Audiobook release day: Non-genre, young readers, zombies, and missed opportunities.

Today sees a pair of big non-genre titles, a pile of zombie novels from Audible Frontiers, along with a 3-book young reader collection that brings back fond memories of trips to the library, backpack in tow. But primarily it’s an opportunity to recount some interesting-looking sf titles which for one reason or another did not (yet?) make it to audio.

• The Third Reich By Roberto Bolano , Natasha Wimmer (translator) Narrated by Simon Vance For Macmillan Audio — a German wargames player becomes engrossed in more than he bargained for in coastal Catalonia in this early novel discovered in Bolano’s notes and billed as “… a stunning exploration of memory and violence. Reading this quick, visceral novel, we see a world-class writer coming into his own—and exploring for the first time the themes that would define his masterpieces The Savage Detectives and 2666.”
• Micro: A Novel 
  by Michael Crichton Narrated by John Bedford Lloyd for Harper Audio — completed by the science writer Richard Preston, a thriller of nanotech murders, pitting “nature against technology in vintage Crichton fashion”
• Young readers: The Ralph S. Mouse Audio Collection By Beverly Cleary Narrated by B.D. Wong For Harper Audio — collecting previous standalone releases The Mouse and the Motorcycle, Ralph S. Mouse, and Runaway Ralph in a single, much more economical, audiobook
• … and a veritable pile of zombie novels from Audible Frontiers

Also out today are two new physical audiobooks for previously-released digital-only, Audible-exclusive audiobooks:

• The Fountains of Paradise by Arthur C. Clarke  from Brilliance Audio — never before in (physical) audio, Hugo and Nebula winner in 1980 — this is Marc Vietor’s 2009 narrationfor Audible Frontiers
• All Tomorrow’s Parties by William Gibson from Brilliance Audio — never before in (physical) audiobook, this is Jonathan Davis’s 2009 narration for Audible Frontiers

MISSING IN ACTION:

• Ten Billion Days and One Hundred Billion Nights by Ryu Mitsuse (Nov 15, Haikasoru) — more info about this important Japanese sf novel
• The Book of Heroes by Miyuki Miyabe (VIZ Media LLC)
• Anthology: Lightspeed: Year One (Prime Books)
• Automaton by Cheryl Davies (MP Publishing)
• The Griffin Mage by Rachel Neumeier (Nov 16, Orbit)
• Scotland as Science Fiction (Bucknell Apercus: Histori) by Caroline McCracken-Flesher (Nov 16, Lexington Books)
• The Future of Us by Jay Asher & Carolyn Mackler (Nov 21, Razorbill)
• 20 Years Later by Emma Newman (Nov 22, Dystopia Press)
• Somewhere Beneath Those Waves by Sarah Monette (Prime Books)
• New Cthulhu: The Recent Weird edited by Paula Guran (Prime Books)
• Hearts of Smoke and Steam (Society of Steam, Book Two) by Andrew Mayer (Pyr)
• Young Readers: The Freedom Maze by Delia Sherman (Small Beer Press) — recent subject of a “Big Idea” post at Scalzi’s Whatever blog and the bearer of some high praise from all over the map
• Anthology: Alien Contact by Neil Gaiman, Stephen King, Orson Scott Card and Cory Doctorow (Paperback, Night Shade Books) edited by Marty Halpern
• Theft of Swords (Riyria Revelations) by Michael J. Sullivan (Nov 23, 2011) — from Library Journal: Orbit brings Michael J. Sullivan’s self-published sensation, “The Riyria Revelations” series, to wider audiences, starting with the thieves-on-the-run ­adventure Theft of Swords