Category: book Nook
I know there have been topics on this before, but they seem to all be archived.
Do you ever avoid an audio book you might like based on the synopsis or author because of the narrarator?
I will not download anything that Roy Avers has done. I cannot stand the sound of his voice and worse yet is his overwrought dramatization.
I will on a rare occasion download something that Madeline Buzzard has done, but usually have to quit listening before long for the same reasons.
Scott Brick is another one I have trouble listening to, although I don't mind his voice. His overly intense way of reading stresses me out. I tend to listen to books as I'm going to sleep and you can bet he most definitely does not relax me at all!!
Two of my favorites are Gregory Gorton and Erin Jones.
I also happen to love Ray Foushee's voice, although he is not necessarily a great narrarator.
Whatcha all think?
And my apologies if I've offended one of your favorites.
I love Scott Brick, though I've only heard him in the Kingkiller Chronicles, Books I and II. Frank Muller is also a favorite of mine, though sadly he no longer lives.
I will never avoid a book I want to read just because I'm not fond of certain narrators. I don't use the Kindle, audible.com, or bookshare, so NLS is my only source for audio books, and there are too many good books I want to read to be picky about narrators. Having said that, Roy Avers is definitely one I do not like. I have listened to some with Madeline Buzzard as narrator that are just fine and some where she just seems too strident. But the digital age has definitely helped me deal with Madeline better. When I had to listen to her on cassette, because of her extremely slow reading speed, I always had to slide the speed up which increased the pitch which made her voice extremely screachy. But with digital players you can increase speed without affecting the pitch, so that does help.
I am not familiar with many of these narrators. Scott Brick can either do a really good job or a really poor job; if the book is really good I can overlook a poorer performance.
I agree Frank Muller was quite a talent; so sad that he is no longer with us.
Narrators I love: Humphry Bower, Mary Louise Walker, Jane McDowell, Peter Fernandez, Gillian Vance, Robin Miles, Mark Bramhall, Kathe Mazur, Bahni Turpen
narrators that are usually good: Caroline Lee, Deirdre Rubenstein, Linda Emmond, Scott Brick, Coleen Marlo, Ali Ahn, Richard Ferone, Anna Fields, Karen White
Narrators I personally don't like (and I WILL avoid their books): Kate hood, Arthur Morry, Steven Hoye, Jenna Lamia (Bahni Turpen and Octavia Spencer carried "The help")
I am sure this list is not exhaustive, but this is what I can come up with just off the top of my head.
Kate
I realize I don't really pay attention to the names of many narrators. That said, Roy Dutrice (SP?) is one I really don't like. He did the Song of Ice and Fire series. He tries hard, and I do like some of his voices, but I find his actual narration bothersome.
On the other hand, Simon Vance was really good in the Girl with the Dragon Tatoo and its subsequent novels, as well as Dune. Devina Porter did a great job in https://soundcloud.com/remy-c-chartier/dreamlight-intro-sample%3ENarration%20sample%3C/a%3E%3Chr%20width=50%%3E%3Cp%3EMake%20any%20changes%20you%20would%20like,%20then%20press%20the%20post%20button.%20You%20can%20check%20the%20preview%20box%20again%20if%20you%20wish.%3C/p%3E%3Cform%20id=the Outlander novels, and Colleen Dalaini voice actress and narrator of Graphicaudio fame is pretty much gold in everything she does. Incredibly dynamic.
On a related note, I myself am trying my hand at narrating, and I would love to hear what you all think if you have a minute and a half to spare. I'm not professional, but I'm trying to become so, so please tell me what you think if you can. I'm putting my most recent piece below, as it is a recording with some more professional equipment, but my longer narrative piece (which can also be found) is a bit more versatile.
Narration Sample on Soundcloud
If you're using a screen reader, just hit B a few times, the play button is labeled.
The only narrator whose voice irritates me is Fred Major. He narrarates Mystic River, Crime and Punishment, Nightmare in Wichita, Notes from Underground, The Black Hand, and many other books that I have enjoyed in spite of his voice. I’m debating whether or not I want to subject myself to 15 hours and 44 minutes of his dull annoying reading again but I probably will just to read The Dante Club. He sounds angry all the time.
