Bookish Banter: Mr. or Ms.Narrator?

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.

When listening to audiobooks do you prefer if a male or a female narrator?

Ash-

I think I prefer females mostly. I always seem to have an easier time listening to books when it's a female reading them.

I'm not sure what makes me like females more, but it seems that I always finish the books faster and like them that way. 

I think I also read a lot of books where the main character is a female. So maybe that's why. I always find it weird when a male does a female voice. It kind of freaks me out. I don't know why.

So anyway, female narrators for me because I get more immersed into the book!

I don't have much to say about this. Oops

Jenn:

It really depends for me. I like both and if the book is mainly from a male protagonists point of view, I rather have a male narrator... even if its third person. If the book is mainly from the female protagonist's point of view I want a female narrator. 

Sometimes it is hard to have a male do a female voice and a female do a male voice. It's hard to get the perfect narrators for this and for sure not many books wouldn't have one or the other voices. I think females do better doing male voices than the other way around. But I have had really good narrators, male and female, and really bad narrators, male and female. So really I guess it comes down to the narrators. 

What I can't stand is when the female voices are done by males and the males voices by females feel and they forced. So fake. Like they are trying way too hard. I mean I get that the voices aren't going to be perfect. So let's try and make it feel as normal as possible. Just a little bit of variant in the voices is good. Just enough to tell who is who when the speaking is being done. That is what is really important. 

The problems I have with male narrators is when the voice is too low. I have compromised hearing and some tones are hard for me to understand fully. So low tone male voices. hard for me. I have to listen to the book at a slower speed and have a hard time in the car with it on. One thing about audio is I like to hear it all, miss nothing.I don't like to be confused. 

The issue i have with female voices is it's hard to find the right voice that goes with the voice in my head. Some characters feel whinier than I would have made them. Some are more innocent sounding than I like. And some were much aggressive. Sometimes the voice doesn't match the character for me.

For the most part, though, I am happy with most of the narrators and get used to the style and voice they give within just a short time.