THE DOOR OF NO RETURN

British Ghanaian performer Kobna Holdbrooke-Smith lends his vocal talents to this trilogy opener, which finds 11-year-old Kofi thrust through the titular door into the Middle Passage. Before this happens, however, listeners are immersed in Kofi’s rich, full life in the Asante village of Upper Kwanta, where he navigates friendship, rivalry, school, and a crush. Modulating easily among characters, Holdbrooke-Smith’s protean voice evokes the pompous tones of Kofi’s teacher, the plummy accents of his British captors, the indifferent nasality of the American seaman who counts him aboard the slaver, and Kofi’s every emotion along the way. The text’s free-verse line breaks are largely inaudible; where they are heard, as when Kofi reluctantly, word by word, tries to stop time in the moment before his capture, the effect is haunting. V.S. 2023 Audies Finalist © AudioFile 2022, Portland, Maine [Published: JULY 2022]