One question I have is how do these narrators choose what they read? It’s probably based on personal taste which would be somewhat ironic as a lot of the books Fred Major reads are books I really like.
Bruce Huntey is narrator for The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, The Devil in the White City, and one of my favorites, A Confederacy of Dunces. He has an energetic voice that captures your attention and makes the characters and story come alive.
Richard Hauenstein is the narrator of The Kite Runner, Cryptonomicon, and Ship of Fools. He has an excellent deep voice and a unique accent.
Guy Sorel is narrator of Steppenwolf and The Sorrows of Young Werther. His voice reminds me of a wise old man with whom I used to converse frequently at the local public library.
Noah Siegel is narrator of Call It Sleep, The Double by Dostoyevsky, and one of the best audiobooks I’ve ever had the pleasure of listening to, The Dark Side of Guy de Maupassant. He also narrates many books which cannot be found on BARD. His voice is clear yet melancholic.
Jill Ferris narrates most of the books in the Earth’s Children series. She can sound like an old lady at times but that quality can also improve the narration.
Catherine Byers narrates Their Eyes Were Watching God and many other books I’ve read. She has a voice I could probably never tire of, not because it’s sexy or anything, but simply because it’s pleasant.
Blue Velvet, more power to you. I just don't have the fortitude to muster through! I actually found I could do more with the old cassette players to make the voices more tolerable for my listening than the digital. The digital just doesn't mask enough of the basics of the voice quality for me.
Ah, Colleen Delaney! Yes, she is good for most things.
For all that I have a few that I really like, I do find that some things they do well and others not so well.
I have only been using NLS Bard for some time now so I have a smaller group to choose from. One fo these days I'll sign up for Audible again. The thing is, if there is a book I want to read that isn't on NLS or has a lousy reader on NLS, when I go to Audible and listen to the sample I haven't been impressed with those readers either.
Aaron jones is very good too. She reads The Hunger Games, Divergent, and delirium.
Liz
I like Colleen Delaney generally, but sometimes she tries too hard when doing dialogue of men and makes the men's voices too deep, and it just sounds annoying to me. It's the same thing when certain male narrators go up several octives to do women's voices and make all the female characters just sound simpering and stupid. I'd rather have them just not even try to immitate the opposite gender than try so hard that they sound rediculous.
Ugh, much as I love Gregory Gorton, he is horrible at female voices. He needs to just read not try to imitate! Hmm, I like his general reading but even some of the minor male voices are not good.
But I forgive him because he does great at reading the Robert Crais Elvis Cole novels.
I wasn't crazy about Jill Fox as she often makes her voice too little girlish, but her rendition of "The Help" was spectacular.
In the past I've avoided certain audio books based on the narrator, though on quite a few occasions there have been a few other versions either commercially recorded or recorded for the blind by our equivalents of NLS for me to choose from. I suspect most of my favourites and least favourites may not mean much to a lot of people if they are from a UK context, but a classic example of one I would avoid at all costs is Jim Dale who read the American versions of Harry Potter. He starred in the carry On films back in the day, but seems incapable of keeping a consistent accent for a character, even switching it in the same sentence which I think is pretty 'impressive'. I think the versions narrated for Stephen Fry for the UK audience are a lot better.
He's not a professional narrator, but I really like Stephen King's narration of his own book. I think it must have something to do with the cadence as I'm not sure his characterisations are that spectacular. Still, something about it makes him one of my favourites.
There is also an American actor resident in the UK, Kerry Shale, who reads some of the crime/thriller titles by the likes of Lee Child, Harlen Coben etc. He's pretty good, but some of his voices would probably be more suited to animation than audio books.
Ah yes, Simon Vance. He gave new life to one of my favorite fantas trilogies, the Fionavar Tapestry. Te ones I don't like are Roy Avers and Ted Stoddard fron the NLS.
