The numbers don’t lie—print may be bouncing back and e-books may be tanking, but audiobooks are the hottest format in publishing today. And that trend, which you’ve no doubt seen in your library, is poised to continue.
“There’s an overwhelming amount of content being published today,” says PW audio reviews editor Annie Coreno of the boom in audio. “Unlike movies, television series, or traditional books, you can listen to audiobooks while you drive or exercise, or even at work. That’s why more and more readers are dabbling in audio. They are still reading books in their spare time, but also listening to them throughout the day.”
Have you—or, perhaps more importantly, have your patrons—ever wondered about what goes into making an audiobook? Here’s your chance to learn a little more about the publishing industry’s hottest trend—join a lineup of Recorded Books’s award-winning voiceover artists in the Librarians’ Lounge. You can ask questions about the recording process, get autographs and free audiobook samples, or just chat with the personalities behind your favorite titles.
Scheduled to appear are:
Therese Plummer, an actor and prolific audiobook narrator, has recorded more than 200 audiobooks. Among her works, she is the voice of Robyn Carr’s The Wanderer, and most recently for We Are Water by Wally Lamb.
Johnny Heller has narrated a whopping 600 titles for adults, young adults, and children, hitting almost every genre. Heller has won numerous awards for his work, including a Publishers Weekly Listen Up Award, and his best-known works include the Baseball Card Adventures series by Dan Gutman and Marley & Me by John Grogan.
Jonathan Todd Ross is the voice of Luthor, the Doberman, from the popular Swindle series, and he can also be seen and heard in numerous commercials and audiobooks, including Jonathan Safran Foer’s Eating Animals and Gary Shteyngart’s Little Failure.
Tim Gerard Reynolds was trained at the Samuel Beckett Centre for Theatre and Drama Studies, Trinity College Dublin. Among his works, he is the voice of the epic Age of Myth series by Michael J. Sullivan, widely considered one of the finest next-generation storytellers.
Thursday, June 1, 9–10:30 a.m., at the Publishers Weekly BookExpo Librarians’ Lounge (Booth 875).