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This is another in a series of wholly unnecessary essays written by Biff Steele examining books by E Ryan Janz, today discussing one of the best free audiobooks Mr. Steele has ever heard.

A Baseball Story – A Wonderful Free Audiobook

by Biff Steele

Before we start, I’m willing to listen to any employment offers out there from you folks. Anything to get away from this E Ryan Janz guy. Just so you know, if it’s a delivery job at minimum wage, which would be a major step up for me, I want to assure you that I do own a car, or I can at least steal one. Pretty darned impressive if you ask me. Now, although my driver’s licence has been recently revoked, it will be renewed again by September, I hope. I won’t tell you exactly what caused the judge to revoke it, but he really had it in for me. He didn’t seem interested at all when I tried explaining to him about free audiobook sites like this one where he could get audio books for no charge at all, but instead, he chose to revoke my license. All he seemed concerned about was my fleeing the scene of some accident. If you ask me, he was downright rude. And the person I ran over was rude as well. I mean, how am I supposed to know you’re supposed to turn on your headlights when driving at night? Or that it’s unlawful to run over people? I mean, come on!  All of these rules are enough to make your head spin.

Anyway, let’s dive into the essay part of this debacle.  A Baseball Story is available in three different formats online, those being paperback along with ebook and audiobook, the latter being the fastest growing segment of worldwide book distribution and the one this essay will heretofore be concentrating upon. A Baseball Story is terrific no matter how you receive it (just take a gander at the Amazon reviews), but the audiobook version is really something special. And unlike the ebook or paperback versions, this audiobook is free exclusively through one of the free audiobook sites out there where one can get audio books at absolutely no charge or obligation, and that is at this very site, eryanjanz.com., on this very page. 

So, for the moment let’s talk about one of the best free audio books you’re apt to find anywhere. It starts and ends with what any great audiobook must have – a superlative narration. The first thing the listener notices, before even getting into the story, is the quality of the narrator’s voice. In this case the narrator of A Baseball Story is Amy Fisher. Janz tells me he auditioned over thirty high quality voice artists, but what separated Amy from the pack was that she had the true instincts of an actress. She knew where the dramatic parts of the story lay and how to best inflect her voice to emphasize them. In our opinion, there are plenty of fine audiobooks online from which to choose from, but Amy Fisher’s narration distinguishes A Baseball Story from most. 

After she was hired and could finally read the story in its entirety, she told us that she actually cried during certain moments, and I think her outstanding narration reflects that. By that I mean that she certainly understood the characters and what they were going through, but beyond that she really loved the overall story. She told us it’s not often when she gets to narrate such high-quality work, and for that reason she was delighted to get the job. 

So, what is this story about? It begins with a young boy named Danny, who is undoubtedly the worst player on his baseball team. He can’t hit, he can’t field, and he can’t throw. Simply put – he’s bad. But Walter, an older man with an equally bad knee who is recently retired takes an interest in him. Walter loves the game the way it was originally meant to be played, as a game and not a business, and so he sits atop the grandstand observing the activity down on the field, practice after practice. He discovers in Danny a talent one can’t teach – that Danny can really run. Therefore, Walter figures that with some private hands-on tutoring, something Danny’s coaches do not have time for, that he can help the boy improve on his deficiencies to amplify his already existing speed. 

At the outset the relationship between Danny and Walter is antagonistic, certainly from Danny’s perspective. He is justly taught by his mother to be wary of strangers, so he initially behaves accordingly with Walter. But eventually Walter meets Danny’s beautiful mother, Caroline, and over time she is impressed with his honesty. So, Walter begins tutoring Danny in baseball, and as the story progresses the listener discovers that Walter is also teaching Danny about more important things, like life. Adding some conflict to the story comes in the appearance of Danny’s stepfather, Bill, a vicious, violent excuse of a man whose main purpose in life seems to be physically threatening everyone around him, especially those deemed weaker than he, including his wife, his stepson, and ultimately Walter. 

The narration progresses at a fluid pace and despite the book’s title it becomes more focussed upon the developing relationships between the characters, both friendly and antagonistic. But the game of baseball certainly plays a roll, and whether the listener is a baseball fan or not, they will love that aspect of the story as well. By and large A Baseball Story concerns four personally damaged people, and how they individually handle their particular demons. 

The narrator tells this story in a way that by the time it is over the listener will be unable to imagine anyone other than her telling it. Her talent is too great to just “read” the script. In the opinion of everyone here at eryanjanz.com, Amy takes an already very good story and makes it great. 

So, there you have it, at least a small taste of it. If you are in the market to get audio books from free audiobook sites such as this one, all you have to do is provide your email address and specify whether you desire the UK or US code in the above form. You will then be emailed your code and the link to Audible, the only one of the free audiobook sites where you can redeem it. 

It’s just that simple. You do not have to subscribe to Ryan’s newsletter or anything else. He merely wants you to have the audiobook, a $13.08 value on Amazon, for no cost or obligation.  If you want to get audio books via a free audiobook website, you can’t do any better than A Baseball Story, a top free audiobook containing a wonderful story, memorable characters, and an equally memorable narration.

I think you’ll love what you hear.

Thank you.

About the Author

Biff Steele has been employed at eryanjanz.com since its inception as a website in 1847. He also acts as Mr. Janz’s personal assistant, bodyguard, and chauffeur to Mr. Janz’s dog (after his driver’s license is renewed anyway). This article is another in a series of essays Mr. Steele will be writing for each of E Ryan Janz’s books.