I agree about Gregory Gorton's narration of the Elvis Cole booksk by Robert Crais. He does that snarky attitude Elvis has sometimes perfecdtly. Another male narrator who does snarky quite well is Scott Brick. NLS used the commercial audio version for one of the John Corey books by Nelson DeMille, and Scott was perfect for John Corey's sarcasm and flippant attitude. Unfortunately, NLS had various other narrators do the other books in this series.
I've always enjoyed John Polke's narrations. Dude has a real distinct voice, might be hard to get used to, but it grew on me. I'll even imitate him when I have to do intercom announcements. Jack Fox is good too.
I agree about Jack Fox. I know nothing about him but have a crush on him just because of his voice. Unfortunately I don't seem to read many books that he narrates. But I disagree about John Polke. He is one of my least favorites. I hate the way he does women's voices. If he were to just read without trying to do voices, or if I heard him narrate a nonfiction book, I might like him better.
Jack Fox? Hmmm, I know I've heard his narraration before but can't think of what he sounds like. I really wish NLS had a page with snippets of their voices to "test". I was hoping that they would have their own stuff on youtube, but no.
Raskolnikov regarding Fred Major-believe it or not, I do like him in some books, but it has to be just right. I know there have been books I sent back (when NLS was doing cassettes) because I couldn't take it.
I enjoyed him doing some Stephen J Cannell books, the Shane Skully series.
I am new to audio books, new as in the last couple of years. Good to say people don't like the voices though. When I read out loud to my daughter, I never tried to do fake voices. I know parents who did this, or considered me to be somehow deadpan for not doing it, but I just couldn't.
And, I could not do the rich timbe and cadence of the woman's voice any justice, so.
I know that's a bit of a diversion. But yes I will agree I find fake voices to be distracting.
I liked John Polk's narration of the Dragonlance Legends and certainly a lot better than Peter Johnson's narration of the Dragonlance Chronicles.
I like some of the older readers, when nls got radio personalities to narrate their books during the hayday of radio.
Alexander Scourby is by far the best I've ever heard. He could read the bible and I'd read it. Oh, he did and I did. *smile.
Leon Janny is great, he sounds so sarcastic. He did a great rendition of "the electric coolaid acid test" I think he was tripping when he read it.
Ralph Bell is fantastic. He sounds so mean he'd probably kill someone if you asked him.
Robert Donley is kind of iffy. He sounds like he has a chaw of tobacco in his mouth when he reads, but he does a really good job with westerns.
I'll probably do something on more modern readers later.
Oh yes, the guy who read the last book of Stephen King's proud tower series should have his lips stitched shut forever.
Bob
I have my favorits so much so I get excited to read the books and will choose it over another just because of the reader. I have found that some readers read the same kind of books or something and I like that. I hate when I am reading a searies of books and they are all red by different people. I have had a couple of books I was dying to read but couldn't stand to read them because the reader was so bad.
Long series seem to have that happen. Piers Anthony's Xanth series to name one. The first eight books were read by a fellow named Leigh Ewing whom I really liked, well except for his attempt at Night Mare. Of course that may have been his first forray into Xanth (and possibly one of his first ever narrations) since it was done about a year or so earlier than a lot of the rest that he'd done. He basically tried a straight reading with a few voices that didn't quite work out. Fortunately the other Xanth narrations he did were much, much better. Then Ray Foushee did an ok narration of Golem in the Gears. Then a good number of books were done by Bruce Hunty whom I actually really liked since while he does try to differenciate between characters he manages to do so within the parameters that his rather deep voice allows for. Many of the newer ones have been read by Sharon Murray and John Polk. I'm not a huge fan of Sharon Murray but I generally really like John Polk.
I'm not familiar with a lot of these NLS narrators you folks are on about, but here are a few thoughts of my own.
Stephen King: I agree with the thoughts expressed above by another user who says that he's not excellent, but that he reads his own work passingly well. This is only sometimes true though; listen to him read The Gunslinger and he sounds like he's pinching his nose. Listen to his part of Rose Madder and he sounds bored with the whole thing. Meglet and I have both poked fun at him for the phrase "Right...up...close", found near the end of that book. For my part though, I liked the way he did Bag of Bones; it was also the first King book I ever read, so that doesn't hurt.
