I Tried an Audiobook and here’s what my experience was like

As a mother of a toddler and an equally in demand dog mom, I often find myself hard-pressed juggling my time and tasks of the day. What water is to the body, reading is to my soul and so in all the hustle, I found myself struggling to even flick through a couple of pages, till a few days back. It was frustrating to say the least. Which is when a friend recommended me to subscribe to Audible. Well, I had my apprehensions after my experience with Kindle. Although, it’s a delight to carry all your books comfortably in a natty and a light device when you have to travel (considering most of the times the zippers of my bags are on the verge of snapping) but, on regular days I still prefer the feel of the cover and the pages of my book. After much thought I decided to give it a shot. So, downloaded the app, logged in, and picked a membership plan. Here I was looking at books, so many books at that. A few features that I came across as soon as I signed up -

1. I loved that they offer a credit a month with which, you can buy any book for free.
2. 2. It has a plethora of free books to read from that don’t require a credit.
3. 3. A general observation was that the Audiobooks cost relatively higher than your regular paper back books. Come to think of it, it’s justified because of all the effort that goes into narrating it. I put myself in place of someone who had to narrate a 500 page book with consistent fervour and I realised it definitely ain’t easy.
4. 4. You get to sample the books before you read. Each sample Audiobook is for 5 minutes which is more than enough to gauge whether the narrator and the book are captivating enough or not to sustain them for quite a few hours.
5. 5. Half way through the book and realised that it is a “Nah” for you? Not to worry, you can exchange it with another one.
6. 6. I was put at ease when I found out that I could actually rollover my monthly credits for 6 months if I didn’t avail it in a particular month.

About my experience so far with the book-

1. So, I chose Atomic Habits by James Clear to be my first Audiobook. The book has been narrated nicely by the author himself. Although at times I felt that the voice became too monotonous, maybe it’s because it’s a self help book and there is not much scope to fit in emotions when you are talking about building habits.
2. 2. It’s the perfect companion when you have chores that don’t demand your grey cells. So, even if you have 5 minutes, you would have heard a few pages of the book.
3. 3. It feels like the narrator has a lot to do with how much you are going to enjoy the Audiobook. There were a few samples wherein the narrator’s voice seemed to have no spunk, despite the book being a best seller.
4. 4. The only obstacle that you may come across listening to a self help book is, when you. need to refer to images and graphs. Although the book I was listening to has these available on the website and was shared by the narrator during the read yet I am not sure if everyone will be comfortable with this arrangement of referring to the website or taking a printout.
5. 5. Listening to the Audiobook reminds me of the joy of having being read to as a child may be it’s reminding me of the good old times.

Am still taking my time to understand the functioning of the app. It’s been a delightful experience so far and I have already shortlisted the few books that I am going to listen to next!

Any recommendations for the next audiobook are most welcome .