, but in learning more about Bright’s family history and Cameron’s brother Nathan’s standing in the tiny rural community, we find that the real danger in this nearly uninhabitable climate is entirely human.