Best Orson Scott Card Audiobooks
Where to Start with Orson Scott Card
- Best entry point → Ender's Game
- Best standalone → More of the Best of Science Fiction and Fantasy
- Start the Ender's Shadow series → Ender's Shadow
- What fans keep coming back to → Speaker for the Dead
- Best narrator for Orson Scott Card → Prentice Alvin
- Highest rated by listeners → Shadow of the Hegemon (The Shadow #2)
Best Orson Scott Card Audiobooks
- 1
Ender's Game
The Ender Saga • Book 1
Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki, Harlan Ellison, Gabrielle de Cuir
★ 4.59 ABR Score (1.5M ratings)★ 4.31 Goodreads (1.5M) ★ 4.63 Audible (44.6K)11h 57m listening time • Released 2002The gold standard of military sci-fi — a child prodigy trained for interstellar war in a story that's as emotionally devastating as it is thrillingly plotted.
- 2
Ender's Shadow
Ender's Shadow • Book 1
Narrated by Scott Brick, Gabrielle de Cuir, full cast
★ 4.59 ABR Score (194.4K ratings)★ 4.32 Goodreads (180.6K) ★ 4.76 Audible (13.8K)15h 42m listening time • Released 2005A companion novel that retells Ender's Game from Bean's perspective — and in many ways surpasses the original in emotional depth and strategic brilliance.
- 3
Speaker for the Dead
The Ender Saga • Book 2
Narrated by David Birney, Stefan Rudnicki
★ 4.37 ABR Score (294.6K ratings)★ 4.11 Goodreads (272.3K) ★ 4.56 Audible (22.3K)14h 8m listening time • Released 2002A richer and more ambitious book than Ender's Game, tackling xenobiology, grief, and moral philosophy in a story about understanding truly alien life.
- 4
Shadow of the Hegemon
The Shadow • Book 2
Narrated by David Birney, Scott Brick, Gabrielle de Cuir
★ 4.19 ABR Score (90.1K ratings)★ 3.97 Goodreads (81.7K) ★ 4.49 Audible (8.4K)12h 47m listening time • Released 2002The three narrators bring distinct voices to Bean and Peter's ruthless power grab, making this geopolitical thriller feel like a lived conspiracy unfolding across continents in real time.
- 5
Shadows in Flight
The Shadow • Book 5
Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki, Emily Janice Card, Scott Brick
★ 4.11 ABR Score (26.5K ratings)★ 3.82 Goodreads (21.7K) ★ 4.55 Audible (4.8K)6h 23m listening time • Released 2012Stefan Rudnicki and Scott Brick trade off brilliantly here, keeping the multi-generational stakes sharp across Bean's desperate race against his own biology. It's hard sci-fi with real emotional weight.
- 6
Xenocide
Ender's Saga • Book 3
Narrated by Scott Brick, Gabrielle de Cuir, Amanda Karr, John Rubinstein, Stefan Rudnicki
★ 4.10 ABR Score (179.4K ratings)★ 3.82 Goodreads (166.1K) ★ 4.41 Audible (13.3K)20h 10m listening time • Released 2003A stellar ensemble cast elevates Card's most philosophically ambitious Ender book, with five narrators embodying distinct worlds and perspectives across 20 hours of complex, character-driven science fiction.
- 7
Children of the Mind
Ender's Saga • Book 4
Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir, John Rubinstein
★ 4.08 ABR Score (124.8K ratings)★ 3.78 Goodreads (114.4K) ★ 4.43 Audible (10.4K)13h 30m listening time • Released 2004 - 8
Prentice Alvin
Tales of Alvin Maker • Book 3
Narrated by full cast
★ 4.04 ABR Score (21.0K ratings)★ 3.81 Goodreads (18.9K) ★ 4.55 Audible (2.1K)13h 49m listening time • Released 2007 - 9
Pathfinder
Pathfinder • Book 1
Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki, Kirby Heyborne, Don Leslie, Kristoffer Tabori, Scott Brick
★ 4.03 ABR Score (30.9K ratings)★ 4.01 Goodreads (25.1K) ★ 4.32 Audible (5.7K)17h 41m listening time • Released 2010A five-narrator ensemble cast elevates this time-travel mystery into something genuinely immersive—each voice pins down a character so distinctly you forget you're listening to an audiobook at all.
