A Brief Foray Into AI-narrated Books
I had a strong interest in publishing audio books a couple years ago. The numbers looked good. More and more people are listening to books. They listen while driving, while jogging, while at work and play. Some authors even confided they were earning more with audio than other delivery methods.
I had just finished Ethinium’s Vault, and I found a narrator with the most excellent voice, Joshua Banks. But the economics never quite worked out. My readers, it seemed, had yet to embrace audio to the same level as some other authors enjoyed.
So I did not pursue further audio works. Granted, Ethinium’s Vault is a big book, clocking in at 150,000 words or so. Joshua and I spent a good four months working on it. And I will say that Ethinium’s Vault has practically no known typos, after having gone over the text multiple times, both listening to and reading it.
But I gave up on audio after that, opting to focus on the written word and producing more of it.
Then Amazon offered AI voices. I placed most of my other titles in the program, having them narrated by virtual voices. They’re not bad. I’ve had friends download and listen to the titles, and some even say they actually like the virtual voices narrating the tales. There are a few mispronunciations, but you get that with a human reader, too.
If you’re an independent author who has not gone down the AI-narrated audiobook rabbit hole yet, give it a try on one of your titles and see what you think.
For those who are interested in listening to Joshua Banks’ rendition of Ethinium’s Vault, the Audible version is available on the Meant to be Heard BOGO sale this week for Audible Premium Plus members. If you are in that subscription group, you can download two titles for one credit from the selections included in the sale.
Sale ends Aug. 27, and is for the US only.
