Recordings of longer works usually get the most attention in the audiobook world, but two recent splashy releases are reminders that picture books can also make for quality audio productions.
Late last month, The Rabbit Who Wants to Fall Asleep—the self-published children’s title that saw sales surge in August, which led to Random House Children’s Books acquiring U.S. rights—made its audio debut under Penguin Random House Audio’s Listening Library imprint. This type of lightning-fast production is something the company was ready to take on, according to Amanda D’Acierno, senior v-p and publisher for Penguin Random House Audio. As word-of-mouth support for the original book started “spreading like wildfire,” D’Acierno says, “Barbara Marcus [president and publisher of Random House Children’s Books] immediately involved us in the acquisition, and we cast the audiobook and recorded within a week. Our production team has gotten quite a bit of practice responding to market demand and turning around audio editions to trending books very quickly.” The digital audio edition went on sale on September 23, and a CD edition is scheduled to follow in a few weeks, she notes.
The availability of a Rabbit audio recording may be welcome news to some parents who have struggled with author Carl-Johan Forssen Ehrlin’s detailed tips in the print edition for reading the book to their children. “Ehrlin always envisioned the book being read aloud,” D’Acierno explains. “He even recorded a self-published audio edition and included instructions for reading the book aloud in the introduction.” In fact, the response to the author’s audio informed Listening Library’s casting of the new project. “Carl-Johan had gotten feedback from parents on the original self-published audio edition that they would like a version narrated by a female as well, so we decided to offer both a male [Fred Sanders] and female [Kathleen McInerney] narration in our edition, so parents can choose which is most soothing for their child,” she says.
Rabbit marks only the second time that Listening Library published a recording with multiple narrations. The first was also a picture book, B.J. Novak’s 2014 The Book with No Pictures, which featured narrations by Novak and actress Busy Philipps.
Listening Library was on board for another major picture book audio release in July: What Pet Should I Get?, a posthumously discovered work by Dr. Seuss. D’Acierno notes that Seuss’s writing in particular possesses key qualities that make for a successful picture-book recording, including “rhythm and lyricism.”
Though Listening Library’s recent titles generated a lot of buzz, they’re not the only picture books being released by audio publishers. Linda Lee, v-p and general manager of Weston Woods Studios and Scholastic Audio, says that segment of the business is a bright spot for her company. “Our book-and-CD packages are our fastest growing and most in-demand product line currently,” she says, adding that the strongest demand for these titles is in the school and library market. Lee notes that the read-along format (which packages book and CD together, often with page-turn signals on the recording) tends to work best when recording these titles “because the pictures in picture books are designed to be just as important to the story as the text.”
Lee says that a lot of extra craftwork goes into setting audio picture books apart from print. “We add specially composed music and a rich layer of sound effects to each story,” she notes, something that may not be done with titles for older children (e.g., middle grade and YA novels). “In picture books, it is important that the sound effects help to illustrate the meaning of the words,” Lee explains. “If the story talks about a ‘blustery wind,’ a strong sound effect illustrates the meaning of ‘blustery’ much better than if the sound effect were absent.”
Since picture book narrations are brief, using additional music, and more than one narrator, are ways to bulk up a production. Many publishers that don’t create read-along packaging will group multiple picture-book audio titles into one package for this reason. As one example, Listening Library offers the Seuss picture book titles both à la carte digitally and as collections on CD to reach various audiences. Picture-book audio recording can serve other purposes, too. “We often share the recording with our e-book team to incorporate into an enhanced e-book edition,” says PRH’s D’Acierno.
