Audiobooks discussion

What are some of your biggest pet peeves about Audio books.

* Abridged books. I don't understand why these are still around. Why would anyone purchase them? If I want to read a particular book, I want the book as the author intended it to be

* When one book in a series is not available in audio. For instance, there is a book series that I have been wanted to read for years and the first book is the only book that is not available in audio.

* Bad Narrators. I think we all probably have run into this problem.

Jackie wrote: "What are some of your biggest pet peeves about Audio books.

Jackie, what really gets me is when I am trying to get going on a series only to learn that some books are missing and others are abridged version only, so the whole series is messed up. I will have to hunt down printed versions of the early ones to get going properly!

Linda

Drives me batty when I get int a series that has been out forever in print and has a few books on audio. eg. Sherrilyn Kenyons Dark Hunters. the audio began at book 9 I think.. now they are being released from the start *v e r y s l o w lyyyy*
THAT drives me buggers!
Also he unabridged. I will not buy if I have a choice. eg Diana Gabeldons Outlander series. book # 5 or 6 was on Audible in Abridged Luckily it was released in Un Abridged but it cost much more.
Other things that bug me. When I read something that is supposed to obviously have an accent and the narrator is the most bland voice ever or when the male narrators give women a pitchy high ridiculous voice.
Normally by the time the book get rolling I can forget about the voice but on occasion it is just too silly.
For the most part I love audio.

^ YES! That is currently my biggest pet peeve.

When the introductory music carries on playing over the start of the chapter. One or the other please.

Jackie wrote: "What are some of your biggest pet peeves about Audio books.

* Abridged books. I don't understand why these are still around. Why would anyone purchase them? If I want to read a particular book,..."

I agree on all three.

I agree with all three from the original post. One of the main thing I do before starting a known series is to check for availability of all the part. I have not started some really good sounding series just for this reason.

I'm agree also with all points made. Especially with the series comment. Drives me nuts.

When there is background music in inappropriate places. I listened to The Giver on audio and they kept playing this music in places where it was not even dramatic and the music would play during half of the scene.

I am listening to The Road right now, and the narrator is driving me crazy. He is talking just a little bit too fast, like he can't wait to be done reading and go home. It especially bugs me in scenes with dialog.

Oh I liked The Road on audio. It was way too depressing for me to ever listen to again though.

Yeah - gimics like music, sound effects & multiple authors drive me nuts. Just read the book, already!

I don't much like abridged as a rule ... however ... I did listen to Ellyn Burstyn's autobiography Lessons in Becoming Myself, which is only available abridged. Honestly, afterwards I felt that I'd gotten the full story, and that the missing "details" were truly optional.
I've never read Dewey: The Small-Town Library Cat Who Touched the World, but have read comments that the author upstages the cat with her own ... issues. That one is only abridged, so perhaps the publisher took that into account for the (later) audio edition?
I recently ran across a book where the narrator "stepped on" the introductory music, so agree on that score!

Hi all, noob here :-) Can't resist jumping in!

Totally agree about the abridged versions. What is the point?

I'm currently listening to Marie Antoinette: The Journey, and the thing that is driving me most nuts is the occasional inclusion of a phrase in French - usually quoting from a document or letter or something, and often describing someone. I have no French at all, and can't help but wonder if the print editions have footnote translations. I'm also a bit miffed to miss out on the pictures which the print editions of this book have.

I hate it when I am reading a series and I really like a particular narrator, and the series continues with a different narrator I don't like. That happened with the Takeshi Kovacs series by Richard K. Morgan. The first two books were well narrated by Todd McLaren. I had to read the third book instead of listening to it because I didn't like the narration (William Dufris, I like him for some books but not others).

I recently read Joplins Ghost and each section started with a bit from "Maple Leaf Rag" or "The Entertainer." Which would have been fine but it was the SAME bit every time, and there are a LOT of sections...

Poor editing!
I have listened to a couple books lately where the pause between chapters is forever. About the time I am ready to check to see if my battery has died the next chapter finally starts.

Vicki wrote: "Poor editing!
I have listened to a couple books lately where the pause between chapters is forever. About the time I am ready to check to see if my battery has died the next chapter finally starts."

The opposite is annoying as well: when half a word is cut off at the end of a track... Like they couldn't avoid that??

