I do a lot of audio-book listening. A lot = several a week. Of course, there are weeks with limited listening time, but I generally have my exercise in the mornings and at least part of every Saturday when I can bust out a great book at 2x speed.
Unless the accent is Scottish. I’m not sure why, but Scottish in particular requires a slightly lower listening speed.
I’ve listened to some really interesting nonfiction lately (Stolen Focus, All the Beauty in the World, London Falling, The Gales of November). Some of those take longer because I need to pause and reflect. Not that I don’t do that with fiction, but I’m more likely to relisten to an entire novel than I am to back up a chapter and listen to it again. But of course, that’s all kinds of generalization.
After March of 2020, I heard a lot of discourse about reading that “counts” and I have thoughts. (I know. You’re shocked.) As a person who got through many decades without struggling with any discernable anxiety, the first pandemic spring was a shocker to my nervous system. I had a constant feeling of something hairy and many-legged trying to crawl its way up my throat. All the time. And one of the things I thought would help was to sit in a chair and read.
Nope.
I couldn’t do it. It was almost impossible to sit still, and similarly impossible to pay attention to written text.
Audio books saved my reading, and they’ve done the same for the past many years. (I’m regaining my ability to sit for longer periods of book-based reading, but it’s not an everyday thing yet. Here’s hoping.)
I’m not the world’s pickiest listener, but I will absolutely turn off a book with an annoying reader. Or anyone who “acts” too hard in the narration. Or, yikes, one series I was recommended and there was full “audio enhancement” – the sounds of doors closing, people laughing, a scream in the distance… no. No thank you. I’m sure there are people for whom that is delightful. I am not those people.
There are a few readers whose voices I adore, and I will listen to a book just to hear them. Elizabeth Knowelden. Julia Whalen. Jim Dale. (I’m not choosy.)
I’ve read some discourse about holding on to information better in one medium or another, and the science backs up retention with words on paper pages. Great. I believe that. Also, do I need to retain all the things I absorb? I certainly hope not, because I can barely remember what I said I was going to the store for, much less the details of the Near East Art wing in the Met.
Maybe I should read to broaden my horizons (which I think I do) or to explore great writing (also yes) and to see what the market’s doing with the kinds of fiction I write (occasionally). But mostly, I like the company of a good story, true or otherwise, in my head.
Let’s read.