Frank Muller: He seemed to go through three or four distinct voices over the years, but all of them had their good points. I wish he was still around and narrating.
Scott Brick: Intense is just the word for this guy. I read "The Passage" as narrated by Brick, and it's odd how he can make even driving down a highway seem somehow ominous. He's fairly good, but still.
Nick Sullivan: I don't know why, but I like this guy. He reads the Sword of Truth books. By contrast, the people they got to do the commercial versions just weren't as good, on the whole.
A few questions:
First, what do those of you with experience of these narrators think of the pair who narrated the Wheel of Time series?
Second: am I alone in thinking Craig Wasson (who has read at least a couple of King books) is way way overhyped, and is an awfully bad narrator about 90% of the time?
Third: Third: have any of you listened to Dune, as narrated by George Guidell? If so, is the other version mentioned here better or worse than Guidell's? His seems all right, but it's rather dry, and some of his voices frankly bug the shit out of me.
I read Dune with a full audible cast which worked well, though they only did the full cast sometimes. Otherwise they used Simon Vance. I've read a few books with George though. he's alright I suppose, but one of those readings was the fifth, sixth and seventh Dark Tower books, and after four with frank Muller, it all just sounded wrong.
I forgot about sullivan reading the sword of truth books. You're right, the commercial versions didn't even compare. One of the few instances where a narrator for a "talking book" company surpassed the commercial product.
I love Nick Sullivan if he's the guy I am thinking of. I know he primarily did books for BBC Audiobooks America or whatever, which tends to have partnerships with RNIB, NLS, and similar organizations. So while it might not technically be a "commercial" audiobook, it may just be...
Kate
I liked Sullivan's reading of Touch the Top of the World. I can relate to the comment about George Guidall's Dark Tower narrations. I don't dislike him but I would have preferred a different narrator for the Dark Tower books.
Another narrator I like is Steven Lang, who narrates among other things a few Dean Koontz books. I also like Keith Szarabajka, who narrated the Christopher Snow books b Dean Koontz. There's a series I hope he continues soon.
To me, most narrators are pretty generic. I do, however, really enjoy listening to books narrated by Jake Williams. On the other hand, Bill Wallace reminds me of a drama queen on steroids.
Jake Williams narrates God is Not Great, a book by Christopher Hitchens that I'm in the process of reading.
Nice to see Ralph Bell mentioned! I love him; and Bob's right, he does sound angry. Haha
He's in quite a number of CBS Mystery Theater episodes, too, and I always get a kick out of hearing known narrators in radio shows. Norman Rose is terrific, Barbara Caruso when she was younger...
I don't like many of the newer (mid 90s onward) narrators.
I download books, and then never listen, because of the readers. I prefer plain text, really, and predictable Eloquence.
The one I really didn't care for was Burt Rennolds. He narrated one of the Harry Bosh mysteries by Michael Conelly and he read so fast I could hardly understand him.I also didn't like Lori Petty's narration of the Stephanie Plum mysteries by Janet Evanovich.
Among my all-time favorites were Merwin Smith, Bob Askey, Yvonne Faire-Tessler. These for me were the big three of narrators growing up. Bob Askey had an almost fatherly deep voice, while nobody could do that sort of quiet suspense the way Smith could. And no one could quite pull off bitchiness the way Yvonne could. I also love Lewis Grenville. Check out the Pale Criminal by Phillip Kerr or the Spies of Warsaw by Alan Furst. Very, very nice. I also like George Guidol and George Backman, although I’ve read relatively few by these narrators. Didn’t like George Patterson all that much, and I absolutely will not read anything narrated by Phil Regensdorf. There’s a commercial narrator who’s on BARD now a lot. I think it’s Phil Giganti or however you spell it. He’s good, but the way he portrays female characters with his voice is really, really annoying. You didn’t get that with either Smith or Askey.
Ah yes, Bob Askey. He's good at reading humorous stuff too. I alsolied Yvonne Fair Tessler, who if I'm not mistaken used to read the Dragonriders of Pern books.