Listen up!

Written by Catriona Coote Tuesday, 14 September 2010 14:13

Struggling as I do with a chronic neurological/immunological disorder, there are times when physically reading a book is beyond me. Thank goodness for audiobooks! Stephen Fry's performance of the Harry Potter series has proved a distraction during many a patch of bedbound discomfort. His remarkable capacity to create and consistently maintain voices for each of the numerous characters is quite astonishing, the more so as he allows Ron and Harry's voices to darken as their characters age. But audiobooks are not just for the pale and wan or for those who need a non-visual entertainment while ironing. They are a vastly undervalued resource for all readers.

Many gifted children go through that difficult phase when their spoken vocabulary is much greater than their ability to read. While it is necessary for them to practise reading the simple stories that develop word recognition and an understanding of the connection between sounds and letters, this can be a terribly frustrating and boring time for imaginative and/or highly articulate children. Often these youngsters are capable of understanding very complex stories.

Enter the audiobook. I've recently introduced a bright young 6yo neighbour to the delights of audios and his mother was quite surprised (and pleased) by his interest and enthusiasm - on a plane trip during the holidays, on car trips (even short ones to and from school), to listen to last thing at night. Audios can often help prevent World War 3 in the back seat on longer car trips as well as enabling adults to share stories with their children, encouraging family conversations.

Local libraries are increasingly aware of the value of audiobooks for both children and adults so do check there first as this can increase the range available; but favourites are worth purchasing. While they may at first seem expensive, work it out at price per CD and you'll soon find that most audios are very reasonably priced for the work put into them.

Bolinda Audiobooks offer some of the best quality unabridged readings I've come across, using excellent readers - usually trained actors - who create interesting character voices and are sensitive to mood and pacing within the texts. I've recently acquired Edwina Wren's reading of Emily Rodda's The Key To Rondo which I can highly recommend. Bolinda is also very good about producing entire series on audio - the other Rondo books are available, as is the entire series of Garth Nix's Keys to the Kingdom read by Alan Corduner. The cases are user-friendly, being made of the same plastic as DVD cases and therefore less likely to chip, crack or fall apart than the usual hard-plastic CD cases that most other audiobook providers still use. Both adult and children's titles (including YA) are available and Bolinda also offers a wide range of non-fiction. Most good bookshops offer a range of Bolinda audios but you can also order direct from their website: http://www.bolinda.com/aus/

Louis Braille Audiobooks (http://www.louisbrailleaudio.com/) are a little more expensive but they provide some less mainstream titles which can be an advantage, especially for the 6-9 reading age.

Your local ABC shop will offer a variety of audiobooks and both Australian and BBC recordings are of predictably good quality. There are, of course, MP3 format audibooks available for sale and download, just as there are audioblogs such as Stephen Fry's ‘podgrams' (see http://www.stephenfry.com/ ). Finally, http://librivox.org/ offers audiobooks in the public domain. Just be aware that these are read by volunteers so the quality is variable - and you can end up with each chapter read by a different reader using different voices; there's also the possibility that not all chapters of a book may be available. Their ultimate goal is to make available as audiobooks all texts available in the public domain.

Both Bolinda and Louis Braille recognise that background music is not only unnecessary but often annoying or distracting for listeners, so most of the time you get the book, the whole book and nothing but the book. Just be aware that other production companies are inclined to add phase-in-and-out music between scenes or chapters and sometimes even during the reading. Unless it's directly referenced by the text - e.g. the songs in Lord of the Rings - this can be an annoyance when listening.

As you can't use a physical bookmark as you do with a hard copy, track timing is something to be aware of with audios. The early Harry Potter audios suffer from overly long tracks, which often makes it necessary to listen again to four or five minutes of already-heard text. Bolinda and Louis Braille use a much more sensible system, also used in the later Harry Potters, creating a new track every 2-3mins as well as a new track for each chapter. This means that, provided you keep an eye on the track being played, it's very easy to ‘pick up where you left off'.

Unless you are introducing a young reader to a ‘children's version' of an adult text, look for unabridged texts so that children don't miss any of the nuances crafted by the authors. If abridged is the only option, try and ensure that the abridgement has been made by the author themselves - although obviously this isn't possible with classics. (Miss Austen, could you please abridge Emma for us? Mr Dickens, are you available to make some cuts to David Copperfield?)

Dramatisations can also work, especially of crime and mysteries. The BBC dramatization of Tolkien's The Lord of the Rings is excellent but there are some issues with their interpretation of The Hobbit, principally the fact that the goblins' overly synthesized voices are almost incomprehensible.

And of course Naxos (http://www.naxosaudiobooks.com/home.htm) produces dramatizations of many classics, such as Shakespeare's plays. These are usually good, middle-of-the-road interpretations that will give listeners an idea of the play's narrative, the flow of language and the relationships between characters; this can be very useful for school and university students.

Audiobooks also work well for underachieving students and reluctant readers. During my years as a teacher I used to read the class novel onto tape (old technology!) so that struggling readers could ‘read along' without becoming overanxious or distressed by their ongoing battle with text. This enabled them to enjoy the story, participate in activities and discussions and helped develop their confidence in their reading. Dyslexics often find audiobooks a blessing for similar reasons. Adults who have to drive long distances or who are frequent flyers may find audios a rewarding accompaniment, making it possible to spend hours enriching one's mind at the same time as travelling. There are plenty of business and motivational audiobooks available in addition to other non-fiction titles. It's great to see how quickly Bolinda, particularly, gets new releases onto audio, so it's possible to get an audio version of, say, the latest Tim Winton, very close to the publication date of the novel itself.

If you still have a cassette player, keep an eye out at fetes, fairs, church jumble sales, in charity shops and garage sales - you'll often find audibooks on tape that people are happy to dispose of cheaply because of changing technology.

In a recent Gifted article I reviewed a number of audiobook titles and I try to add others regularly, so check the online Reviews for audiobooks.

Until next time - happy reading: or in this case, listening!