Reporter Nate DiMeo argues that for all the advances of the U.S. audiobook industry, the art of choosing the right readers has yet to be mastered. In an article on Slate, he lists some of the most notable casting blunders, citing (among other examples) Brad Pitt’s inexpert Spanish on All the Pretty Horses. DiMeo also points out how some readers have achieved a peculiar kind of fame within the industry, such as British voice actor Jim Dale, best known for his work on the Harry Potter series, and former B-movie actor Scott Brick.
For this Quillblogger’s money, the most exciting audiobooks are the ones read by the authors themselves – Douglas Adams’ reading of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, which first saw life as a BBC Radio drama, is a particular fave. It’s too bad Adams isn’t around to read the series’ capstone novel, which is being penned by Irish writer Eoin Colfer and is due for release next fall.
I agree that the author doing the reading is often best, but let me plug a couple of audiobooks NOT read by the author: John Cleese’s reading of C.S. Lewis’s THE SCREWTAPE LETTERS is brilliant, and the alternating male and female readers for Audrey Niffenegger’s THE TIME TRAVELER’S WIFE (the readers are William Hope and Laurel Lefkow) add an enormous amount to an already fine book. (And I certainly have no complaints about the readers who have done audio versions of my own books.)
I am in two minds about whether the author should read an audiobook. An audiobook needs to be performed, not merely read. The voice needs character, charisma, and energy and in many instances the author simply does not measure up in holding the listeners’ interest. There is no question that the choice of reader makes or breaks an audiobook – aside from having good material to start with!
I made the audiobook version of my own novel, The Violin Lover, for the CNIB. It was a fascinating experience. I have a theatrical background and am generally a confident reader, but reading my own work really tripped me up, because I knew it so well that instead of reading word by word I would anticipate and therefore make a lot of errors.
Recording audio books for Rattling Books I am always having to decide whether to get the author or an actor to read a given work.
Narrating a text from the page into a microphone is quite a different experience than most people expect. I’ve worked with actors who are great on stage but have great difficulty getting through a paragraph (and sometimes even a sentence!) without tripping. And I’ve worked with authors or other civilians who I’ve simply had a hunch about who almost stream the text.
Last night I recorded Joel Thomas Hynes reading his Say Nothing, Saw Wood for an upcoming short fiction anthology and I was amazed yet again by his ability to channel text with hardly a trip to speak of.
It is extremely common for narrators to say words that aren’t on the page and to not say some that are. It has happened to some extent with every single person I have worked with. A funny little quirk of the process which means someone else has to watch the text like a hawk and haul them up.
In my view the performer’s voice is as important to an audio book as the content they are reading. I have listened to content I would never have enjoyed reading and loved it because of the narration and I have aborted listening to content I dearly wanted to hear because I could not stand the voice or the approach.