Think back to when early humans first began to absorb long, complex stories told orally around the campfire. Now, instead of the campfire, think car; or commuter train; or plane—or wherever you can wear a headset and get the same pleasure as those primitive cavemen did by having a story told to you.

Audiobooks — those first humans were onto something.

I ended an earlier post by mentioning how I accidentally coughed into the microphone as I was recording the first page of my audiobook. It was the beginning of many mishaps that threatened to sabotage the entire production. When I started this journey, I had the notion that reading a book out-loud into a microphone couldn’t be very difficult — after all, I’d been reading bedtime stories to my kids for years and they never complained. Not once. Not even when I coughed. Or screwed up pronunciations. Or started to yawn in the middle of a sentence. My kids never told me I sucked as a reader, so why would anyone else? Continue reading