Audiobook Narrators. They can make or break a good book.

Baldbloke said:
What narrators are your favorites?
Click to expand...
A bad narrator can definitely kill a books enjoyment. Bill Bryson is pretty bad at narrating his own books, the versions I have are narrated by William Roberts and are much better. But, Michael Palin reading his own books is excellent.

Best narrators?

Nigel Planar narrating Terry Pratchett's Discworld, Tony Robinson is pretty good for the abridged versions.
Stephen Fry. Baaaaaah!
Heath Miller is excellent with the He Who Fights with Monsters series.
Wil Wheaton - Surprisingly good with audiobooks, especially The Martian.
Ray Porter doing the Bobiverse series
Luke Daniels doing the Magic 2.0 series.

Aaaand finally, I'm going to recommend an audiobook production company. Soundbooth Theatre. They are superb. The narrators are some of the best out there imo. Especially Jeff Hays and Annie Ellicott. They regularly stream their recording sessions as well so you can watch Jeff crack up in the middle of a line as he's cold reading it. We also try and make him laugh in the comments on youtube. ;) Some of their most popular productions include Dungeon Crawler Carl, Everybody Loves Large Chests, The Feedback Loop and Monster Hunt NYC.
 
Baldbloke said:
[..]
What narrators are your favorites?
Click to expand...

Roy Dotrice in the Song of Ice and Fire series. Although not so much in the last one he did. Maybe he was ill, maybe it had just been too long since the previous one. That one is well done. The others are superb. Every character has their own voice, even an innkeeper with one spoken sentence. Not only is every character's voice completely consistent with itself, it's also completely consistent with their character. You can tell what part of the bookworld a character is from by their accent (unless the character has been said in the books to have changed it). You can tell a character's social class from their pattern of speech (likewise as for the regional accent and also consistent with the pattern of speech as written in the books). They're outstanding examples of the pinnacle of the art of audiobook narration.

Either I've been lucky or I'm unusually tolerant regarding audiobooks. I haven't encountered a professional audiobook narrator whose work put me off the audiobook. There have been some for whom I thought "That's not how that character should sound", but I could get along with it. I did try some free audiobooks read by volunteers and, well, no thanks. I like the idea and I think the volunteers are doing a good thing, but narrating an audiobook is definitely skilled work and not everyone has that skill.

EDIT: Some publishers put music over the intro and between chapters and suchlike. That annoys me. I don't want to be forced to listen to someone else's choice of music played over narration for no reason other than to play music over narration for some unexplained reason. Nor do I want to have to wait between parts of the book while being forced to listen to someone else's choice of music for no reason at all. It's worse than being on hold because at least that has an explanation - the company doesn't want you to get served because that reduces their profits. But at least so far, I haven't encountered any publishers who force people to listen to the publisher's choice of music played over the entire narration of the book. Not yet.
 
Last edited:
Timely post - I had Peter rabbit on the other day for my daughter, and the women reading it could barely string together the words. Very annoying.
 
If you like zombies/post apocalyptic type stuff find the Mountain Man series by Keith C. Blackmore, narrated by R.C. Bray, it's excellent.
 
Last edited:
Minstadave said:
Already got it preordered. Going back through the Witcher novels currently.

The authors new series, or the free snippet of it, seemed pretty decent.
Click to expand...
Indeed I have too! I haven't listened to that yet. I am awaiting how I feel from the end of this tbh.

i-bert said:
Is it worth sticking with? I'm only on the first book at the moment but really liking it.
Click to expand...
Yes it is epic. 15 ish books, one of them is an audio drama that is pretty cool and different. There is something new in every book. The spin off books are as good as the main books and all tie in really well. The Author dropped a book almost every 6 months in the series which has been amazing (slowed down a little near end but still!)
 
BigBoy said:
If you like zombies/post apocalyptic type stuff find the Mountain Man series by Keith C. Blackmore, narrated by R.C. Bray, it's excellent.
Click to expand...
Oh I need to check this out.

The first book is available, its decent, gets a thumbs up from me.
Click to expand...
I am still going to wait till after. Almost feels dirty ha.
 
