Earsay: The Audible and iHeart Audiobook Club

“Dungeon Crawler Carl” with Matt Dinniman and Jeff Hays

Earsay goes live at Audible Story House in New York for an episode about Dungeon Crawler Carl, the global phenomenon that started as a single line in a middle school notebook ("Alien Game Show") and grew into an eight-book franchise with a TV adaptation in the works. Kal was joined by author Matt Dinniman, and Jeff Hays, the narrator who brings this immersive world and all its characters to life in the audiobook. They get into where the story and the performance comes from, why Carl is a deeper character than meets the eye, and how maybe it’s the cats who are really in charge. See omnystudio.com/listener [https://omnystudio.com/listener] for privacy information.

“Seek the Traitor’s Son” with Veronica Roth

Today, we’re diving into Seek the Traitor's Son — the sweeping new romance/fantasy/sci-fi epic from Veronica Roth, author of the Divergent series. Veronica shares why she spent years steering away from the things that actually made her happy as a writer, how COVID shaped the story's central premise, and what it means to write a male romantic lead whose superpower is radical empathy. See omnystudio.com/listener [https://omnystudio.com/listener] for privacy information.

“Just Kiss Already” with Lily Chu

A forensic anthropologist who secretly writes cozy mysteries. An actress-turned-director who adapts his book into a film he hates. A media tour forcing them together. Just Kiss Already! Author Lily Chu joins the show and explores the book’s dual-narrator structure (voiced by Simu Liu and Phillipa Soo) — and how satisfying it is to hear two very different people experiencing two very different sides of the same love story. See omnystudio.com/listener [https://omnystudio.com/listener] for privacy information.

"The Body" with Wil Wheaton

Wil Wheaton starred as the main character in the 1986 classic Stand By Me, which was based on the Stephen King novella The Body. Forty Years later, Wil has narrated the new audiobook version of The Body in a real true circle moment. He joins Kal to jump into the differences between the darker novella and the film, and we hear about a vivid flashback to filming with River Phoenix that hit Wil while recording this audiobook. He also gets into his own parallels with the character he voices, and explains how his fellow cast of Star Trek: The Next Generation became the family he never had. See omnystudio.com/listener [https://omnystudio.com/listener] for privacy information.

“Project Hail Mary” with Ray Porter

For the premiere of our second season, Kal Penn dives into Andy Weir's interstellar epic Project Hail Mary with the man who narrated the audiobook: Ray Porter. They break down the challenge of performing dense science without losing the fun, finding real emotion behind the mic, and take up the new Ryan Gosling-led movie (as well as Ray's cameo). Plus: British comfort food in space, vocal warm‑up secrets, and the one thing Ray would not bring aboard a spaceship. See omnystudio.com/listener [https://omnystudio.com/listener] for privacy information.