Our score
Excellent
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Under Story Audiobook by Chloe Benjamin— narrated by Maggi-Meg Reed
Chloe Benjamin follows The Immortalists with Under Story, a literary science fiction novel about a biologist hiding from her own career in the McMurdo Station dish pit, a light that appears on the Antarctic ice, and the ex-husband who arrives to measure it. Part marriage novel, part physics thought experiment, serious about both.
Why the audiobook wins
Maggi-Meg Reed takes Under Story alone, all twenty and a half hours of it, which is the right call for a novel that keeps its camera on one woman. Laurel spends the first stretch of the book hiding inside a job, and a single narrator has to sell both the flatness she performs for everyone at McMurdo and the scientist still running underneath it. Split that between two voices and you lose the seam that holds the character together.
The back half is where the format pays off. Benjamin's antiuniverse arrives as explanation before it arrives as experience, physicists talking through something none of them fully believes, and dialogue-heavy science is exactly the material that stalls on the page and moves out loud. Hearing Laurel and Eli argue their way toward the wildest theory either has ever floated does more for the idea than another paragraph of description would.
Twenty hours and change of ice, physics, and a marriage neither party has finished with. One Audible credit covers it.
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Audiobook questions
- Who narrates the Under Story audiobook?
- Maggi-Meg Reed narrates the audiobook edition of Under Story.
- How long is the Under Story audiobook?
- The audiobook runs 20 hr 37 min.
- Is the Under Story audiobook worth listening to?
- We scored Under Story 4.1 out of 5. Maggi-Meg Reed takes Under Story alone, all twenty and a half hours of it, which is the right call for a novel that keeps its camera on one woman. Laurel spends the first stretch of the book hiding inside a job, and a single narrator has to sell both the flatness she performs…
- Can I listen to Under Story free with an Audible trial?
- Eligible new Audible members can use a free-trial credit to listen in the Audible app. Eligibility and current offer terms are set by Audible.Listen to Under Story free with an Audible trial
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- Is Under Story on Kindle Unlimited?
- No. Under Story was not included with Kindle Unlimited when we last checked on August 26, 2026.
- How much does Under Story cost?
- On Amazon: Kindle $14.99, Paperback $34.00, Hardcover $22.38. Prices as of September 6, 2026 at 7:21 PM EDT and may change.
