Bookish Banter: Audiobooks

A little Bookish Banter to get us through.  Bookish Banter is a little bit of banter about our bookish thoughts as we have a friendly discussion over a nice cup of tea ( wine)

Jenn: 

I have done a discussion about audiobooks a couple of times. I love absolutely love audiobooks. I find it hard to believe when I find avid readers who say they can’t do audio books or won’t try them because they don’t think they can do them. It all started for me back in 2008. I was at work bored and co-worker of mine had twilight series on audio. She couldn’t read anymore because her eyes were bad so she had to listen. This, of course, was back when it was all on CDs. I knew I liked the Twilight series. It was a series I had read and decided to give it a try when she offered. I realized hey this isn’t so bad. Well, I listened to the books and didn’t pick it up for a while. Maybe a year. Then at a new job I had a coworker that was listening to some books. I decided okay I will give this a try again. I didn’t mind it last time. I started to listen and was hooked. I realized I could get so many more books read if I could listen while I worked, cleaned, traveled. 

                     

Sometimes I will just play solitaire on my phone so I can finish a great audiobook.  I do have to be doing something with my hands while I listen or my mind will wander. I am a bit ADD. But my phone with all its mindless games works just fine. I also listen while I am in the bath or taking a walk. It's great. I get so much more readable with audio. I am sure I actually listen more than reading. When I find a book I am interested in… I will look to see if it's on audio before I buy the book. I just know I would get to it and through faster if I listen instead of reading. I still like reading my books but listening is great alternative and I do think some books are just better when they are read to me. I have also found in my audible app… I can make the speed to 1.25 or 1.5 faster. This even gets me through more books. It sounds crazy to some but my mind goes a million miles and minute and listening to it at higher speed is pretty much like my brain reads or my mouth speaks. So it's just normal to me.

I have tried for years to get Ash to listen. She would say I don’t like the way its read, or I won't pay attention. I tried to give her my knowledge and experience to urge her to try. Well finally after years and years of prodding… she decided to try audio…. Of course, it was once I stopped all my urging.  I think she is hooked but I will let her tell you about her experience and her thoughts.

Ash:

Jenn has literally been telling me for years to listen to audio. But I had it in my head that audio sucked and there was no way I could really pay attention, or I'm too ADD for this. Well, let me tell you. I LOVE audiobooks. When I'm driving is especially great, it keeps me focused, keeps me from yelling at idiot drivers, and I get to read at the same time. I mean, how else can you read and drive? 

The Ghost Files by Apryl Baker was the first audio book I chose. It was a book I had been wanting to read for a while, and it was sort of short. So I decided well why not. Jenn kept talking about how great it was, so let's do this. 

At first, I only listen to it in the car. It took me about a week to listen to a 6-hour book because Finn kept wanting to talk about it, and John wanted me to call him on my way home from work. So on the way to work was basically the only time I could listen to it. 

When I first started listening to the narrator was kind of annoying, keep in mind I had never listened to an audiobook, and so when she kept changing her voice for each character, it sounded kind of dumb. Of course, how else could we tell between characters, plus when we read to Finn, we change voices for the characters. So, duh, the narrators would too.

After that I tried to listen to the second Ghost Files, that narrator was awful. I didn't get far into it, so I will go back and listen, but for now, it's a no for me.

I graduated to listening at work when no one else was there and we were slow. I could keep doing what I needed to do, but with my book going. Again, that's great.

Since then I have still only listened to two books whole, and I've started a few others. I think it will still take me time to get used to listening to it, and to be able to ignore the narrators that aren't very good at reading it. But I realized when I'm cleaning, playing video games, or just playing on my phone, I can also be reading. It's a win-win!

As far as listening to an accelerated speed, I haven't gotten that far yet. It sounds like they're talking really fast, yes, even faster than you Jenn. And it kind of makes me want to panic. I know we had started this one book and she kept speeding up and slowing down while reading, and I just couldn't do it. I'm hoping someday I'll be able to listen to it at a faster speed so I can finish the book faster.

Y'all can definitely expect more reviews and more books being finished by me now. I'm so excited! And I have to admit, Jenn, you were right

So what are you guys thoughts on audio? Do you prefer to read or audio or about the same? Do you have favorite narrators? where do you get your audiobooks?

Please share your audio experiences!