Booklist Online: Book Reviews from the American Library Association

This terrific look inside Full Cast Audio’s production of Eyes like Stars by Lisa Mantchev includes comments from actors, Full Cast founder Bruce Coville, artistic director Daniel Bostick, and more. I love seeing how the cast rehearses, how the script pages are marked, and to see & hear readers morph from actor to character. Lots [...]

Listen here to wonderful comments from Kathie Lee Gifford, author and narrator of Just When I Thought I’d Dropped My Last Egg; Lisa Scottoline, author of Look Again; and Katherine Kellgren, Audies award-winning narrator of Curse of the Blue Tattoo, a 2008 Odyssey Honor-winner. Great reflections on audiobooks, the value of the spoken word and [...]

I had the pleasure of serving as a judge for the Audies‘ Distinguished Achievement in Production award, with the wonderful requirement of critically listening to outstanding audiobooks. Here’s the official press release on the nominees from the Audio Publishers Association:
The Audio Publishers Association (APA) has announced three Audie nominees for the prestigious Audiobook of the [...]

Welcome to another look at evaluating audiobooks. In Part One & Part Two of Listening with a Critical Ear, I focused on the skills of the narrator. Today’s spotlight is on the production team and the music that creates the setting and mood of an audiobook. Often, it is the music that raises an audiobook [...]

I am taking part in the Share a Story, Shape a Future event the week of March 9-13, blogging about the role of audiobooks in children’s literacy. Here’s the week’s line up – be sure to stop in!
Day 1: Raising Readers
hosted by Terry Doherty at Scrub-a-Dub-Tub, the Reading Tub blog

Finding Time at Home – Tricia [...]

Bouncing around the blogs today are audio outtakes from Barack Obama’s self-narrated audiobook Dreams from My Father, featuring quotations from Obama’s high school friend (but read in the voice of our president) using profanity and offensive terminology. This brings up a question I’ve often grappled with: Does hearing  a shock-laden term affect an audiobook listener more than reading the [...]

On Monday, January 26th, the following titles were announce at the Youth Media Awards ceremony at the ALA Mid-Winter conference as this year’s top audiobooks. For a complete listing of all award winners, including a video, go to www.ala.org/yma Congratulations to the publishers, directors, authors, and narrators of these wonderful productions, and to the Odyssey [...]

Thanks to Macmillan Audio for producing this fabulous behind-the-scene video look at the creation of the Dune audiobook series. You’ll see and hear master narrators Scott Brick, Katherine Kellgren, Euan Morton, and Simon Vance reflect on the honor of translating Herbert’s classic science fiction novels to the audio medium.  Paul Goodrich and Scott Sherratt demonstrate [...]

From the U.K.’s Guardian, a story on British family entertainment company Chorion’s new service that provides classic tales Mr Men, Paddington Bear, and Noddy with a new digital twist. “Time for a Story” allows children to interact with a distant adult who can share an online story through an Internet connection, webcam, and microphone. Get [...]

Enjoy this video from Random House on the making of a Star Wars audiobook, narrated by Jonathan Davis. Learn about the roles of an audiobook director, engineer, sound technician, and narrator:

And for all you Star Wars lovers out there, here’s another audio treat: