The Boys in the Boat (Young Readers Adaptation)

As the University of Washington's crew team quests to represent the U.S. in the 1936 Olympics, narrator Mark Bramhall is rooting for Joe Rantz and his teammates with every stroke. Bramhall sets a steady pace and transitions smoothly from scenes of Joe's personal life to scenes with his team and his rowing coaches. As narrator, Bramhall precisely delivers the technical terms of rowing and calls each race with excitement. Bramhall's voice produces a range of tone--steely, tender, distant--as he recounts aspects of Joe's story: his determination to make the rowing team, his tenderness toward his half-siblings, his vulnerability at being abandoned by his father and stepfamily, his questioning of himself, and his aloofness in his interactions with teammates. What a crew and what life lessons! A.R. © AudioFile 2016, Portland, Maine