I thought this was such a fun retelling of the Baba Yaga story. This Russian Cinderella story is a classic, but this is a whole new take on the tale. In this new version, Baba Yaga lends her wisdom to some of life's most difficult questions. Harsh but wise, Baba Yaga is the ultimate contemporary advice column and everyone should listen to her advice!

I got a review version of this audio book via Netgalley and loved the book. The character of Baba Yaga and the responses to some real life dilemmas and questions are funny, witty, insightful and deep. And in some cases all at the same time.

The artist who read the book did a great job of bringing Baba Yaga alive in my mind.

With audio books that are professionally produced, I expect the listening experience to be much richer than just having someone read the text in the book. For example, in order to stay true to the book, the artist reads the name of each chapter and then everytime before giving the response from Baba Yaga, she repeats Baba Yaga's name - both of which could be avoided, specially since she does two voices - one for the person asking question and one for the response by Baba Yaga. This would have done two things

1. Reduced the overall time taken to listen to the book.
2. Made the experience of listening to the book much more smooth and fun.

But overall, a good book.

I really liked the narrator. She was great at doing character voices. The book itself was fun and good to listen to, the advice was solid. Not something I'd want to read in one sitting, but good for every once in a while.

I really enjoyed the stories in this book. What made it truly enjoyable is how funny some of them were and that they were written as an advice column style. After about half of the book I did start to feel a little sad and unsetttled by the sad questions being asked. I wanted that cheer and funny reaction back.

It did discuss some difficult subjects and as a woman, I am very grateful for that aspect.

"Ask Baba Yaga: The Audiobook Collection" was such a surprise to me, in a good way. I thought it would be light and humorous. There was humor, but the book surprised me with its depth and poignancy. It's self-help, but self-help as told by a sarcastic, loving, strong, kind-hearted woman, who doesn't sugarcoat things but is always deeply loving.

This book is a treasure. I plan on buying many copies to give as gifts. It really is a beautiful, unexpected, creative gem that I am looking forward to owning and rereading. It's like sitting across Baba Yaga at the table, drinking tea and being hugged by her words.

In the latter half, I did start to feel a bit bogged down by the sorrowful questions, especially about the state of the world today. I'm not sure if that's because I'm highly sensitive to stuff, if the world is just strange right now, if the collection could have been organized differently to spread them out more, or a mix of all three of those things!

I'm very appreciative of the difficult topics it tackles, from the expected concerns of self-worth, to the painful topics of toxic parents, feeling like half of a woman because you gave birth via a C-section, to how you can get your family to respect your gender. If you've ever had a conversation with someone that didn't go too well, Ask Baba Yaga makes up for it, in a way. She cradles you and I do believe this book has the capacity to help people heal.

Thank you, Netgalley, for this copy. These are my honest thoughts.

A few years back, on Fairy Tales News Once Upon a blog, I read about the Ask Baba Yaga columns which formed the basis of this book and were one of the inspirations for Jane Yolen's forthcoming Finding Baba Yaga. Having been obsessed with Russian folktales since childhood you might say I've always been a little obsessed with Baba Yaga (no, not John Wick, do not go there). I've always disagreed with the idea of Baba Yaga as a one-dimensional evil figure because she was certainly transformative in some stories as you can see in Baba Yaga: The Wild Witch of the East in Russian Fairy Tales. At the interface of Russian folklore and Zen Buddhism, in Ask Baba Yaga we see her as a figure dispensing deep, if occasionally abstruse, advice.

Who is Baba Yaga? In her own words, "I am the unknown soul, the chaos in the mud. The snake roiling in butter, the nightmare in the bark, the owl sleeping on the nightmare.; In each egg, I am the cracking, and the bird, the delirious chicken scratching yr wound. You reach your hand into my dress, come up with diamonds, then worms. Ha! I am your fear turned inside out like a sleeve..."

Asked "How do I keep from dwelling on the love I haven't had?" Baba Yaga's answer is:

"The life of every being has some vast emptiness in it. Unspeakable, grievous, there is a field in the middle of my wood where no one goes. It is the heart of my loneliness. I go there to dance and be quiet & I love the intensity of its silence. If I were human I would wish to take another there. You must know every contour of your emptiness before you can know whom you wish to invite in."

or

"Why does this one physical feature make me grotesque?" to which she answers:

"All mirrors tell the wrong story." Your cloak-hem has already brushed the ink-pool that mars all of us; the marring of being not as we thought we were... You have made a loveliness of your body through the moving of it & the mirror is a false confidant. Evermore, to be as I am is an honor & a magic."

This audiobook collection There is much that I love in these little books and it seems that Jane Yolen found much there, too. I'm certainly planning to read more of Kitaiskaia's work.

I recently listened to the audiobook collection, which includes Baba Yaga's Poetic Remedies for Troubled Times: From Ask Baba Yaga, as well as the first book, Ask Baba Yaga. The collection is colorfully narrated by Zura Johnson, and it made me realize yet again how interesting (weird and wonderful) Kitaiskaia's writing as Baba Yaga is. Johnson's voicing of Baba Yaga (properly pronounced Baba Yagá, by the way) is wonderful and grew on me as I listened.

I received the digital audiobook copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

Loved! Best advice ever told in the wise voice of Baba Yaga with witchy mystic wisdom! I listed to this all at once, but I am going to go back and listen to one piece of advice each day for my daily dose of Baba Yaga wisdom! The reader voice is fantastic and perfect!

This was a fun read. I wasn’t sure how I’d feel, hearing this voiced by someone other than the author— I actually heard her on a podcast I love first (Spirits). But this voice actress did an amazing job! Her Baba Yaga was fantastic. And she was able to pull out a variety of voices to play the advice-seekers.