Last edited:
A couple of others for people to look into are
  • Ark Royal series written by Christopher G.Nuttall and narrated by Ralph Lister - More pretty awesome SciFi
  • Eisenhorn: Warhammer 40,000k / Gaunts Ghosts series by Dan Abnett narrated by Toby Longworth - It 40k and actually decent cause not just super space marines chomping through things, deep and interesting characters
  • Kingkiller Chronicle by Patrick Rothfuss for books 1 & 2, annoyingly did own narration of book 2.5 and still awaiting for book 3 proper!! - Interesting Fantasy and slightly different telling of a story
  • The Demon Cycle series by Peter V.Brett narrated by Colin Mace - First 4 books are excellent, the 5th and final I felt a bit meh compared mind so depends how you feel once you get invested!!
  • The Left Hand of God by Paul Hoffman narrated by Sean Barrett - Well written semi-dark fantasy and was so disappointed that it was only 3 books! but the characters were great
  • The First Law Trilogy by Joe Abercrombie narrated by Steven Pacey - Super dark and bloody fantasy loosely based on Britain and Scotland wars
  • Galaxy Edge series by Jason Anspach & Nick Cole narrated by R.C. Bray - Cliche Sci-Fi but well done and fun with some interesting space wizardry to boot
  • Planetside series by Michael Mammay narrated by R.C. Bray - Another good sci-fi series to take a look at
There more as I have been listening to Audio books for well over a decade and get through 4-5 books a month generally ha.
 
BigBoy said:
Honestly the best zombie series I've listened to in years, think I did the whole 9 (I think including all the prequals) books in two weeks straight.
Click to expand...
That is awesome I see they have book 1-3 as a single book now too so saves a few credits so I will get that when I get some more credits! Is it worth doing in release order as there is 2nd Prequel or could you do them in in like chronologic order?
 
Last edited:
I don't know many names of narrators. But I've listened to a few via BBC Radio 4 Extra.

For me the narrator as to be in to the book they are reading, otherwise it can make following the story difficult.
 
If the Narration is by any of these Guy's I know it's going to be a good listen, I've returned many books because i just can't stand the narration style.

Steven Pacey
Jeff Hays
Peter kenny
Mikael Naramore
 
I enjoyed Al Murray reading Brothers in Arms. But that was just a simple reading

My main issue with many narrations is too many characters for voices to be unique enough I kind of just wish that would read the book with the odd bit of high emphasis rather than losing the ability to emphasise heavily because they are already doing a "silly" voice

I'm re listening to WOT and struggle with the American accent(s) although I had to return the Rosalyn Pike one as her accents and voices were even sillier so resorted back to American
 
UnknownDonut said:
If the Narration is by any of these Guy's I know it's going to be a good listen, I've returned many books because i just can't stand the narration style.

Steven Pacey
Jeff Hays
Peter kenny
Mikael Naramore
Click to expand...
Steven Pacey has been awesome on books I have listened to with him narrating. I will have a look at things the others have done. Thanks for the names.
 
Totally agree.

Racked up a total of 3 months 26 days total listening time on Audible...

The best example I can think of is Roy Dotrice reading the Song of Ice and Fire books. The range of accents he employs as well as his general commitment is stunning (even if he does slip up from time to time, even changing voices for characters entirely in the later books).

The narration for the first two Hannibal books is fantastic, Frank Muller doing SotL and Alan Sklar doing Red Dragon.

Michael Jayston is the king imo. Narrates a lot of Jon Le Carre's earlier work including all of the Smiley novels (he played Peter Guillam in the BBC adaptation of Tinker Tailor and Smileys People). His voice work is impeccable and he does such a fantastic impression of Alec Guiness.

There's not many I've actively disliked so far as I can remember. Not a fan generally of Gaimans own narrative stuff. Though I love most of Stephen Frys work in audiobooks, I just can't do his Orwell narration. His voice is just that touch too jovial and it doesn't suit the theme.
 
Last edited:
If you want a laugh I'd recommend 'Beware of Chicken' - both the book and audiobook are very well done. Its a twist on the whole cultivation/progression theme its really amusing.
 
Shirtaloon - He Who Fights with Monsters series is excellent, Narrated by Heath Millier (I think) is an excellent series and the introduction I had to the LitRPG scene.

Matt Dinniman - Dungeon Crawler Carl series is again a LitRPG series that is awesome, cannot remember who narrated it though.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom