So You Just Got Hired To Narrate Your Own Audiobook...
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Rajneeshpuram: Inside the Cult of Bhagwan and Its Failed American Utopia, by Russell King. Available 3/8/22.
The publishing journey for my nonfiction history of the Rajneeshpuram commune in Oregon — Rajneeshpuram: Inside the Cult of Bhagwan and Its Failed American Utopia — has included many twists and turns. But something happened that I really never saw coming: an audiobook publisher decided to produce an audio version of my book and then hired ME to narrate it.
I’ve never narrated an audiobook, and I guess I assumed the job was exclusive to actors, professional narrators, or big name authors. But the publisher heard some of my voice work on my podcast about the Rajneesh cult, Building Utopia: Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, and they liked it enough to give me an offer to read my own book. It took a little psyching myself up to say yes.
And then I actually had to record the damn thing. Having now completed the book after spending nearly 30 hours in the studio, I’m here to share some tips and tricks I gleaned along the way. I certainly don’t profess to be an expert, but I know a lot more now than I did at the beginning of the process. Hopefully this will be helpful to other authors in a similar situation, or anybody who’s new to narrating audiobooks or wants to give it a try.
Be Prepared.
Sure, you wrote the book. Sure, you’ve read the text 10,000,000,000 times throughout the editorial process and feel like you could recite entire passages from memory. But now try reading a couple pages out loud. Or, even worse, record yourself reading it out loud. You may be surprised at how challenging it can be.
Before you show up at the recording studio, you will need to have gone through your entire manuscript with a pen (digital or ink) while thinking about how it sounds when you read it. Maybe that means you actually read the entire thing out loud. (But preserve your voice in the days before recording!) Maybe it means you just whisper or mumble the words as you read it.
Whatever your process, pre-reading the book will help you flag crucial elements that you might otherwise miss, like the following:
Long sentences where you need to strategize about the best place to take a breath. I notated these with a slash in the sentence wherever I wanted to breathe.
Places in the text (often the end of a page) where you want to pause for dramatic effect. I’d put two slashes at the bottom of the page if the next page were the beginning of a new section or chapter. I’d also put two slashes if I wanted to leave a lot of space to allow something complicated (or, more often, horrifying) sink in for the reader.
Tricky passages where you’ll need to proceed slowly. I learned this one the hard way while recording. Some phrases look beautiful on paper but they read horribly out loud. Your tongue will get twisted by repetitive vowel sounds or syllables, or you will stumble over a phrase with lots of clauses. Save yourself some retakes by highlighting in advance any place where you know you’ll need to be deliberate in your reading. It’s just a warning flag for future you in the recording booth: proceed with caution!
Pronunciation. Seriously, you have no idea how many words are in your book that you don’t know how to pronounce, or you think you know how to pronounce but don’t. I was lucky that my (amazing) audiobook publisher, Blackstone, sent me a massive spreadsheet ahead of my recording session with all of the words in my manuscript that are prone to mispronunciation, with specific diacritic guidance on how I should pronounce them and links to online dictionaries or other pronunciation sources. In my book, I have a lot of Sanskrit names, Indian words, German towns and places, and foreign last names. And there are also some words that I just pronounce in a nontraditional way (“syringe” haunts me). For all of these, I noted in the text the correct pronunciation to save myself from some headaches and retakes while recording.
The goal here is to show up to the studio as prepared as possible so that you minimize interruptions and retakes while recording.
Be Flexible.
I didn’t know how audiobooks are produced, so I had to go into the process with an open mind and a willingness to learn. I didn’t know who would be there, what the setup would look like, or even whether I had to bring my own copy of the book or not. As it turned out, I sat in a studio booth with the audio engineer on the other side of the glass window and the audiobook producer listening in from his home office in Hawaii. (He has the best gig...) I just ran with it when I got there.
Before we started, we discussed how we’d proceed on those occasions when I’d make a mistake or need a sip of water. These were the options: They could either keep the “tape” rolling and have me just start over where I made the mistake (and then they would have to edit out all the bad takes in post-production), OR they could do a “cut and run” method where if i made a mistake, the engineer would quickly rewind to the end of the last good phrase I said and then I’d have to just jump in from there. This makes the post-production process more efficient, since the bad takes are all gone by the time we’re done with the book. I didn’t know ANYTHING about this going into the session, and “cut and run” made me nervous since it felt like I’d be leaping into a Quadruple Dutch jumprope every time. But since they preferred that method, I just ran with it. (And actually ended up loving it.)
The theme here is to be flexible. I didn’t walk into the studio like an AUTHOR there to give them the gift of my words. I walked in like a contractor who had been hired to do a specific job, working with people who know a hell of a lot more about it than me. I’d urge you to be humble and open to unexpected parts of the process and new ideas about how to make your text sound best.
Turn Off Your Author Brain.
It was only after a full day of recording that I realized I was thinking way too much about my book as I was reading. As an author, of course it’s hard to stop engaging with your own text, even when it’s set in stone. It’s hard to stop worrying that perhaps you never tied up a loose end that you’re just now noticing in the text, or beating yourself up over a clunky phrase or a weird transition. And there are problems that you will ONLY discover by going through the process of reading the entire thing out loud. (Guilty confession: we found three (minor) typos in my book while I was recording it.)
But you really can’t focus on that while recording. You’re there to give a performance of your work, and if you’re reading out loud but also critiquing your text at the same time — you’re not really doing your job. Take off your author hat, and put on your narrator beret. (I don’t know, it just seems like it’d be a beret.)
Take Care of Yourself.
Go into this knowing that it’s a MARATHON. If you aren’t braindead and numb by the end of each long session, you have been gifted with some incredible stamina. Most bodies aren’t physically prepared to read for that long. Your lungs will give out on you. Your tongue won’t cooperate. Your lips will stop forming the syllables you intend. For that reason, I think you should try to conserve your energy around your recording sessions and pay close attention to what you’re putting in your body.
There are lots of tips online about how to take care of yourself before, during, and after recording sessions. Here are some things that worked for me:
Green apple slices!!!! This is my number one recommendation. They are lifesaver snacks throughout the day when your mouth and throat start to become dry and you start hearing the dreaded “mouth noises” in your headphones. Any apples I’m sure will help you salivate, but my producer told me green apples are the best and I will just go with that!
Hot water with lemon and/or honey. Very calming on the throat.
Water water water water water. But drink it the day before your session. Drink it overnight. Drink it that morning. Drink it on the train to the studio. If you haven’t hydrated before your session, you won’t be able to suddenly catch up while spewing out a hundred pages of text from your poor, parched mouth.
Bland foods. Your stomach can become a character in your recording session, especially right before and after lunch. If you’re in a good studio with a great microphone, it will pick up tiny gurgles that you would barely notice in normal life. I found that a light breakfast and then something bready for lunch made me feel nourished but with minimal stomach sounds. Lunch for me was usually a croissant, a bottle of juice, and some green apple slices.
Have Fun!
Yes it can be stressful and taxing and perhaps beyond your comfort zone, but then your sessions will be coming to an end and you’ll realize you’ve made it through your entire book and that makes you a REAL AUDIOBOOK NARRATOR! So make sure you have some fun along the way. Try a wacky character voice. Chat with the engineer. Snoop around the studio to see if anybody cool is recording there. Take selfies during breaks. Enjoy your moment as a performing artist before disappearing back into your lonely writing cavern.
These tips may not work for everyone, but they worked for me. If you have any great narrating tips, share them in the comments! And good luck!