The book itself was an interesting read. I’m not going to speak on Baba Yaga speaking through the author, except to accept it for the purposes of this review. Baba Yaga gives advice that ranges from zany to thoughtful and over to spicy. I laughed out loud several times.

Because advice columns tend to only give advice to a few requests at a time, I think I did get a little overwhelmed by going through so much at once. I think I might enjoy her physical book better— to flip through more randomly, to return to, and to gift. But this is definitely worth a chance for the voice actress’s skills!

*I received a copy of this via NetGalley, in exchange for an honest review.*

Thank you to NetGalley and Andrews McMeel Publishing for my copy of Ask Baba Yaga: The Audiobook Collection by Taisia Kitaiskaia Narrated by Zura Johnson, in exchange for an honest review. This published October 6, 2020.
What a fun premise for a book! Dear Abby, but Baba Yaga instead! I knew I had to read this as soon as I heard about it, and I'm so glad I did, it didn't disappoint. I didn't necessarily agree with all of her advise, but that didn't make it any less enlightening or entertaining.
The narration was superb and I couldn't get over her Baba Yaga voice, so talented!

How a witch from Eastern European folklore got a job as an Agony Aunt leaves a lot to wonder about. Who ever gave her a job? And did anyone find any actual help with her answers?

Modern-day questions are sent in and answered by Baba Yaga, such as Am I better than everyone else? How do I keep from giving too many fucks? and other lovelorn questions which are answered by Baba Yaga, and many of them had my son and myself laughing out loud.

What a wonderful concept. I love it!

I am Russian so I gravitate to anything that is Russian, especially if related to Baba Yaga.

Ask Baba Yaga: The Audiobook Collection is unique. An advice column answered by a mythological creature, the advice has a unique tone. The narrator does a good job voicing the questions then taking on the role of Baba Yaga answering. Though some of the advice is...questionable or vague, it was entertaining.

This collection was so sweet. It was a quick listen and it was easy to lose myself in the rhythm of the question and answer format. The language was beautiful, the questions heartfelt and relatable, and the answers touching in a dark and magical way. I loved this so much!!

I have been reading Ask Baba Yaga back since it was a regular column. I love how playful and cryptic and still hopeful her advice is. Baba Yaga is my favorite folklore character, and I really appreciated the section by the author about how Baba Yaga is the greater force in the world she believes in. It makes a lot of sense to be to believe in someone so old and trickstery and contradictory, and I was touched by that. I think this as a print book is a five star read, because it's good to dip in and out of. As an audiobook, I found the organization a little repetitive, and because the responses are so poetic, it made them hard to absorb. I prefer to able to sit with Baba's answers, or reread them, and the audio format is not condusive to that.

Nicely narrated and humorous! I enjoyed listening to Ask Baba Yaga!

It’s a short audiobook. The author has written it in a simple, engaging QAs. And I like how the narrator changed voice to distinguish between the questioner and Baba Yaga

I volunteered to listen to this, audiobook through netgalley, in exchange for an honest review. The narrator did a good job reading this book. This is a humorous story to listen to. It is also a quick story. The author of this story is good and did a good job. I would recommend listening to this book to anyone and everyone as it will make you laugh out loud. This audiobook is in stores now for $17.99 (USD).

This was a really cute collection of advice from Baba Yaga for the modern human experience. Taisia Kitaiskaia wrote this is such a poetic way, that made it really engaging and gave Baba Yaga a unique voice. Like most anthology-esque books there were some responses that I loved, and some that were meh to me. I would recommend dipping in and out of this book when you need a specific question answered.

*received for free from netgalley for honest review* Interesting book, never heard of baba yaga before either but pretty cool read

Reminiscent of “Coffee with Dickens”, this book seeks to provide a voice to the voiceless as an outlet for advice we would not normally give. While this book is full of honesty- which has its own kind of beauty to it- it is not a book to sit and read in one go. Instead, it would make a good coffee table book, to be picked up and read as you feel the urge.

First things first: this narrator was PERFECTION. Her voice really exuded the mysticism, the old-as-time energy, the witty, sometimes biting magical wisdom of the Baba Yaga. At some points, where the questions could have been written by me, I felt like I was sitting down opposite Baba Yaga in her chicken-footed hut, gazing into her bottomless eyes in supplication... wishing she could be a mother to me, giving me the strength to go on through merely her wordless, imposing presence. (Perhaps that's my mommy issues acting up...)

I think maybe this recording could have benefited from having some short musical interludes here and there, though. Personally, I found myself losing focus quite a few times while listening, because the individual questions and answers are so short and simultaneously so packed with metaphors to interpret and decode, so beautifully crafted - each answer is like a gift, carefully wrapped, and one must peel off the layers of wrapping to get to its core. The advice and wisdoms given here really deserve - and need - to be properly listened to and taken to heart, so I would have appreciated a minute or so here and there to reflect on everything, especially after dealing with the heavier subjects. Instead, I had to skip back several times, which made for a less relaxed listening session.

Regardless, I really did like it. It was a quick and introspective listening experience, and it kind of felt like having a mental and emotional spa session. Having already read and enjoyed Jane Yolen's beautiful verse novel Finding Baba Yaga, which apparently took some inspiration from the Ask Baba Yaga column, listening to this collection was a closing of the circle, in a way. It made me want to go back to Yolen - in fact, I think I'll do that right now.

I barely enjoyed this audiobook it is two books in one. The narrator did a wonderful job portraying baba. It does answer pretty difficult questions in a way that is fun but also is self-help. Throughout the book you have the question narrated by one person and then the narrator is baba so it is very distinct and who is talking.