As you know, I recently started listening to audiobooks and have been enjoying them. So far I’ve listened to three, two of which I’ve already had a chance to review and I have a couple of thoughts.
1. The narrator makes all the difference. I started listening to an audiobook and when the narrator started doing some of the other voices I couldn’t keep listening. All of the guys in the story sounded kind of creepy. That being said, the narrator for Reality Boy was so good that I really believed in him as the character and I think I picked up on parts of the text that I may not have if I had been reading it. Which has made me consider the next thought.
2. I’ve been wondering how listening to an audiobook impacts the “reader’s” interpretation of the text. This is probably a really nerdy thought and it might not be something that anyone else would think about, but I do think that I picked up on things in Reality Boy that I wouldn’t have picked up on if I had read the book because the narrator emphasized them. I can’t say with 100% certainty that I wouldn’t have picked up on them, however knowing how I read I don’t think I would have. So the interpretation of the text isn’t entirely up to the “reader,” because the narrator is reading the text based off of their own interpretation, which means that I might laugh at a line that I wouldn’t have laughed at if I had read it on my own. I’m not sure if this is a good or a bad thing, but I do know that there are some books that I want to read, at least for the first time, on my own.
3. I really love how convenient they are. I listen to an audiobook while I get ready in the morning, on the bus and while I’m cleaning if I don’t have the TV on or videos on YouTube playing. Since I started listening to them I’ve already listened to three books, so I also like that I’m able to “read” more books, in a way, by listening to audiobooks. Right now I’m listening to a book that I’ve already read, and I’m enjoying “rereading” a book in this way, so that when I’m actually reading a book I can read something new.
I guess those are the only thoughts that I have about audiobooks right now, but they have been going through my mind quite a bit and since I’ve been talking about listening to audiobooks, I wanted to share them.
What are your thoughts on audiobooks? Do you think you’d consider checking them out if you haven’t already?
