Getting "Into" A Book

[terpkristin]

As you may have read in the "What Are You Reading June 2010" thread, I'm currently trying to read Ringworld. It's a book that's been on my "to-read" list for a few years and I finally found some time to get to it.

I'm having a dickens of a time getting into it. I wonder if it's because I'm "reading" the audio version and so far (about an hour in/about 25 pages or so I'd estimate), it's been kind of slow. Thus, when I'm listening, I find my mind wandering to all kinds of other topics.

I've had this happen before with audiobooks, and am contemplating going out and buying a dead tree version of the book (no Kindle version available), to see if I can get over the hump, as it were. I've had this happen with other books...either I couldn't get into the audio, so picked up the print book and got into it, and vice-versa, finding the audiobook a much better way of getting sucked into the story.

Anybody else have this happen to them every now and then? Really wish there was a Kindle version, would make it a lot easier to just grab the book and get going!

[Rick]

I have had the paper edition of a book not catch me, but the audio grab me by the shorts and not let go. A good narrator can really make a story for me.

[Sandi]

I'd check first and see if it's available at the library. It would suck to pay twice for a book regardless of the format.

[Michael]

I wonder if you could use a text-to-speech engine to derive the text from the audio version. Anyone tried this?

[Janalyn]

I'm right there with you on audio books. I won't even realize my mind has wandered at first.

[Tamahome]

I'm pretty impatient with books these days; I might only give it one chapter. Sometimes I'll just read the 1st page to see if I like it. I think we had a thread like this on ning.

[Nate Frary]

I listened to an Audio version and liked it well enough. However, the reader makes a huge difference in any audiobook performance. If they aren't doing it for you, you probably aren't going to like the book. That said, I didn't love the book. Niven has a problem, in my opinion, making human characters even remotely believable or interesting.

[aldenoneil]

Nate wrote: "I listened to an Audio version and liked it well enough. However, the reader makes a huge difference in any audiobook performance. If they aren't doing it for you, you probably aren't going to li..."

Well, you could argue the humans in Ringworld are beyond human, which may be why they're harder to relate to. That said, I really liked Louis Wu and Teela.

[Brad Theado]

I started reading Ringworld in dead tree format and stopped after about 100 pages. I just couldnt get into it.

[terpkristin]

I'm about halfway through now, in the audio version, and while I'm not going to call it my favorite book, I'll finish reading it, I'm kind of intrigued.

I think the turn-off for me is that the plot is REALLY slow. The book is more about descriptions of potential technology and the interactions between the crew (which haven't changed much since the beginning of the book). It's a SLOOOOOOOOOW book.

[terpkristin]

Well, I'm going to finish this book today or tomorrow, come hell or high water. As I "read" (listen to) more, I still think my issue is that the plot is kind of weak and very slow, with characters that haven't changed much.

I don't think this is an issue with the narrarator. Oddly, though it isn't the same person, he sounds almost exactly like the narrarator for the Andy Carpenter books, a series I quite enjoy.

I've definitely had issues with getting into the print form of a book and finding that the audio book sucked me right in (The Way of Shadows books were like this for me, though I think part of the problem with the print version was that I didn't have a lot of time to read but plenty of time to listen). And I've had a few cases where the audio just wasn't doing it, so I switched to paper and it worked better.

[Sandi]

Do you listen on an iPod? You may already know this, but you can speed up the playback speed of audio books. I did it with Roots because the book was so danged long and the narrator was so darned slow. In most cases, speeding it up doesn't make it sound like the narrator inhaled helium.

[terpkristin]

Yeah I have an iPod and I sometimes speed up the narrator. I've found, though, that unless the narrator has virtually no accent, it can be difficult for me to understand what they're saying. I didn't speed up Ringworld, though I probably could have. Other books, like the Harry Potter ones, I could never do, I'd never understand what Jim Dale was saying.