Its not cheating, some books can only be read, while others are improved with audio.
I prefer reading books, there is something special about holding a book in your hands, insering a book mark or jotting down something illegible in the margins.
I have read a massive amount of books in my time as a psychotherapist for 25 years.
For me, it is far better to read books to fully understand and examine the theories, concepts and methods illustrated by the authors. Marginalia comes to its fore.
However, I do listen to my fair share of audiobook. My main gripe with audiobooks is the readers voice. I cannot stand the squeeky, high pitched, robotic, nasally, sounds like AI, might well be AI, especially american female voices. Being British, just one paragraph and I am immediately put off and turn them off.
I have recently tried to listen to "Into the Into the Deep Wood 01, The Witch by Polina Volkova". I had to stop listening after a few paragraphs. If only the reader had a british voice.
I find switching back and forth between pages to find something you remember reading a few days ago is too difficult with an audiobook. No marginalia with audiobooks.
Do authors select who reads their books. maybe they do not. They should have readers from different countries and different languages.
My favourite audiobook reader is David Thorpe. I have the entire series of Mark Dawson's; John Milton, Beatrix Rose, Isabella Rose, Group 15, plus the novellas and more recently the Charlie cooper series.
I do not experience the same excitement reading those books.
>My main gripe with audiobooks is the readers voice. I cannot stand the squeeky, high pitched, robotic, nasally, sounds like AI, might well be AI, especially american female voices. Being British, just one paragraph and I am immediately put off and turn them off.
I would say that this could be said about books and the writing style. Whether it is Hemingway's bare bones style or Cormac McCarthy's lack of punctuation, they can put you off the whole book. To be fair, the voice of the narration is in addition to everything in a written book that could put one off.
>Do authors select who reads their books
I am no authority, but as a general rule, authors only have some input in the process, but the publishers are the main and final deciders (unless it is a big name author).
I have issues with voices too sometimes. My favourite audiobooks are the Doctor Who audiobooks that are actually read by David Tennant, because then you get the proper Doctor voice, a nice scottish "narrator" voice, and he does reasonably good impressions of everyone else too. I got The Stone Rose, The Resurrection Casket and The Feast of the Drowned as freebies with the Radio Times when I was very young, and I listened to them so much. I recently found them again on youtube, as well as some others I'd not heard before, and it was a fun experience since I can apparently recite a lot of them from memory now
I like David Thorpe too. George Guidall and John Lee are probably my favorite narrators. Jonathan Cecil narrating the Jeeves books is wonderful. So is Stephen Fry, but he's pretty much amazing in anything.
I prefer reading books, there is something special about holding a book in your hands, insering a book mark or jotting down something illegible in the margins.
I have read a massive amount of books in my time as a psychotherapist for 25 years.
For me, it is far better to read books to fully understand and examine the theories, concepts and methods illustrated by the authors. Marginalia comes to its fore.
However, I do listen to my fair share of audiobook. My main gripe with audiobooks is the readers voice. I cannot stand the squeeky, high pitched, robotic, nasally, sounds like AI, might well be AI, especially american female voices. Being British, just one paragraph and I am immediately put off and turn them off.
I have recently tried to listen to "Into the Into the Deep Wood 01, The Witch by Polina Volkova". I had to stop listening after a few paragraphs. If only the reader had a british voice.
I find switching back and forth between pages to find something you remember reading a few days ago is too difficult with an audiobook. No marginalia with audiobooks.
Do authors select who reads their books. maybe they do not. They should have readers from different countries and different languages.
My favourite audiobook reader is David Thorpe. I have the entire series of Mark Dawson's; John Milton, Beatrix Rose, Isabella Rose, Group 15, plus the novellas and more recently the Charlie cooper series.
I do not experience the same excitement reading those books.