Saturday, February 7, 2015

Audiobooks are Amazing: The Best and Worst


Yesterday's Feature & Follow Friday topic was about reading multiple books at once. And, yes, as I said yesterday, I do this all the time. And I do this via audiobooks. Because they're awesome. Allow me to share my audiobook journey with you and give you my list of the absolute best and worst!

A few years back I needed a part-time job while going to school and, wanting something flexible where I could work for myself, I started doing laundry and odd jobs for a pretty awesome family. While I really actually loved it, it quickly started to get kind of monotonous, which is totally unacceptable when working for oneself! And so I got an audiobook copy of Partials. That's where it began and it's never ended.

Since that day I have had audiobooks almost constantly playing while I'm doing basically everything from brushing my teeth to making the bed to driving. While I will admit that I tend to zone out from time to time, for the most part it keeps my full attention and I love that I can basically double the books I read during any given time!

This is where the big, giant BUT comes in! Book narration is a skill and not everyone has it. I have definitely found that a narrator can really make or break a book. There have been books that I've listened to that I absolutely despised because the narrator was so annoying. Some of these I've even decided to give another chance. Because I don't want any of you to go through the pain of sifting through different narration skills, I'm going to give you my top and bottom five audiobook narrations (in no particular order).


Top 3

    


Bottom 3

      


So there you have it! My most and least favorite audiobook narrations. This isn't to say that I absolutely LOVED the books that were on my top list because the truth is I didn't (review for Mortal Danger is upcoming). I also did absolutely LOVE The Unbecoming of Mara Dyer even though I really didn't like the narration. Oh, and Clockwork Angel is the one I've decided to give a second chance - in hardback this time. I couldn't get into that one because I wanted to punch the narrator in the face...

The moral of the story is that you should definitely give audiobooks a try, especially if there's a book you want to read but are intimidated by. I never would have gotten to book six in The Wheel of Time series if it wasn't for audiobooks!

What about you? Do you listen to audiobooks? Or are you the kind of person who just can't stand them?!