Musing Monday...Do You Hear What I Hear?

It's Monday, so let's see what Miz B at at Should Be Reading has in mind this week...

This week’s musing asks…


Do you listen to audiobooks? If not, why not? And, if so, what has been one of your favorites, so far?


Not looking for trouble here. but didn't we muse about this recently?
Oh, that is ok..I love to repeat myself. Sometimes endlessly.
So, do I listen to audiobooks?
Hmmm..well, I do, on occasion. Not a regular basis though.
Why? Because I do not think we are really suited for each other, audiobooks and me.

I only figured it out in recent times, but I am not an audio person. I blame that for my total inability to learn a foreign language. Ok, not total. I somehow made my way through 3 years of Spanish class in high school, even getting good grades but it was all a sham. In one ear and out the other..literally. Now a written language, like Latin and classical Greek, they and I got along just fine. Well, except that one teacher in high school who though Latin should be taught as a spoken language. I could have murdered her. Happily, no other Latin or Greek teachers I had shared that idea.

I learn things visually. When I remember things, I actually 'see' them in my mind, as they happen or as I saw them in a book. Even my memories of spoken things are visual..which is a bit hard to explain. The written word, on a page, is my friend. Things I hear are not.
Yes, audiobooks. My attention wanders. I have a problem following the story. Even at its best, I think I miss a lot of detail that I would have picked up in a written text. And for me, that is a lot of the enjoyment of reading that I am missing. So, even at their best...by which I mean the ones that do not put me right to sleep, audiobooks are a lesser thing, a compromise, as opposed to a written book.

Now, I have had a few fair successes with audiobooks, but I realize it has to be the right book and under the right circumstances. A long road trip, ideally on a boring interstate is perfect. Nothing to distract me but endless road, mile after mile. But taking maybe only one road trip a year, even at a couple of books per trip, that is not very productive. Oh well.

And the right book helps. Not a book with a big cast of characters. No, that is sometimes difficult enough in print, where I actually 'see' the names. Not a book like a complicated mystery with a lot of twists and turns. No, something more straight forward I think.
I had a lot of success, audio speaking, with a couple of books by Joshilyn Jackson...Gods in Alabama, Between, Georgia. They were narrated by the author and I thought she was perfect. I actually have Backseat Saint on my iPod, but I somehow screwed it up and the chapters got all mixed up..wow, I was happy I was listening to it on a walk and not a 12 hour drive somewhere. That would have driven me nuts.
Which unlike my road trip, is not a long drive.