My husband bought me a subscription to Audible for Christmas. I'll confess I have - despite my many years in publishing - until now never listened to an audiobook. I have to also confess that I am not sure I like it!
I selected a title on a historical palace which we are visiting on vacation in a couple of months. I figured it would be a good way to engage with a subject that was likely to be pretty dry.
I was wrong. Rather than be more engaging than the printed version, I find myself missing large chunks of the content when my mind wanders ('hmm I wonder of that guy knows he's snoring really loudly...oh that is a nice coat...etc etc'). Not very good when you're trying to digest lots of facts about a location!
My plan for my next title (the sub gets me one free book a month) is to try a language book. I am thinking that an audiobook geared to learning a language should be better suited to my short attention span on the train. I also think it is the kind of thing I might find easier to listen to than read in print. The benefits of hearing the language spoken are pretty obvious.
I also have plans for book no. three: There are a huge number of titles by celebrity authors reading out their own books. Now that might be well worth a listen...
Any audiobook recommendations?
Hi Mithu - I also tried audiobooks for the first time recently (I had laser eye surgery and couldn't read, watch TV etc afterwards). I got a free download and tried a potboilery sort of novel which I thought would keep me suitably engaged / distracted. It's about an autistic boy being tried for a murder that - I think - he didn't commit. A fascinating and gripping subject. But I find that:
ReplyDelete1. the voices annoy me - the story is first-person narrative told in 5 voices. I'm finding a couple of them particularly annoying, and also when the narrative requires them to do impressions of each other (as it were! i.e. report someone else's speech) I find that really annoying. It's a distraction you don't get when reading.
2. I keep losing my place in the book by using my device to do other things in between 'reading' e.g. listening to music - I think that's because it's not a specific app, but a bunch of MP3 files (downloaded from eMusic as if they were music tracks) - probably not a common problem as other sites / apps are better set up for audiobooks?
3. I keep falling asleep! and of course, the book carries on without me and I have to find my way back to the last thing I remember!
Despite all of these, I have found it quite engrossing and haven't had the problems you described with distraction (which I do find with some content, e.g. some podcasts I have tried to listen to while travelling), so perhaps subject matter is relevant. BUT, now that my eyes are up to it, I haven't quite brought myself to continue listening and finish the book - I'm back reading (non-audio) books, emails, twitter etc.
I think there's definitely a time and a place for audio books but in future I would think more about the person reading it, and the format. Will be interested to hear about your continued experimentation and whether the celebrity route in particular is a success!