What are we listening to? (audiobooks)

[CRussel]

Interesting. I find it absolutely impossible to listen to audio books when I'm working. I either lose total track of what's going on with the book, or I end up not getting any work done. OTOH, I can knit, swim, garden, cook or potter around the house while listening, in addition to the more obvious driving or walking.

I used 47 Audible credits this year (and bought rather more than that, counting WhisperSync and library audio books.) I have no idea how many of those I actually read, since I don't keep a separate list just for audio books. But I suspect the number was even higher, since I did a bit of re-reading as well.

[melmac]

Originally Posted by CRussel

Interesting. I find it absolutely impossible to listen to audio books when I'm working. I either lose total track of what's going on with the book, or I end up not getting any work done. OTOH, I can knit, swim, garden, cook or potter around the house while listening, in addition to the more obvious driving or walking.

I used 47 Audible credits this year (and bought rather more than that, counting WhisperSync and library audio books.) I have no idea how many of those I actually read, since I don't keep a separate list just for audio books. But I suspect the number was even higher, since I did a bit of re-reading as well.

I'm the same walking, driving, housework and gardening are fine but I can't do it while working in the office.
I note that some audible members received an end of year email telling them how many books/hours the did for the year I, however, did not receive it on either of my accounts So this year I plan on tracking it myself on goodreads

[issybird]

I can't listen and work, either. I also have two different listening streams, though; more mindless for when I'm swimming or in bed, more challenging for when I'm otherwise occupied (although the mindless ones can sneak in there, too).

[haertig]

I have enough trouble trying to listen to an audiobook when I'm doing absolutely nothing, let alone working. I am trying to train myself for audiobook listening. I am improving, but I still find it hard to hold concentration at times. What I'm doing now is starting an action/adventure fiction novel (other genres are too slow for my current listening skill level), and if it is not engaging enough to keep my attention then I set it aside. To be listened to later - maybe years from now - after I have further honed my listening skills.

[pwalker8]

Listening and retaining information are two different things. I listen to audiobooks when I'm doing dull, monotonous tasks like testing my programs. I don't listen to audiobooks when I'm actually programming. For that I either listen to music or listen to nature sounds depending on the level of concentration that I need.

[be4morgan]

Words Can Change Your Brain

If you are into compassionate communication then you might be interested in listening to this audiobook.

[issybird]

I'm listening to the last of Trollope's Palliser novels, The Duke's Children, read by Timothy West who is wonderful. I can already tell that the novel won't be one of the better ones in the series and I'll never forgive Trollope for

Spoiler:

killing off Lady Glencora

but it's still a highly enjoyable listen.

[Bookworm_Girl]

I’m listening to The Library Book by Susan Orlean. I’m not crazy about the narration (done by the author). However the content is very interesting.

From Amazon:

On the morning of April 29, 1986, a fire alarm sounded in the Los Angeles Public Library. As the moments passed, the patrons and staff who had cleared out of the building realized this was not the usual false alarm. As one fireman recounted later, "Once that first stack got going, it was good-bye, Charlie." The fire was disastrous: It reached 2,000 degrees and burned for more than seven hours. By the time it was extinguished, it had consumed 400,000 books and damaged 700,000 more. Investigators descended on the scene, but more than 30 years later, the mystery remains: Did someone purposefully set fire to the library - and if so, who?

Weaving her lifelong love of books and reading with the fascinating history of libraries and the sometimes eccentric characters who run them, award-winning journalist and New York Times best-selling author Susan Orlean presents a mesmerizing and uniquely compelling story as only she can. With her signature wit, insight, compassion, and talent for deep research, she investigates the legendary Los Angeles Public Library fire to showcase the larger, crucial role that libraries play in our lives.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by Bookworm_Girl

I’m listening to The Library Book by Susan Orlean. I’m not crazy about the narration (done by the author). However the content is very interesting.

I've never found an author who I thought had done a good job of narration. My experience has been that they range from barely adequate to absolutely awful. I wonder what the motivation is? They want a bigger piece of the pie? The publisher is too cheap to pay for a professional? Hubris? In any case, I think an author who provides his own narration does himself a disservice.

The book, however, does sound interesting. I see the waitlist at my two best OD libraries is pushing a year (assuming books don't get returned early), but I'm third in line for the paper copy at my local library.

[CRussel]

I tend to agree with you about authors reading their own books. Mostly they're not very good at it. I have had exceptions, but they're rare. I've got a copy of Michelle Obama's new book, Becoming, however, and I'm going to try it as an audio book. We'll see.

[CRussel]

Originally Posted by Bookworm_Girl

I’m listening to The Library Book by Susan Orlean. I’m not crazy about the narration (done by the author). However the content is very interesting.

Originally Posted by issybird

The book, however, does sound interesting. I see the waitlist at my two best OD libraries is pushing a year (assuming books don't get returned early), but I'm third in line for the paper copy at my local library.

12 week wait at one of my libraries, >6 months at another. I've put it on hold at the first. I've had a life long love of libraries, starting with my very first grade school library to my first job (library page) as a teenager to now, when libraries are my first and most important defense against spending way too much at Amazon (or Kobo).

[Bookworm_Girl]

I borrowed the audiobook through my Scribd subscription.

[taosaur]

I'm on an audio book break. The last one was The Killing Moon by N.K. Jemisin, which was a great world and story. The narrator was fine for the most part, but every once in a while would read a sentence in a rhythm that suggested she didn't actually understand or care what it was saying.

I've been filling the audio book gap with the fiction podcast Welcome to Nightvale.

[haertig]

I have found that I do not like listening to audiobooks for novels that I have already read.

For example, I really like the Sigma Force series by James Rollins. One of the narrators of the books pronounces his name Role'-ins, not Rawl'-ins (like everybody else, including other narrators, has pronounced it). That drives me crazy, but is not a deal breaker since you don't have to listen to the authors name in the text of many books.

But when they mispronounce one of the main characters names, NOOO! That really drives me batty. They don't even have to mispronounce it - they just have to pronounce it differently than my mind pronounces it when I'm reading (even if it is my mind that is in error!)

There is character named Seichan. In my mind, I pronounce this Say'-chin (right or wrong). The narrator says it Say-Shawn' (like it's French). Yeuch! It's hard for me to argue which is correct - the character is supposed to be of unknown but possibly Asian descent, although my mind visualizes her (probably erroneously) as Slavic (I think because Rollins is a pen name for James Paul Czajkowski, which definitely sounds Slavic even thought he's American). But which pronunciation is correct doesn't matter to me. When you hear a name pronounced wildly different than you imaged it when you first read the book, it is disturbing. For me anyway. There is another character name Monk who is voiced as what sounds to me like a gravel-voiced troll/dwarf. Not exactly the way I imaging him when reading...

Why this annoys me so much, I can't say. But I should probably just stick to audiobooks for novels that I have not read yet. Oddly enough, it didn't bother me in the slightest to find that Kono from the original Hawaii Five-0 TV series had magically morphed from male to female in the remake of the series.

[pwalker8]

Interesting. The vast majority of the audiobooks that I buy are books I've already read. Pronunciation is something that rarely bothers me in an audiobook, as long as they are consistent about it. Could be simply that I'm old enough to have grown up when we still had regional dialects in the US, so I'm use to people pronouncing words differently.