Audiobooks, you know?

Historical text from HellasProject (2009–2014). It is not current advice or a present-day service.

For a while I have been hooked on a new kind of reading books — or rather not reading, listening.

Audiobooks are not new; they have been around for years, I would say since the cassette era, and they are a very good way to put across the book and the tone the author wants the reader to feel.

With audiobooks recorded in dozens of titles in recent years, anyone interested can get more deeply into every protagonist and the rest of the characters and scenes.

On bigger productions there are different voices and effects that take the audio-book experience to a unique level.

If you are a bookworm, there is no way an audiobook will not impress you.

Other pluses: younger listeners keep what they hear more easily than what they read, and we also spare our eyes from letters and varying brightness.

In 2010 alone I have “listened” to the following:

• Rick Riordan, Percy Jackson, the first 4 books.
• All of Harry Potter (7 books)
• The Secret (1 book)
• William Gibson, Neuromancer (1 book)
• Charlaine Harris, Sookie Stackhouse (7 books in 2009, the 8th and 9th this year), which became True Blood, which everyone now knows (ANT1)
• Dan Brown, The Lost Symbol (1 large book), which was also the last

The last one, and one of the best in production from a book, and of course in plot.

I would never have had the chance to read all those amazing books in so little time. I listen in every possible case: at the gym, on the bus, or (now) on the beach while I sunbathe.

Have you tried audiobooks?

• From my iPhone

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