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humanaevitae
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| Posted: July 26 2005 at 10:11pm | IP Logged
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We are just going to start purchasing audio books and I've read some great titles I'll want to get. BUT do all the different publishers and/or readers do an equal job? Do you have a favorite reader? Please share what your favorite version is of some of those classic tales!
Thank You,
Nicole
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stefoodie
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| Posted: July 27 2005 at 10:20am | IP Logged
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macbeth has an awesome list on her website (charlottemason.tripod.com/audio) -- besides that we love blackstone audio and audible (blackstone has downloads of their stuff available at audible) -- and audible has ratings from listeners, so i try to get the top-rated ones, and so far no major mistakes yet. my kids are loving the redwall selections -- they've been listening to these the last couple of months. i wish audible would carry ALL the books. now my 9-year old is asking me to find him a Redwall songbook so he can sing the songs AND play the music.
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teachingmom
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| Posted: July 27 2005 at 11:06pm | IP Logged
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One of my favorite narrators is Barbara Caruso. I just picked up Anne of Green Gables and Anne of Avonlea on audio from the library today for our upcoming vacation to the Outer Banks of NC. She is the narrator of both of the Anne books from Recorded Books. She also narrated the book I mentioned elsewhere on the message board called What Katy Did. And finally, we enjoyed some of the Henry Huggins books narrated by her a few years ago. I like audio books from Recorded Books in general. One thing I really appreciate is that CDs are tracked every 3 minutes, so it's very easy to find where you left off if you have to pop out the CD.
I've heard good things about the Little House books on audio, but we read the books instead of listening on audio for those.
We really enjoy the entire unabridged Chronicles of Narnia from Harper Children's Audio. That included narrators like Kenneth Brannagh and Michael York. BUT they track only at the end of chapters, so it was a huge deal if lost our place. More than once we had to re-listen to around 15 minutes of story to get to where we were before. I found it very inconvenient. I wish they would follow Recorded Books lead and track more often.
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Kelly
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| Posted: July 28 2005 at 11:40pm | IP Logged
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We loved, loved, LOVED the BBC recordings of the "Lord of the Rings", as well as "The Hobbit". Most of the Focus on the Family recordings are great, too. We very much enjoyed and learned from the FotF recording, "Bonhoeffer, the Cost of Freedom". This is an excellent recording.
Many of the recordings that feature different voices "acting out" the various parts (as opposed to just one person reading) have sound effects and are especially riveting to the younger set. Many of the BBC recordings and FotF recordings fall under these categories. However, EB White reading "Trumpet of the Swan" and Mr. Gabriel Woolf's readings of "Swallows and Amazons" are wonderful and equally spell-binding to the little (and big!) listeners.
Also, if you are building an audio library, I'd highly encourage you to look into the 5 or 6-cd set put out by Seton High School in Manassas, VA, of history lectures by Ann Carroll. They all cover "problematic" historical periods: Cortez in Mexico; Martin Luther; the "Reformation"; the Inquisition; Joan of Arc; the French Revolution;... but they are told in a very story-like manner. Even my little kids listened closely to these. We have listened to them many times. They aren't literature, per se, but they're worthy!
Also, the Jim Weiss recordings and Rabbit Ears recordings are all really nice (at least the ones I've heard...I boo-hooed my way thru "The Velveteen Rabbit" by the Rabbit Ears people. Pull out your hankies!
Kelly in FL
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alicegunther
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John McDonough is an excellent narrator, as is Gabriel Woolf. We loved McDonough's recordings of Misty of Chincoteague, Sea Star--Orphan of Chincoteague, and Heidi. Gabriel Woolf's recordings of the Swallows and Amazons series have been keeping us all entertained for the entire summer. We are in the middle of Pigeon Post at the moment.
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MacBeth
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I love Blackstone Audio's E. Nesbit books (read by Johanna Ward)...these are way better than the Puffin or Dove audio versions. Dove audio often abridges the book.
Ward also reads Ellis Peters' books (Br. Cadfael).
If you want to get a feel for what an audiobook sounds like, try poking about Audible.com and clicking on samples. If you do a download, make sure that you download in the biggest file format they offer that will work on your equipment (computer, iPod, mp3 player, etc.).
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Karen T
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When do you use books on tape/cd/mp3? Mostly for car trips, while kids are playing in the house, "quiet time" after lunch or during your schooltime, what?
The reason I ask is that ds12 has really surprised me by not liking any of the ones I've gotten at the library for him. In each case, he ended up liking the book once he read it, but hated listening to someone else read. yet, he's enjoyed everything *I've* read aloud to him. I much prefer reading myself, b/c I can usually read much faster than they can speak LOL, but I often use recordings for when I want to multi-task, like knitting or sewing while I "read".
I've been thinking about getting the Narnia series to listen to along with all 3 kids ( dd almost 4 probably won't get much out of it, but hopefully the 5.5 yo will. Ds12 has read them but not recently)
Karen T
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MacBeth
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| Posted: July 31 2005 at 9:56am | IP Logged
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Karen, we listen in the car all the time, and we listen while doing housework. Libby also listens to assigned reading (teaching company tapes or longer audio books) as she commutes to the city for music. This turns out to be a big time saver, as she is frequently in the city two or three days a week, and I don't like her lugging her school books as well as her instruments on the train/subway.
I have a very good friend who is a young writer (college student) and she could never bear an audio tape, as she felt it brought the reader's emphasis to the book. Perhaps your ds has the same feeling. I have found that there are certain readers, especially authors reading their own work, who just don't sound right. Madeleine L'Engle has a slight lisp, and it drives me crazy!  And John McPhee (I love his work!) always sounds as though he were chewing gum.
My kids have been listening all their lives, so they are very used to it, and enjoy most of what we choose, though my rule remains--if I can't stand it, we don't listen--after all, I'm driving  .
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MacBeth in NY
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alicegunther
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| Posted: July 31 2005 at 10:43am | IP Logged
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MacBeth wrote:
| I have found that there are certain readers, especially authors reading their own work, who just don't sound right. |
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This is quite true, MacBeth. We loved the recorded books versions of Redwall and Mossflower, but were disappointed by the full cast recordings narrated by Brian Jacques himself. He read so quickly that it was difficult to savor his work, and some of the cast members were hard to understand or had unpleasant voices.
One author who does an exceptional job, however, is Seamus Heaney. His rendition of his own translation of Beowulf is top notch. His voice has a pleasant Irish lilt that enhances the epic tale.
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Marybeth
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We are loving Five Children and It in the car the past few days. I could listen to Joanna Ward all day long! 
I tried to get ds to listen to Cherry Jones reading Little House, but he would have no part of it. I don't have a CD player in the car so when I do the cds in the house he can leave the room!!
*sigh* Maybe Santa will bring me a cd player!
Marybeth
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4Real Forums : Living Literature
Topic: favorite audio versions?