- 10
Alvin Journeyman
Tales of Alvin Maker • Book 4
Narrated by Blackstone Audio
★ 3.98 ABR Score (18.2K ratings)★ 3.76 Goodreads (16.5K) ★ 4.52 Audible (1.7K)15h 1m listening time • Released 2007 - 11
Heartfire
Tales of Alvin Maker • Book 5
Narrated by full cast
★ 3.95 ABR Score (15.1K ratings)★ 3.73 Goodreads (13.6K) ★ 4.5 Audible (1.5K)12h 8m listening time • Released 2007 - 12
Red Prophet
Tales of Alvin Maker • Book 2
Narrated by Scott Brick, Stephen Hoye, Stefan Rudnicki
★ 3.93 ABR Score (24.1K ratings)★ 3.81 Goodreads (21.5K) ★ 4.4 Audible (2.6K)12h 12m listening time • Released 2007Three top-tier narrators bring Card's alternate-history magic system to life with distinct voices that make this sprawling frontier fantasy breathe in ways the page simply can't.
- 13
Seventh Son
Tales of Alvin Maker • Book 1
Narrated by Scott Brick, Gabrielle de Cuir, Stephen Hoye
★ 3.92 ABR Score (41.5K ratings)★ 3.88 Goodreads (37.4K) ★ 4.32 Audible (4.2K)9h 7m listening time • Released 2007 - 14
The Crystal City
Tales of Alvin Maker • Book 6
Narrated by Stefan Rudnicki, M. E. Willis
★ 3.78 ABR Score (13.1K ratings)★ 3.63 Goodreads (11.7K) ★ 4.34 Audible (1.4K)11h 31m listening time • Released 2004 - 15
The Worthing Saga
Worthing #1-3
Narrated by Scott Brick
★ 3.73 ABR Score (10.4K ratings)★ 3.86 Goodreads (9.2K) ★ 4.07 Audible (1.2K)18h 34m listening time • Released 2005Scott Brick transforms Card's interconnected stories about humanity's long sleep into something genuinely haunting—his measured delivery makes the slow corruption of immortality feel intimate and inevitable.
- 16
Cruel Miracles
Maps in a Mirror • Book 4
Narrated by Grover Gardner, John Rubinstein, Stefan Rudnicki
★ 3.71 ABR Score (548 ratings)★ 3.78 Goodreads (519) ★ 4.48 Audible (29)6h 42m listening time • Released 2010Three narrators bring distinct voices to Card's best short fiction, making this collection feel like stories told by different storytellers rather than a single audiobook monotone.
- 17
Master Alvin
Tales of Alvin Maker • Book 7
Narrated by Gabrielle de Cuir, Kirby Heyborne, Mirron Willis, Nan McNamara, Scott Brick, Stefan Rudnicki
★ 3.69 ABR Score (89 ratings)★ 3.92 Goodreads (89)11h 18m listening time • Released 2026A full ensemble cast brings genuine depth to Card's alternate American frontier—each narrator becomes their character so completely that the dialogue crackles with real tension and warmth.
- 18
Pretty Boy: The Story of Bonzo Madrid
Ender's Saga short stories • Book 4
Narrated by Scott Brick
★ 3.58 ABR Score (1.1K ratings)★ 3.53 Goodreads (612) ★ 4.06 Audible (442)Scott Brick's narration transforms this psychological character study into something haunting—a portrait of how parental ambition can fracture a child, told with surgical precision and devastating emotional weight.
- 19
More of the Best of Science Fiction and Fantasy
by Richard Curtis, Arthur C. Clarke, Siddig El Fadil, Karen Joy Fowler, Joe Haldeman, Roger Zelazny, Kristine Kathryn Rusch, Nana Visitor, Orson Scott Card, Robert Silverberg, Robin Curtis, John Varley, Claudia Christian, Lawrence Watt-Evans
Narrated by Roddy McDowall, Terry Farrell, Wil Wheaton, other stars of
★ 3.50 ABR Score (210 ratings)★ 3.7 Goodreads (57) ★ 3.65 Audible (153)5h 54m listening time • Released 1999Having sci-fi legends like Wil Wheaton and Roddy McDowall narrate their own genre's best stories transforms this from anthology into a masterclass—each voice perfectly attuned to the worlds they're inhabiting.
- 20
The Folk of the Fringe
Narrated by Scott Brick, Stefan Rudnicki, Emily Janice Card, Richard Brewer
★ 3.34 ABR Score (4.5K ratings)★ 3.33 Goodreads (4.3K) ★ 3.65 Audible (233)10h 35m listening time • Released 2007Multiple narrators bring distinct voices to Card's post-apocalyptic vision, turning what could be dry survival narrative into something intimate and deeply human about rebuilding from nothing.