Friday Favourites - Your Favourite Audiobook?

Friday Favourites - a chance to rave about a favourite reading/book related topic each week.

Sometimes you just want a chance to rave about some favourite aspect of reading that doesn't really come up during regular blogging posts - that's what this is about. I'm willing to bet that at least some of those will come up one week or another.

This week I'm asking what your favourite audiobook is.

Please leave either a link to your response or your response in the comments.

My answer is:

The BBC Radio Play version of The Lord of the Rings. Thirteen hours long, and every minute of it is done extremely well. This isn't simply a narrator doing the whole thing, but a  full cast extravaganza. You've got Ian Holm, who does the voice of Frodo, Michael Hordern doing Gandalf's voice, Peter Woodthorpe for Gollum, and he does a really good job of it too, and Robert Stevenson doing Aragorn's voice. On top of that there's the music which is also extremely well done.

So much of this one is taken directly from Tolkien's own descriptions and the dialogue is word for word in many places that the magic is still there. And then, there's the inclusion of the poem Bilbo's Last Song, which is a separate book on it's own, enchantingly illustrated by Pauline Baynes.

When I'm listening to this thing I'm ending up completely involved with the story - laughing along at some points, jumping out of my skin at others - I remember one point where I swear I jumped several inches and ended up having trouble getting to sleep afterwards - and even ending up with tears in my eyes.

This version of the Lord of the Rings is one I've listened to several times now and I love it every time.

So, what's your favourite audio-book, and why?