Robots vs Humans

I love audio books. LOVE THEM. There are some series that I will only read as an audio book. Mostly because I love how the narrator gives life the the words on the page.

Case in point - Kim Harrison's The Hollows series. The narrator, Marguerite Gavin IS Rachel Morgan. The series does not come alive unless it's in Marguerite's voice.

There are other books I absolutely cannot stand the audio books and the narration actually interferes with my enjoyment and consumption of the media.

Case in point - anything by Neil Stephenson. SnowCrash, Diamond Age, Cryptonomicon... they are all so vivid in my head that narration fucks me up.

AND HERE IS WHERE I WANT YOUR OPINIONS

Issue 1 - Narration vs reading aloud.

Narration is different than reading a book aloud. With a wee bit of training, anyone can read a book aloud and sound pretty good. That is not narration. Narration involves a certain level of acting and voice work. If you listen to Marguerite's performance in Dead Witch Walking for example, Rachel's dialogue is different than Marguerite narrating the exposition sections in Rachel's voice.

Does that make sense? Marguerite is reading the whole book as if she's Rachel, but when Rachel is speaking, the voice actually changes. I've listened to other series Marguerite has done, and yes, you know it's her voice, but the performance is different.

Issue 2 - Accessibility

There are times that listening to content is more accessible for me. Sometimes, I just can't read, I just can't sit down in front of text and absorb it. Sometimes the only way I can enjoy the written word is to have it read to me. An there are serious disability accessibility issues authors should consider. I feel like I should do everything in my power to have my work available to everyone, regardless of how they are about to consume the material.

Issue 3 - Audiobook Costs

Audiobooks are expensive to create. And they should be. When you are making an audiobook, you hire actors and professionals to bring your book to life. An audiobook can easily cost $2000 and up. That is a huge financial gamble for an independent author to take. You have to sell hundreds of copies of an audiobook before you break even. Often, audiobook production is more about reader wish fulfillment, as you may never make that money back.

AND audiobooks are expensive for readers to buy.

Issue 4 - AI

There are a lot of ways to have a book read to you. Like, if you have the Alexa app (or an Alexa device) you can have it read anything that's in your Kindle Library. This is amazing for accessibility... BUT... the quality is suspect. This is a robotic voice reading to you. It gets the job done, but it doesn't breath life into your work. Apple Books has a AI narration program that is in its beta stage. This will naturally reduce the cost of producing audiobooks AND reduce the list price of buying audio books... but at what cost?

SOOOOOO...

This is specifically where I want your opinion...

Do you buy (or borrow) audiobooks?

Are audiobooks your preferred method to read fiction?

How likely are you to buy both the written book (ebook or physical) AND an audiobook?

How much do the voice acting part really matter to you?

How do you really feel about robot voices?

Do you listen to audio content (podcasts, audiobooks) and normal speed or do you speed it up?

When you listen to audio content, are you doing anything else, like knitting, drawing, washing the dishes, exercising?

On a scale of 1 to 10, how badly do you want my books in audio format?

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