Jacqueline wrote: "* Abridged books. I don't understand why these are still around. Why would anyone purchase them? If I want to read a particular book, I want the book as the author intended it to be ..."

I actively avoid abridged books.

Jacqueline wrote: "* When one book in a series is not available in audio. For instance, there is a book series that I have been wanted to read for years and the first book is the only book that is not available in audio."

I have the same problem. There are a few series I want to listen to, but the first book has not been converted to audio. Why?

Jacqueline wrote: "* Bad Narrators. I think we all probably have run into this problem."

This is the reason I now listen to samples first, and download free chapters when possible, to avoid really bad narration.

Count me in the pet peeve club of abridged audiobook haters! I catalog audiobooks at the library where I work - and often decide which donations get added to the collection. If it were up to me, I'd never add a single abridged book. But the criteria is whether or not it will likely circulate. And the abridged ones do circulate. I sometimes wonder if the patrons realize what they are checking out. I, myself, listened to an entire book without knowing it was abridged once and got well into a second one before I found out.

What also gets me is that many of the abridged books are actually pretty long - 4-6 CD's. So if you don't know the unabridged length of the original, it can be hard to tell - without reading the fine print - whether a particular version is abridged or unabridged.

I have read some nonfiction books that would have been better abridged, although I assume you're talking about fiction?

John wrote: "I have read some nonfiction books that would have been better abridged, although I assume you're talking about fiction?"

Actually both. I would hate for the history books I've downloaded to be abridged, especially when it came to discussing them with others.

I, too, avoid abridged audiobooks like the plague. Several books I've long wanted to listen to are only available in abridged format so I forgo them until someone wises up and records the full version.

There was one exception. I had ascked for the unabridged Da Vinci Code for Christmas several years ago and received it--on cassette if you can believe it. I listened and it wasn't until the announcement at the end that I realized it was abridged. I bought the unabridged version. In this particular case, the abridged version actually made a better story because the non-stop action was unimpeded by back story and extraneous details. But I'm a geek for such details and had to have the whole thing. I'm tempted with other such books to listen to abridged first and then get the unabridged version for the rest of the story, though I've never intentionally done it since.

Ancestral wrote: "John wrote: "I have read some nonfiction books that would have been better abridged, although I assume you're talking about fiction?"

Actually both. I would hate for the history books I've downlo..."

I'm going to have to disagree here.

A History Of Christianity: The First Three Thousand Years and The Warmth of Other Suns: The Epic Story of America's Great Migration had me crying out for abridged versions. The narration was fine, but they were just too bogged down to listen, without the ability to skim.

Actress Ellen Burstyn's memoir Lessons in Becoming Myself is only available as an abridged work. since she reads it, I'm assuming that she herself decided what not to read. It was fine, and later out of curiosity I looked through the print version to see what I'd missed - not a lot.

I throw up my hands at this knee-jerk reaction against ever doing so for any book.

Tracks that are longer than 3 minutes.

Scratched audiobooks from the public library. (I love my public library though.)

I'll am firmly in the "no frickin' abridgements, nosirree, not in my mp3 player!" camp. I want to read/listen to the book AS THE AUTHOR WROTE IT -- not as some anonymous editor thought I might like to listen to it. Ptooey.

And I also hate the background music. I can stand it between important divisions of the book, but I don't want it under my narration. There's one book in particular, the first Elric book by Moorcock, that had music under the WHOLE DANGED THING. That about drove me batty. This isn't supposed to be a song, people -- it's a BOOK.

I'm anti-abridgments too. If the book isn't interesting enough to want to "read" the entire thing, I'm not interested in listening to it at all.

Music can be done well... but under the whole thing? That's just STUPID! I don't mind it at the beginning and end of discs though, to warn you you're going to need to switch.

John wrote: "I throw up my hands at this knee-jerk reaction against ever doing so for any book."


I can see that there may well be some non-fiction books that are better abridged. I've read many a non-fiction book and decided it would have been better as a magazine article (and many start out as such). But since I can't know in advance, I'd rather not bother with some editor's idea of what I should read - and just hope for the best.

I'd rather hope for the best with the real thing and then skim where I like. That's not so easy in an audiobook, I know. But it's definitely the lesser of two evils in my book (pun intended).

