I like the idea, mostly for fiction. But the few I’ve tried really turned me off. The person doing the reading overacts the parts. Worse, sometimes they have multiple readers, they hack out parts of the text and even add sound effects. It’s like a radio show.
That’s not what I want. I just want someone with a pleasant voice to read me the story in its entirety.
Do audiobooks come that way? Is there some form of labeling that tells you what you’re going to get?
First off, make sure you get ones that are “unabridged” so they don’t have bits of the text missing. I have listened to audiobooks that were full-on dramatic interpretations, and ones that were just like having your grandfather reading you the story on the sofa, and a wide range in between. My biggest issue with audiobooks is when they pronounce character names differently than the way I would–in some cases differently from how any sane, literate person would.
Getting an unedited version is mostly just as simple as looking for ‘unabridged’ somewhere on the label. It ought to at least match some published written version (even if there are alterations among editions).
Some abridgements I’d consider more acceptable - a collection of short stories might simply drop a whole story, or chapters (of a non-fiction work) might be left out instead of chunks of text, but there’s not really any way to tell unless they make it clear. An interesting example of whether or not an unabridged version is better - My Life by Bill Clinton is availabe unabridged (25 hours) or in an abridged version which is read by the author himself (7 hours).
If you go to Audible.com (downloadable audiobook store), you can see who the performer(s) are and more importantly hear a sample before purchasing. The sample is usually several minutes, so you get a good feel for it. Audible also lets you filter searches so that you are only looking at ‘unabridged’ books. The website is unfortunately pretty awful in many other ways, though.
Okay, thanks. I need to look for unabridged and from looking at that website, some of the books are also labeled “dramatized.” Have to avoid that.
I really like the ability to listen first, too.
Basically “listening to grandfather just read the book” is what I’m looking for.
That’s practically all of them, in my experience. There are some where the author does the reading himself, so he doesn’t have to share the royalties, but few of them have smooth enough voices not to get in the way of just reading (which is what it is). David McCullough is a notable exception.
But most of them are performed by minor actors, who’ve done it before and know how, and that’s really all it takes. Just look for the words “Read by …” somewhere in the description and you know you’ll get a decent performance. If there’s a lot of dialogue, though, I usually find that male actors can perform credible female voices better than the reverse.
Your local library likely has a good selection of audiobooks to start with. I read a ton of these, and normally donate them the ones I’ve bought and finished.
I listen to them often.
Not good quality, but FREE:
Free and GOOD short fiction:
More free, mix of good and not so good:
http://www.podiobooks.com/podiobooks/search.php?showall=true
Been meaning to try:
http://www.alexwilson.com/telltale/
Good, free, and a worth the shout-out:
http://scottsigler.podshow.com/
You can always go to audible.com as suggested or itunes. Look for Nigel Planer and some well done narrations of Pratchett if you like that type of fiction.
BTW, I gave some links to good, free stuff… but seriously consider a small donation if you like Sigler or escapepod/pseodopod. It is worth supporting the medium, IMO.
Costs money, but you won’t get better service anywhere:
This commercial is not paid for. I’m just a satisfied customer.
Just to reiterate what others have said: the package (as well as the website you order or download from, if you buy online) ought to say whether the book is abridged or unabridged (some are available both ways), and who’s reading it (it could be the author him/herself, a well-known or not-so-well-known actor, or someone whose specialty is reading audiobooks). Unless there’s more than one performer listed, or it says something like “dramatized” or “full cast audio,” you can probably assume it’s just one person reading it (who may or may not try do different voices for the different characters).
If you want specific recommendations, you can look at these old threads:
Recommend books on CD
Looking for some good audiobooks
Recommend me an AudioBook please.
Recommend some Audio Book CD’s that I Can Get My Wife for Christmas.
To which I’ll add that if you want something relatively short but not abridged, I thought Steve Martin did a great job reading his own novellas Shopgirl and The Pleasure of My Company.
Librivox has readers that are Just Plain Folks. They’re doing just public domain stuff, but they recently did a version of King Lear that I thought was really good.
Books read by Frank Muller (sadly no longer reading due to a motorcycle accident) and George Guidell are great, but may be a bit over dramatic for you. I LOVE Muller’s voices and Guidell’s work reading Dune is the best audio book work I’ve heard yet, and I’ve listened to hundreds.
Bill Bryson reads some of his own work, and I think he does a fantastic job.
Audible is probably your best bet. You can sign up to get them cheap, too, if you get a year long deal. I was paying $22 for 2 books a month. If you’ve looked at book prices lately, that’s a heck of a deal.
…plus if you sign up for the full year they often have deals like you get a free mp3 player.
Audiobook are good in theory but I tend to fall asleep or tune them out.
I listened to dozens of audiobooks over the course of three or four years when I had a reasonably long commute. Mostly what I was able to get from my local public library. I had the same criticism of many of them as the OP – I don’t like dramatizations, and I found the tone and manner of many of the readers annoying. However, I did come to regard the products of Recorded Books as being uniformly well-done. The readers are generally actors, though not “name” actors – they tend to specialize in reading audiobooks. Patrick Tull, who’s done Patrick O’Brian’s Aubrey/Maturin novels, Ellis Peters’ Cadfael novels, John Mortimer’s Rumpole novels, and a bunch of other stuff for Recorded Books, is particularly good (you can hear samples at the link), as is George Guidall. I can honestly say that I never listened to any of their releases in which the reader bothered me. Recorded Books only does unabridged versions, as far as I know.
