There is a reason most audiobooks aren't read by their authors. Authors write. They don't talk. I've been in over a hundred creative writing workshops and it's only very rarely when a person can make their writing sound like something other than a low-pitched drone. I don't criticise most authors for not reading their own stuff aloud on such recordings. Writing is where their talent lies and if they love their work they should put it in the hand of someone whose voice can manage to make a book glow, not ruin the effect by trying to be something they're not. I respect that alot.
However, Neil Gaiman does not have that problem.
Neil Gaiman is not just a writer. He's a storyteller.
I bought The Graveyard Book off Audible.com and believe me when I say it was worth it. Gaiman has this hypnotising nonchalants to his voice that seems to contradict the story's often grim content and give it an eerie lightness. You can tell the difference between his characters in a way that goes far beyond diction and accents. When Silas speaks his voice isn't Gaiman's, it is Silas'. When he talks as Bod you can here something essentially Bod in his rendition, whether Nobody is six, ten or fourteen at the stage he is reading. Gaiman just knows how things should be phrased, how things should be framed and how to be a whole graveyard ful of characters.
If you are a Gaiman fan (and I believe after reading this book I can firmly say that I am) go out there and he the author read it in his own words. It is seven and a half hours of pure bliss.
Get it on audiobook.
There is a reason most audiobooks aren't read by their authors. Authors write. They don't talk. I've been in over a hundred creative writing workshops and it's only very rarely when a person can make their writing sound like something other than a low-pitched drone. I don't criticise most authors for not reading their own stuff aloud on such recordings. Writing is where their talent lies and if they love their work they should put it in the hand of someone whose voice can manage to make a book glow, not ruin the effect by trying to be something they're not. I respect that alot.
However, Neil Gaiman does not have that problem.
Neil Gaiman is not just a writer. He's a storyteller.
I bought The Graveyard Book off Audible.com and believe me when I say it was worth it. Gaiman has this hypnotising nonchalants to his voice that seems to contradict the story's often grim content and give it an eerie lightness. You can tell the difference between his characters in a way that goes far beyond diction and accents. When Silas speaks his voice isn't Gaiman's, it is Silas'. When he talks as Bod you can here something essentially Bod in his rendition, whether Nobody is six, ten or fourteen at the stage he is reading. Gaiman just knows how things should be phrased, how things should be framed and how to be a whole graveyard ful of characters.
If you are a Gaiman fan (and I believe after reading this book I can firmly say that I am) go out there and he the author read it in his own words. It is seven and a half hours of pure bliss.