How This Author Made the Best Audiobook By Doing Nothing At All

While my ultimate dream was to get my book published, getting an audiobook made was the shiny unicorn trailing right behind it.

This is because my ears are rarely unoccupied. No, I’m not a music lover. Words are my jam. This explains my addiction to audiobooks and podcasts. I wear an apron around the house so I can stick my iPhone in the front pocket and fire up Audible. I even perfected the fine art of blow drying my hair while wearing corded headphones.

When I wrote my book Some Assembly Required: A True Story of Love and Organ Transplants, I always hoped an audiobook would follow. But…it’s complicated.

My publisher — the fabulous Black Rose Writing — reserves the right to make an audiobook. But the thing about rights is: You can choose not to exercise them. It comes down to good-sense decision making about economics and suitability. There is a cost to produce an audiobook and some books just don’t make great audiobooks. A high school geometry text, as one example, might not make a scintillating listen. My publisher looks at each book through that lens and ultimately makes a determination.

Mine is a funny non-fiction book about a liver transplant. As this is the very definition of “niche,” I figured my chances were quite slim on the audiobook front. But, I think I may have caught my publisher by surprise by the book’s reception. My hope was that it find its way to the transplant patients and caregivers who need it. My unexpected joy was discovering there are readers, in neither of the categories above, that just really liked it. (Yes, yes. There is a little Sally Field in all of us.)

Then, one day, this showed up in my inbox:

From: The Voice of James

Subject: Your Narrator

It was a very nice message from my soon-to-be-narrator of my soon-to-be audiobook advising me that my cherished publisher decided to move forward with production.

My hands shook as I typed back a message in response that probably used way too many exclamation points.

James (I’ll call him that for short) and I did a short round of emails and texts. In terms of author help, he only asked for my assistance with one sentence. It wasn’t a pronunciation thing, which I would have expected in a book that name drops hepatic encephalopathy. Rather, I had written a terrible hash of a sentence that he — bless him — had to actually say out loud.

Anyone could tell James is talented. I immediately joined his Facebook page and listened to his stuff. Based on my personal experience, I also knew him to be outstandingly professional. But, being truly honest with myself, I really didn’t know how this would all turn out. Let’s start with the basics: I’m a lady and he is not a lady.

I then realized this was probably my audio prejudice talking. I sometimes spend more time listening to Tavia Gilbert, Emily Rankin, and Renee Raudman than my own spouse. These are the voices associated with some of my go-to fiction books. But then I remembered that Jim Frangione narrates a couple of my other favorite reads and his strong lady voice is pretty badass.

Both James and I got the simultaneous heads-up email from my publisher that the book was live on Audible and ready for download.

Regrettably, I got this message right after arriving at the office. Absent headphones and with a full day of work and meetings ahead of me, I didn’t have the opportunity to listen. It was only when I was in my car, commuting home, that I finally got to push play on my own book.

I’ve been a ghostwriter for years, so I’m used to what I pen sometimes coming out of someone else’s mouth. In my profession, we take that whole “pay no attention to the (wo)man behind the curtain” thing seriously.

But, this was my first time hearing my story told by someone else. I think what surprised me most was: I forgot it was me.

Let me explain. People say that reading my writing feels like we’re both sitting down and having a cup of coffee (or more likely in my case, a big glass of wine) and a nice chat. I think that’s a very kind thing of them to say — because compliments from readers are the fuel writers run on — but it also captures the conversational style of my work. Could James talk… like me?

During my listen, I noticed there were certain times where James hit a different emotional note or added an inflection in a way that absolutely elevated the material. In listening to him perform, the most marvelous happened: I was laughing at my own stuff because he said it better!

It was like hearing a book by someone else for the first time. I got to take the reader’s journey, which I certainly never expected to go on. It was a great experience for me and I now hope readers (make that listeners) think so too.

In sum: Something I always hoped for and never expected came to pass. And the lesson in this? Resist the urge to meddle and sometimes the universe take good care of things for you — audiobooks chief among them.