I have spent the past few days recording the audiobook version ofNews from the Squares
I think it's fair to say this process is one of two things.
An act of desperate insanity
or
A labour of love.
So far I have recorded 6 hours and 3 minutes and I'm on Chapter 22. There are 37 chapters.
Obviously the chapters are not of uniform length, some are fairly short, some very long.
Also, this isn't the first audiobook I've recorded.
I've done two on my own before, The Man in the Rubber Mask and News from Gardenia
I used to record audiobooks for the BBC, I've done probably 20 over the last ten years. Young adult fiction, they never let me do grown up books.
However when I record them on my own, I also edit the sound file.
I use GarageBand, it's a bit of a faff but I'm used to it and I already had it, knew how to use it and it's fine...
I know I'm going to get suggestions for better audio recording software, oh well.
Anyway, I'm experiencing two conflicting emotions as I read through the book.
The first is definitely excitement as I'm generally really pleased with how the book is shaping up, how the central character of both News from Gardenia and News from the Squares, Gavin Meckler is developing as a character, how his observations of the worlds he visits are revealing of our own times as well as the future.
However to balance this there are sentences and notions that I read through, slump in my chair and think...'damn, I could have expressed that more clearly, I could have made that point come across more dramatically, I could have written it more better.
That was a joke by the way.
So, the paper book, the e-book, Kindle, and audiobook come out in late September, I'm doing some book tour type things, not much, popping up here and there but I'm very anxious/excited to hear what people make of this work of non dystopian science fiction.