Agree with so many above who say that really it’s all about how YOU feel about them. I can’t abide them, it’s just someone droning in my ear. I don’t think that it’s because I retain information better visually than aurally (I remember things I’m told, and I can sing almost anything I’ve heard once), I think it’s more that I read really fast and while I’m not much of a skimmer, I lose patience with how long it takes for someone to speak every single damned word out loud. I wind up getting frustrated and distracted.
My best friend *loves *them. She listens to them in the car and while she runs (whereas I’m like “How the hell do you run to something with NO BEAT?!?!”). We discuss books all the time so clearly listening to them works just as well for her as “reading” them.
I’ve been getting through a lot of audiobooks lately, too, and I think of them as “books I’ve read”. I find I can get through a LOT more audiobooks these days than “real” books, simply because I can listen while doing something else, unlike reading, and these days I have zero time to set aside where I can just sit and read. So if it weren’t for audiobooks, I’d be getting through nothing at all.
If you, like me, are at least partially interested in using audiobooks to fill in the gaps in your education, and get caught up on a lot of the classics you always sort of meant to read but never got around to, I highly recommend Librivox (librivox.org). They’re the Project Gutenberg of audiobooks. Librivox volunteers read works that are in the public domain, and the audio files are released into the public domain as well, so they’re absolutely free. Now, to a certain extent, you get what you pay for, as these are volunteers, and not professional readers, but for the most part, I find they’re a good way to get through a lot of old classics.
I definitely include audiobooks in my “Books Read” count, and I’ve become a big fan of audiobooks over the past year or so.
I walk my dog at least an hour a day, and I enjoy having my mind engaged as well as my body. I started with books I wanted to re-read (The Discworld books are quite entertaining!) and I’ve had good luck with Young Adult novels as well. For me, nonfiction is a lot tougher to stay focussed on, tho Erik Larson’s Thunderstruck worked pretty well.
Reading and listening are two completely different things. They use and engage different areas of the brain. Even if the audiobook is word for word the same as the book, you still have not read the book.
It is your challenge and goal, so you can set the bar wherever you like.