However the concentration for pure reading deserted me alongside my
appetite and my energy. So, by means of the audio-books in the last week I have
‘read’ three books: The Forgotten by David Baldacci; Zoo Time by Howard Jacobson;
Standing in Another Man’s Grave by
Ian Rankin. Waiting for me to enjoy are ring Up the Bodies by Hilary Mantel; Where
There’s a Will by John Mortimer and Victorian
London by Lisa Picard. I have also managed to read on the paper page The Examined Life: How We Lose and Find Ourself by Stephen Grosz.
(Should you be interested - my next post here will be my personal notes on
these individual books…)
But I have to say that this experience has made me reflect on the
audio-process. First, how wonderful that these texts were unabridged. When I
think of the care that we writers put into every word, every paragraph of a
novel it seems some kind of heresy to abridge it to make it fit into a required
audio timescale. So the audio-time is anywhere upwards of ten or eleven hours.
Also, being read by accomplished readers, the rhythms and nuances of the
prose enhance the meaning - perhaps more than the echoes in the head that
emerge from reading on the page.
It certainly improved my line by line attention as I have to confess, as
a lifetime reader, to a well entrenched and somewhat destructive habit of
speed-reading and skipping. With audio books you can’t skip; you have to let
the story unfold at the author’s designated pace.
It could be the euphoria of the illness but I would swear that I have
enjoyed these books much more intensely than usual. As I come back to life and
writing and work I’m certain I’ll use this form of reading into my book habit more
regularly
in the future.
And then I suddenly remember I’m not alone. In his exceptionally good
book On Writing author Stephen King urges
all writers to read widely, wisely and well for their own self education. He lists
the books he read in a single year. His list is enormous. Then he tells us that
he had read a great proportion of this list by
audio-book.
I suppose I could declare an interest here. All my books are now on
Kindle - just got the stats – they’re trickling out very well there (except for
Family Ties. Do give it a try. One of
my best, I think) . But as well as thise= they are also out there in audio-book
form. An Englishwoman in France looks
very fine in its audio-book packaging. They’re available through libraries to
order borrow and download. Or through companies like Audible.
And now I’ve had my own valuable and enlightening audio experience I
treasure the thought of my own readers enjoying my novels in this steady
appreciative pace, read by the brilliant actresses who give them their voice
NEXT: Tomorrow my appreciative notes on the audio books I have read this
week. By David Baldacci, Howard Jacobson, Ian Rankin, Hilary
Mantel, John Mortimer Lisa Picard, Stephen Grosz.
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| Click: My novel set in North London |
