The Audio Book Experience

What is it like to hear someone read your writing aloud? I don't think I'd ever had that experience before. Not really; not reading whole chapters of text. Maybe that's why I was so nervous. Or maybe it was because the recording studio was in the basement cells of an old Victorian penitentiary in Clerkenwell, and as you descend the stairs you can't help thinking of the generations of convicts who made the same descent, never again to see the sun. Or maybe it was because I was about to meet the great Adjoa Andoh - who lest we should forget - appeared in Doctor Who and starred alongside Morgan Freeman in Invictus. Adjoa would be reading my book. My book! This is the actress who read all the First Ladies Detective Agency audio books. Nervous doesn’t begin to cover it …

But you can’t be nervous for long in a recording studio. The whole place projects calm. The walls are padded and people talk in hushed voices. (And there’s enough technology to fly a starship. But that’s by-the-by … )



The Brilliant Adjoa Andoh reading 'The Coincidence Authority'

‘I’m so pleased you’re here,’ Adjoa said, once we’d been introduced. ‘You can answer a question. What kind of accent would John Hall have?’ I was a little taken aback by this. John Hall is a supporting character in The Coincidence Authority. He doesn’t have a great deal of dialogue. ‘I don’t suppose it matters too much,’ I said. ‘Although I suppose, strictly speaking, he’s a Manxman.’ ‘That’s great,’ said Adjoa, and she looked over at Jenny, the producer. ‘Let’s re-record that last chapter and give him a Manx accent. He only has one line.’ ‘No, no, it’s okay,’ I protested. But Jenny and Adjoa had already made up their minds. Back they went through the pages. ‘She needs a bloody doctor, not a baptism,’ Adjoa read. In a Manx accent. I felt a sudden thrill. Those were my words. Spoken exactly as they were meant to be. If I’d had any reason to worry that they might not take my book very seriously, those worries had now been soundly spiked.

I knew Adjoa would be good. But I wasn’t expecting her voices to be so amazing. She gave Marion Yves a beautifully Manx – almost Liverpuddlian – twang. Thomas is a rather dusty, slightly hesitant, academic. Azalea is engaging and clever. And Clementine Bielszowska emerged perfectly as the inscrutable intellectual Eastern European that she is. The way that Adjoa supplies the voices you really don’t need my descriptions. You can close your eyes and see the characters, exactly as they were meant to be. And Adjoa does this reading a conversation that bounces back and forth between several voices. That, Ladies and Gentlemen, is a rare and remarkable talent.

There was more evidence to come of the thoroughness, and the amount of detail that goes into a good audio book. At one point the novel introduces the Biblical name ‘Shaphan.’ The context is rather oblique. It appears in a quick exploration of the origin of the name, ‘Azaliah,’ and this is because Azaliah (who becomes Azalea) is a central character in the story. In the Bible, we learn, Shaphan was the son of Azaliah. But how should ‘Shaphan’ be pronounced? All recording came to a halt while researches were done. ‘I really don’t think it matters,’ I said, anxious that this minor problem shouldn't hold everything up. ‘After all, who would know?’  But again my protests were ignored. Jenny consulted a book on biblical pronunciation (yes – there is such a thing); then a website; then another. Opinion varied. Shap-han suggested one; Shay-fan another. A debate ensued. In the end we went with the majority of academic opinion, and Shay-fan it now is. We’d spent several minutes on the single appearance of one name. Bear that in mind when you listen to the audio book.

It is a unique experience hearing your words read aloud, especially by as accomplished a reader as Adjoa Andoh. As a writer you have a voice in your head that speaks the lines in one particular way; an actor comes to the same lines with their own pace and delivery. The emphasis isn’t quite what you’d imagined. The rhythm subtly changes. It unsettles you at first. You have to relax and let it happen. But within just a few lines you’re sold. And the surprising thing (for me at least) is how much better a good actor is at reading your lines than your own internal reader is. Not just a little better – waaay better. This, I suppose, is why they do their job. When Adjoa read the story of the seagull I found myself transported into the scene even more vividly than I had been when I wrote it. And that is a rather spooky sensation for a writer.

I can’t wait to hear the full audio book of The Coincidence Authority. I sat in for four chapters and then I left them to it. There was nothing I could add. To be honest, I suspect I’d become a distraction. Still, I couldn’t have been happier than I was when I left. A very big Thank You to Orion Books and Strathmore – and to Pandora and Jenny and Adjoa. And thank you Adjoa for the anecdotes about Morgan Freeman and Clint Eastwood. It was an unforgettable experience.