Oh GOSH... I've read one of those. BLEGH. Wish I'd just read the magazine article. SERIOUSLY.

I don't think this one has been listed yet...

What's up with Audible releasing like book 3 in a new (to them)series but not book 1 and 2 ?

Are you talking about series where you know for sure that those earlier parts exist in audio form?

Perhaps, the narrator for them turned out not to have done such a great job? Or, in hindsight they were weaker writing, and the later ones stand on their own okay?

I know of one series of three books, where only the third one was done as an audio. I like the narrator, and the sample and premise seem fine, so I read the first print one ... somewhere between yawn and yuk. The second one appears to have a rather weak plot, so it seems they made the right call there (probably).

What's up with Audible releasing like book 3 in a new (to them)series but not book 1 and 2 ?"

YES...and hen you want to start listening to a new series and can only find a few books further in ie Chief Inspector Armand Gamache Series , AudibleUK has nr 6 and nr.7 ...GGRRR my library doesn't have them on audio either

1) Missing books in a seies
2) Abridged books
3) Mispronunciations by narrators! Isn't there an editor or someone that checks these things beforehand?

Mispronunciations drive me CRAZY!

I listened to Unbroken: A World War II Story Of Survival, Resilience, And Redemption, read by Edward Herrmann (who I love from Gilmore Girls), and part of the story takes place in a TINY town called Ephrata, WA. MOST people probably don't know or care how Ephrata is pronounced, but I've been there and it's NOT pronounced "EF-freh-tuh"... it's "ee-FRAY-tuh". I get it if you only have to say it one time in passing or whatever. Why bother to even look it up? But he said it wrong like 50x in the space of an hour. Drove me nutso!

The regular words are worse though, because SOMEONE should have caught the error.

Sara ♥ wrote: "Mispronunciations drive me CRAZY!

I listened to Unbroken: A World War II Story Of Survival, Resilience, And Redemption, read by Edward Herrmann (who I love from Gilmore Girls), an..."

AMEN!

Alice wrote: "Sara ♥ wrote: "Mispronunciations drive me CRAZY!

I listened to Unbroken: A World War II Story Of Survival, Resilience, And Redemption, read by Edward Herrmann (who I love from G..."


Yeah, mispronunciations drive me crazy too.

Next to that, changing pronunciations of a word throughout the book irk me as well. It often happens with unusual character or place names and I've run into several books where every permutation of the pronunciation occurs throughout the recording--aargh! I did read an interview with Jim Dale who said that when recording the HP books and no pronunciation guide was given, they recorded each occurance of the word with every possible pronunciation and then the editors inserted the correct sentence--usually.

And regarding the Chief Inspector Gamache series... all are available on Audible.Com--and I adore them!--so it must be a problem with international rights that they aren't all on Audible.UK. Aargh again.

I'm always a little peeved when they switch narrators in a series. I was listening to Daniel Silvas books, narrated by John Lee(with a British accept) when suddenly someone else with an american accent takes over the series. It's a bit of a nuisance.

I have two peeves
1. Narrators who speak too slowly and pause excessively
2. Grating nasal voices - how did these people get the job!

Chris wrote: "I have two peeves
1. Narrators who speak too slowly and pause excessively
2. Grating nasal voices - how did these people get the job!"

Amen!

I'm sure these have been mentioned, but my peeves are as follows.

1. pronouncing stuff wrong. In the Dark Carpathian books by Christine Feehan the narrator pronounced a name right in one of the books and the same narrator in the very next book butchered this poor character's name. It pissed me off each time I heard it. Also in the Anita Blake books the narrators change for like 5 books and although I love Cynthia Halloway in the Cassie Palmer books I HATED her in the Anita Blake books. She pronounced were (as in werewolf) wrong, she kept saying it like we're.

2. the wrong voice for a good book. i've passed over many many many audiobooks because I didn't like the narrator. there are a few narrators who make me cringe when I find out they are the narrator, but for the most part I push on through because I want to "read" the book. If you've read any of my reviews it's no secret that I feel STRONGLY that any and ALL highlander books should be narrated by a man...PERIOD.

