Chief,
I don’t know how things are organized in the Norfolk area, but it’s possible that if there’s another library system in the vicinity, they’ll have different policies regarding audiobook lending. Might be worth checking into matters in the next county or city or whatever. Often you can get a non-resident borrower’s card for a fee.
Failing that, let’s consider this: how many times do you expect to listen to the books you’re buying? If the answer is not greater than one, then there’d be no functional difference between buying them and renting by mail from one of the companies that specializes in this.
I’ve been lucky in that my county library system circulates audiobooks on the same terms as all other materials (except reference items): three weeks, renewable once for a second three weeks. Given that I’m spending the better part of two hours a day in my car to and from work, I’ve made it through a lot of unabridged audiobooks in the last year or so.
My recommendation: check out Recorded Books, LLC. They offer only unabridged recordings, for purchase or (for most titles) 30-day rental by mail. Buying them is expensive: $40-$100 for most titles; rentals are in the neighborhood of $14-$20, depending on the title and length, so in many cases renting the unabridged version would be cheaper than buying the abridged. Best of all, both the material and the readings are uniformly first-rate. Unlike a lot of the other companies, they eschew “name” celebrity readers in favor of actors who, though mostly unknown, understand the particular demands of reading a book aloud and are masterful at it. After working through the entire Patrick O’Brian Aubrey/Maturin series, as well as a half-dozen other titles read by him (including a couple of Brother Cadfael mysteries), I’m absolutely in awe of reader Patrick Tull; he’s able to effectively convey the nuances of each character in each book without ever going too far. The accents, where called for, are distinct and accurate but never overdone, and each character’s phrasing and rhythm are, one senses, exactly what the author had in mind. It’s as if one were listening to a well-established rep theatre company rolled into one person. His performances of the Aubrey/Maturin series are astounding enough, but having heard him read such diverse material as Oliver Goldsmith’s The Vicar of Wakefield and the two Brother Cadfael mysteries, I’m amazed at how thoroughly he manages to adapt his performances to the material at hand. I don’t hear Patrick Tull reading a book, I hear the book’s characters and narrator speaking to me. And Tull is just the best example of the quality of the readers Recorded Books uses. I’ve also listened to a number of P.G. Wodehouse novels and story collections read by Alexander Spencer, who’s very nearly as good as Tull, and two of Mark Harris’ baseball novels, The Southpaw and Bang the Drum Slowly, read by John Randolph Jones, that were equally as good, and a couple of Elmore Leonard novels. If you’re a Sherlock Holmes fan, I should point out that Patrick Tull is the reader for several of Recorded Books’ recordings of Holmes novels and stories. Another thing I like about Recorded Books is that they avoid inserting music at the beginning and end, a practice I find distracting at best and annoying at worst. They also occasionally include lagniappes like interviews with the authors or additional author’s notes not found in the printed versions.
I have also sampled the wares of several other audiobook producers, and while they’ve varied greatly in quality, none has matched the quality of the books from Recorded Books that I’ve listened to. I realize this almost sounds like a paid commercial message, so I should hasten to point out that I’m in no way connected to Recorded Books, and that since I’ve borrowed their materials from my library instead of using their rental by mail services, I can’t speak for how they do at customer service. But if I were in your circumstances, I think I’d find out.
