Fantasy Romance
Yesterday was release day for my debut novel.
For those of you giving it a chance, thank you for taking the time to look at my work and giving me the opportunity to at least try to entertain you. It’s what all those years of work is about.
And if you get a chance, I would really appreciate it if you’d stop over and leave a review. Reviews are hugely important for indie authors. It’s how we get our work noticed, and how we get Amazon to take us seriously.
And thank you again.
While I do love audio books, as I mentioned here, there are some things I don’t like about them, especially as I’ve been reading more of them.
Here are six reasons why.
At least on my iPod (which is pretty ancient), it isn’t easy to go back a little to catch something I missed. And I do miss stuff as I’m usually listening while I’m doing something else (laundry, dishes, vacuuming). This tends to means I just miss stuff.
I’m a visual learner. I’m mostly lucky that way as so much of our education system is designed for visual learners, but this does mean that I simply don’t process as much of the story listening to it as I would if I read it.
Reading is very enjoyable, but it also helps teach me to be a better writer. While the audio version still helps me with plot, pacing, and character development, it does a lot less for helping be get better at the mechanics of words on a page.
You need electronics to play an audio book. As I get most of my audio books through Audible, I need a device to play it on. That means taking care of that device. Making sure you charged it the night before. Making sure you don’t drop it while on the treadmill. Making sure you’re careful with it while doing household chores.
Maybe I need to get some earbuds with memory built right into them. Does such a thing even exist? We live in the future with self-driving cars that talk to us (sarcastically if you have an iCar). It must exist. Though this would make going back to get catch up on the stuff I missed even harder.
Nothing worse than buying an audible book, and five minutes in, all you want is for the narrator to shut up because their voice is even more annoying than your whining toddler. This has happened to me. Twice.
Audible books are a lot more expensive than traditional ebooks. This means fewer books for the same budget, and that’s never good.
While I love audio books, there are also some serious drawbacks. I will still be reading the majority of books the old-fashioned way on my iPad.
How about you? Anything you dislike about audio books? Any tricks to keeping devices charged?
The number of audio books out there continues to grow, and Amazon has made it easier than ever to get them. Even my library has audio romance title that I can borrow.
Here are five reasons I love audio books.
Or any household task, really. Popping in my earbuds and working on laundry, cleaning the bathroom, or tidying the living room means more time listening to a book.
I do not like long car rides, however, an audio book can make them more enjoyable. The first time I ever listened to an audio book we were driving out to rural Ohio to visit family. I’m sure if you have a long commute, this would be a good way to spend it.
One of the things I hate about exercising is the excruciating boredom. I know this doesn’t affect everyone. Some people even enjoy exercising. *shudders* But that’s not me. And while I will never enjoy my time on a treadmill or the elliptical, there was more than one day this week that the temperatures didn’t get above 0F/-18C with the windchill.
That requires indoor exercise. However, going down to the basement where we positioned a big screen TV in front of the treadmill and elliptical almost always results in the kids coming down with me and an episode of My Little Ponies or Octonauts on the screen. Not exactly something that takes my mind off the boredom. An audio book helps.
Our youngest child has some sleep issues, and she struggles with falling asleep. Getting her more tired doesn’t work. Warm milk doesn’t work (assuming you can get her to drink it). She never consumes caffeine and gets very little processed sugar. The doctor says some kids are like that, especially kids that have suffered from night terrors. If we actually want her to sleep, we need to sit with her until she falls asleep. That can mean up to an hour of sitting in a darkened room. Yeah, audio books help.
Lots of the books I’ve listened to are narrated by people with British accents. Yeah, enough said.
How about you? Do you listen to audio books? Do you enjoy them? Anything you like about them? Maybe something you don’t like?