3. Music...who's idea was it to put music in audiobooks? In the Anita Blake books they put music, gunshots, and other sound effects in all the moments that should be tense or sensual. The first time I came across it I was like "oh, that's different" then after a few books that crap got annoying.

4. I hate it when a narrator forgets that a character should have an accent. yet again in the Anita Blake books the vampire Jean-Claude is french, and should therefor have an accent. The original and current (damn I can't remember her name) narrator did a great job with assigning accents to everyone who needed one, but the replacement narrator just said screw it I'm not even gonna try.

5. Isn't it he job of post production people to edit out breathing and swallows? I'm just saying...

I've always said a good narrator can save a so so book and a bad narrator can tank a great book.

Librivox has a system where productions are required to be proof-listened before being offered to the public for download. I, too, have run across commercially sold ones that would've (likely) had stuff flagged for review under such a system.
Mis-casting is always disappointing, but tough to "undo" after the fact. Multiple narrators, I suspect, could be a result of say reader #1 being a mismatch, reader #2 being okay, but unavailable due to other commitments, reader #3 and the production team having "issues" etc.

Taria wrote: "I'm sure these have been mentioned, but my peeves are as follows.

1. pronouncing stuff wrong. In the Dark Carpathian books by Christine Feehan the narrator pronounced a name right in one of the ..."

Oh, how true! And I, too, listen to the Carpathian series and the Highlanders--Phil Gigante does a Scottish accent that makes this lass squeal (although his female voices aren't the best... but who cares about the females? ;P). He and a female narrator teamed up in some of the later Carpathian books and the later Fever books to great effect.

John wrote: "Librivox has a system where productions are required to be proof-listened before being offered to the public for download. I, too, have run across commercially sold ones that would've (likely) had ..."

Speaking of narrator problems... I noticed Audible flagged a recent release, "Fifty Shades of Gray", to say the complaints of the reviewers regarding the voice of the narrator had been taken into account and a new version has been remastered and will be released soon. What's up with that? I can well understand why they would want to correct a defect noticed by so many readers and probably affecting sales, but I'm wondering what they're going to do. I'm not planning to buy the book, but I am curious as to what they will do.

I'd say it may be the technical quality of the released version, so it's possible they're fiddling with it to change the pitch, filter background, or something?

Taria wrote: "5. Isn't it he job of post production people to edit out breathing and swallows? I'm just saying... .."

Amen to that. I agree with most listed here but just have to repeat that mispronounced words drive me batty. I'm in the Boston area where there are plenty of funny sounding city names. There is nothing more off-putting than someone calling Worcester WAR-chest-er instead of WUSS-tuh, for example.

Another similar peeve is the reader placing the wrong emphasis, or no emphasis, on a word in a sentence. Hard to think of an example, it doesn't happen a lot. Something like reading the sentence "I would never mispronounce that word" without putting the emphasis on "never."

Oh I just thought of another one. I hate it when I feel like the narrator is just reading to me as oppose to them BEING the characters. Does that make sense?

Tavia Gilbert IS Kat & Bones to me
Xe Sands IS Jacob, Elijah, Gideon, etc... to me.
Phil Gigante IS JZB and the highlanders

Carrington Duffy just reads to me
Justine Eyre reads to me

I hate when the narrator is changed in a series. You get used to that voice and it shapes the characters. I agree Taria, "Tavia Gilbert IS Kat & Bones to me." It takes so long to get used the new voice.

Taria wrote: "Oh I just thought of another one. I hate it when I feel like the narrator is just reading to me as oppose to them BEING the characters. Does that make sense?

Tavia Gilbert IS Kat & Bones to me
..."

I agree that two of my pet peeves are abridged books and changing the narrator in the middle of a series. It is like it is not even the same story line.

If the original narrator is not available (for whatever reason), they should just not record any further books? The assumption here seems to be that it's solely a whim of the publisher.

I agree on the abridgements. When I first started listening to audiobooks in the 90's there was very little choice, as the retail price for unabridged audio was prohibitive and my library mostly carried abridged versions. Now that unabridged versions are so widely available and affordable, I never listen to abridged.

John wrote: "Ancestral wrote: "John wrote: "I have read some nonfiction books that would have been better abridged, although I assume you're talking about fiction?"

Actually both. I would hate for the history..."

I agree with you but instead of having abriged audio versions they should've had better editors!