Read to Me!

December 27, 2010

I love audiobooks. Shall I say it again?  I love audiobooks!!  I listen to them constantly. My family doesn’t understand me. They don’t understand how much I love someone else’s melodious voice speaking to me over my headphones. They don’t understand how I can tune everything else out, and listen to the sounds of some other worldly person speaking soft sounds in my ears.  They don’t get that I can paint a room, vacuum a closet, scrub a toilet, or mop a floor while listening to someone take me away from all of that tedious, everyday, monotonous stuff.

Anyone who listens to audiobooks understands how important the narrator is.  When you pick up an audiobook, take it home, and find that the voice of the reader is as annoying as scratches on a chalkboard, you are likely to give up on audiobooks altogether.  However, when you take one home that has a reader whose voice is like velvet, you know you have hit on something wonderful and truly satisfying.

A while ago, I listened to Beach Music by Pat Conroy. It was one of the first audiobooks I had listened to, and I was hooked. It was narrated by Frank Muller. I was disappointed when the book was over. I could have listened to him forever. He passed away a few years ago, but lives on in audiobooks. I will always be grateful to him for giving me a love for audiobooks. Thank you, Frank.  

You can request an audiobook from the library by the reader. Just type the reader’s name into the computer catalog under author, and they should pop right up. We also have downloadable audiobooks on our website.  In the search box at the top right of the page, type Overdrive and click on the first link.

Some of my favorite readers are:

• Richard Ferrone—he reads John Sandford’s novels and has this amazing  deep gravelly voice that makes Lucas Davennport sound so real.
• Dick Hill—he reads Lee Child’s novels and speaks Jack Reacher very well. (Jack Reacher is the main character.)
• C J Critt—does Janet Evanovich and Diane Mott Davidson. She makes me giggle.
• Jim Dale—who read all the Harry Potter books and made me feel I was magical.
• Barbara Rosenblat—Diane Mott Davidson, Kathy Reichs and Janet Evanovich and too many more to list.
• George Guidall--has narrated over 900 audio books. He is by far one of my favorites and has lent his talents to many genres.  He reads a lot of adventure novels.

Also check out www.audiofilemagazine.com. They have lots of information on the narrators and info on the best books to listen to.  The library also carries the magazine to check out.

So, all of you audio nuts out there, do you have any questions?  Just call me, your local librarian.  Chances are, I’ll be hooked up to my headphones listening to the latest and greatest.  But I’ll turn it off long enough to share.

Penny M.
Parkville Branch