My background
I have never read books for pleasure. I’ve never liked it. The school assignments were we had to read books were the worst. I always tried to calculate things like: if I read 3 pages a day, everyday, I’ll finish in time*
Oh what a fool I was, I could’ve not been more wrong. I never finished them on time.
I think it was in 2013 when I bought a kindle, I wanted to improve my English and the only way was for me to read books. Yes, watching shows and movies helps but only up to a certain point. So I bought some eBooks off Amazon, books for teenagers (they were easier to understand, and also fun).
…skip two years forward…
My first contact with an Audiobook was with The Martian, read my post about it. You’ll understand.
But Why?
I spend my whole day in front of a screen. I work with computers, so that’s a given. Then I get home and I might watch some TV (again, on a screen). At bedtime my eyes are about to melt.
Because of that I moved away from reading in my Kindle to listening to books, and boy it is fun.
Commute time well spent
I have around 30 minutes of commute time everyday, on the subway. I was looking for ways to use that time but reading at 7:30 in the morning it’s not what I want to do. The same thing goes after work, after all day reading a computer I don’t want to read my phone.
Listening to someone telling me a story not only helps my English but entertains me.
It’s not expensive
Paying for the membership at Audible is not expensive. It’s 15$ (at the time of the writing) and they let you pick 1 audiobook a month with a return policy. Fifteen dollars to have a 10 hour audio file. It’s not a bad deal at all.
If you listen to one you’ll immediately notice the quality of the performance and the recording. It made by professionals.
Easy to use
There’s an app for any device and you can listen to it on your laptop too. For me, it’s my phone, that’s where I want to use it. While I’m on the go. It’s like listening to music.
Only one BUT
As one would assume that the files you can download from the site would be somehow protected, and they are. It means you will not get an MP3 audio file you can easily share around. Even if you’re not going to distribute it illegally, the file format will force you to use their apps.
It’s understandable but I don’t like it. Since I bought a copy of it I want to be able to play it anywhere and store it in a format that won’t be linked to Audible. Say Audible disappears some day, all my books (even if downloaded to my hard drive) might not work (as far as I know). Since you have to use their app with your account credentials.
I’m not saying I do but I’ve read there is software that will let you convert the protected format to MP3 regular audio file.
What about you?
Have you ever tried listening to an audiobook?
If so, do you have any good recomendations? I’m in for sci-fi books and space-related-stuff like astronauts biographies.
Ricard