Most of the other publishers were something of a crap shoot, though the Chivers Audio Books versions of P.G. Wodehouse were uniformly terrible, particularly compared with Recorded Books’ versions (recorded by Alexander Spencer). I’ve only been through a few of Books on Tape’s versions of the Patrick O’Brian novels, all read by David Case, which were OK, but nothing more than that; several different readers have done O’Brian’s books for BOT, but Case’s are the only ones I’ve listened to. I did notice on Books On Tape’s website that they have MP3 samples of many of their books so that you can hear for yourself what they’re like.
In all honestly, falling asleep is part of it for me. I often have trouble falling asleep. I listen to environmental sounds sometimes but I’ve found the human voice has a more powerful sedative effect on me. I wouldn’t be surprised if it lowered my blood pressure a little too. Might take me longer to get through a book but that’s okay.
I’ve been known to go to bed with the TV tuned to the NASA channel when they’ve got scientists giving presentations about various space-related stuff which I find interesting but not riveting enough to stay awake for. But it’s hit and miss with NASA.
The new TV series The Dresden Files got me interested in the books and I just found a sample of the audiobooks narrated by James Marsters, known as Spike in Buffy fame. He’s got an interesting voice and that might be what I start with.
Nothing fancy, just read me the book.
If you want classics, read by someone with talent and not all the unabridged stuff, (and don’t mind the violence/death/sex/language toned down considerably if not edited out where applicable) I would heartily recommend
Jim Weiss of his coumpany Great Hall Productions. I have just about everything he’s ever done ( Got hooked on Galileo and the Star Gazers and just have been buying the rest)
It is geared for kids, but entertaining for adults as well. Most are an hour long. The only narrator that I think is better is Jim Dale of Harry Potter Fame.
I think audiobooks of first-person narration stories are easier to listen to. For the most part there’s a whole lot less switching into other voices to worry about.
The best audiobook I’ve ever heard, by far, is Witch Child by Celia Rees. Jennifer Ehle is the narrator.
Classic children’s stories with the violence and death edited out? For shame!
I use Audible.
1984 was read by one man and he had a very strange voice. Normally, his voice would have irritated me but for this particular book, he had the best voice I could imagine.
All the other books I’ve gotten:
Tick Tock - One reader with an irritating monotone. This book should have had more than one reader. At least a female and a male. Part of the appeal of the book is the total bewilderment of the male character, in regards to the two main females. This does not come across well when one person does all the voices.
The Shining - One reader with again, an irritating monotone. But, it worked for this book.
Most of the Redwall books - Multiple readers, very well read. Good emotion and the pronounciation is just what I hear in my mind when I read. These are my favorite books to listen to. I even got my boyfriend listening to them on his very long commute. He now loves the books too and sometimes sings the songs even when he’s not listening to them. In the written books, food and song are a huge deal. This actually comes across in the storytelling.
Anyway, my point (since I didn’t really make it clear), is that sometimes a well read book doesn’t depend on how many people read it. This is why it’s so important to hear a snippet first. If I had thought to listen to a sample of Tick Tock before I bought it, I never would have spent the money. I almost didn’t buy 1984 because some people said in the reviews that the narrator had in irritating voice. But I love the way the narrator sounds like an old fashioned radio show newsreader.
I do that too. And I’ve noticed that some narrators and stories help me sleep faster and some give me nightmares. I try to pick books that have very little violence in them when I want to fall asleep to them. YMMV.
What format do you want to listen to? They have cassettes, CDs, MP3 CDs, and downloadable. If you use downloadable, you need to either leave your computer on (or get up to turn it off) or have a device that you can download it to. Generally, MP3 CDs fit one book per CD but you have to be sure that your player plays them. And if your CD player has bookmarking capability, that’s a bonus.
As rackensack mentioned, I enjoy Recorded Books a lot. And they have a Recorded Books Unlimited program where you can borrow unlimited audiobooks for a monthly fee. It’s the same type of program as simplyaudiobooks that RickJay mentioned, but simplyaudiobooks doesn’t have cassettes and Recorded Books doesn’t have MP3 CDs. Since I prefer cassettes and like being able to access the whole Recorded Books inventory, I go with Recorded Books.
If you like the download method, you might also want to look into downloadable audiobooks from the library. The most popular library services are Netlibrary (Recorded Books) and Overdrive Audio (mostly Brilliance audio).
ETA: Some books are better heard than read and vice-versa. Or at least that’s what I’ve heard from people that do both.
Definitely check a sample of the reader before buying. For instance, Flo Gibson is like nails on a chalkboard for me.
My all time favorite audio book is Anansi Boys. The reader is fabulous. He does do different voices and accents, but it’s not like, “Look at me, I’m ACTING,” more like, you realize you know which character is speaking without any identification, and they become almost like real individual people.