Alfred serves as president of Listen & Live Audio, the company he co-founded in 1994 with his partner Alisa Weberman. Since then, they've put out dozens of great audio titles including Tea House On Mulberry Street, by Irish author, Sharon Owens, and the very popular YA series of Bloody Jack books, written by L.A. Meyer and superbly read by the Audie-award-winning narrator Katherine Kellgren. Nearly all of L&L's titles are available on Playaway.
To date, Alfred has written two books for Young Adult/Teen audiences: Pinned (2006) and Over the End Line (2009). Both were published in hardcover by Harcourt and produced as audiobooks by Listen & Live. They deal with two of Alfred's greatest passions: wrestling (Pinned) and soccer (Over the End Line), but also with a whole lot more.
I recently took a listen to Over the End Line and found it very engaging. As a forty-something who grew up on the East Coast, it's evocation of the early-Eighties high school scene rang very true for me, as did its references to the New York Cosmos and such soccer luminaries of the day as Pelé, Franz Beckenbauer, and Giorgio Chinaglia. The themes of popularity, friendship, love, and responsibility all rang very true as well.
The story should be engaging even for reluctant readers (I performed a pretty successful test on my reluctant nephew). There's some profanity, a little bit of discreetly described teen sex, and a fair amount of high-school partying, early-eighties style. This rough stuff is presented frankly enough to catch the interest of teen readers, but it's not glorified. The audio production is expertly narrated by Todd Licea.
Both of Alfred's titles are available on Playaway:
Over the End Line (release date: 2-1-2010, available now for pre-order.)
You can learn more about Alfred and Listen and Live at: http://alfredmartino.listenandlive.com/
Posted by David Perrotta, MLIS
Playaway Sr. Manager for Content Strategy
