Audiobooks

I forgot a fourth category of book: audiobooks. I bought an ipod in March and have a subscription to audible.com. I had hoped that having something interesting to listen to might make me do more round the house. Hasn't really worked out that way, but it does make what I do get done more bearable.

I don't use the ipod much for music, but mainly for podcasts and audiobooks. I decided last week that I wasn't actually enjoying ficiton in audio form that much. It's harder to follow, and I miss being able to go back and check things. My first audiobooks were Lisey's Story (Stephen King) and Fragile Things (Neil Gaiman). Lisey's Story was OK, but a bit too drawn out for my taste. Plus some of the inconsistencies of the characters visiting the alternate world annoyed me. Fragile Things (short stories) is great, and I particularly enjoyed listening to stories read by the author. But now I want the book too!

The latest choice is The Thirteenth Tale by Diane Setterfield. I was finding this really hard to get into, and in fact was on the verge of giving up. I couldn't work out what on earth was going on, or who any of the characters were. It was only when I went to order my next choice I realised I had accidentally downloaded part 2 before part 1. Doh. In my defence on the ipod it labels the chapters rather randomly starting from 1 even if it is the second part, and I had always selected it from the menu before it scrolled over to the "part" bit of the title.

Now that I have started again from the actual beginning I am enjoying it a lot more, and I didn't listen to so much that it's spoiled what's to come (I hope).

I listened to an hour or so in the car on the way from London to Cardiff on Friday night. The last time I did that journey I listened to four episodes in a row of Start the Week, a Radio 4 podcast with Andrew Marr. By the time I arrived I felt my IQ had risen by at least 3 points. I've downloaded Andrew Marr's History of Modern Britain for my next audible choice - this was before I realised maybe I can do audio fiction after all.