[Tiste Simeon]

champ, on 14 March 2025 - 06:07 PM, said:

Abyss, on 14 March 2025 - 05:52 PM, said:

QuickTidal, on 14 March 2025 - 03:43 PM, said:

...
It's also annoying when one accent given to a character is off and that can irritate.
...

You're not wrong.. i was struggling w the narration of Hearn's IRON DRUID series to begin with, and their 'dog accent' was awful, but then they systematically did a series of the absolute worse stereotypical borderline offensive accents one after the other and i DNF'd hard.

I've not come across a narrator yet that has caused me to DNF but I can remember thinking the early Malazan series narrator was a bit off but that was probably because I love the series so much so a harsh critic.

If you haven't already, you need to treat yourself to LotR by Andy Serkis, best narration I have come across...

He kinda matches up the different characters voices to their LotR film counterparts and he does it so well... and then obviously he is Gollum so that is amazing. When Gollum first talks I was like oh bloody hell aye - this is going to be epic... and it was!

Yes some of the voices done by Ralph Lister are just awful! Kalam especially.

Second Serkis, I've listened to LOTR and Silmarillion narrated by him and it's sublime!

QT should also check out the Rivers of London series by Ben Aaronovitch and narrated by Kobna Holdbrook Smith. He's up there with the best.

[Macros]

Get it back on the rails guys

[Macros]

Mark Lawrence, on 12 March 2025 - 04:43 PM, said:

Macros, on 12 March 2025 - 03:02 PM, said:

I full6 expect you to receive a bizarre list of requests from broken bindings that compells you to go to there and update some of the signatures.
Its what Jorg would have wanted

I mean - if you really want a signed and dedicated copy sent to you today (UK edition) or in the near future (US edition) then you just need to jump on my patreon at level 4+ for a month. Just sayin'.

What and miss out you finay caving and sending me a personally signed book after years of badgering?

For shame Mark, FOR SHAME

[Mark Lawrence]

Macros, on 15 March 2025 - 07:35 AM, said:

Mark Lawrence, on 12 March 2025 - 04:43 PM, said:

Macros, on 12 March 2025 - 03:02 PM, said:

I full6 expect you to receive a bizarre list of requests from broken bindings that compells you to go to there and update some of the signatures.
Its what Jorg would have wanted

I mean - if you really want a signed and dedicated copy sent to you today (UK edition) or in the near future (US edition) then you just need to jump on my patreon at level 4+ for a month. Just sayin'.

What and miss out you finay caving and sending me a personally signed book after years of badgering?

For shame Mark, FOR SHAME

I know... I'm ashamed.

I should definitely change my business model and start paying people to accept books off me

[Tiste Simeon]

I think Amazon is planning on doing that soon...

[Tsundoku]

Mark Lawrence, on 15 March 2025 - 11:06 AM, said:

Macros, on 15 March 2025 - 07:35 AM, said:

Mark Lawrence, on 12 March 2025 - 04:43 PM, said:

Macros, on 12 March 2025 - 03:02 PM, said:

I full6 expect you to receive a bizarre list of requests from broken bindings that compells you to go to there and update some of the signatures.
Its what Jorg would have wanted

I mean - if you really want a signed and dedicated copy sent to you today (UK edition) or in the near future (US edition) then you just need to jump on my patreon at level 4+ for a month. Just sayin'.

What and miss out you finay caving and sending me a personally signed book after years of badgering?

For shame Mark, FOR SHAME

I know... I'm ashamed.

I should definitely change my business model and start paying people to accept books off me

And by the most amazing coincidence I've been thinking of acquiring more of your works after reading the Impossible Times trilogy.
Your new business model could really tip me over the edge to becoming an avid collector.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Any plans for an audiobook version of Missing Pages? (Which would be aptly missing all the pages...)

Rakuten Kobo was in fact paying people $15 "cash back" for buying a $2 audiobook or ebook of their choice---with the caveat being iirc that those "$15" were actually 1500 points towards a digital gift certificate on Swagbucks. Though iirc I used them with points from other similar offers towards getting a $25 Amazon digital gift certificate for 2200 points, so it was actually more like (1500 points)*($25 / (2200 points)) = about $17.05, so $15.05 net profit. There were plenty of offers like that back during the (not so) halcyon pandemic depths of ZIRP. Of course you could generally only do each offer once, and most of them got discontinued after interest rates rose.

[Mark Lawrence]

Azath Vitr (D, on 15 March 2025 - 05:12 PM, said:

Any plans for an audiobook version of Missing Pages? (Which would be aptly missing all the pages...)

Rakuten Kobo was in fact paying people $15 "cash back" for buying a $2 audiobook or ebook of their choice---with the caveat being iirc that those "$15" were actually 1500 points towards a digital gift certificate on Swagbucks. Though iirc I used them with points from other similar offers towards getting a $25 Amazon digital gift certificate for 2200 points, so it was actually more like (1500 points)*($25 / (2200 points)) = about $17.05, so $15.05 net profit. There were plenty of offers like that back during the (not so) halcyon pandemic depths of ZIRP. Of course you could generally only do each offer once, and most of them got discontinued after interest rates rose.

Nope - audio books are very expensive to make, and thus only sensible where you anticipate selling good numbers of them.

Plus, it feels like another variable between me and the reader (rather like translations). I wouldn't know how to pick a good narrator. I don't feel I have an instinct for what's good or bad, audiobookwise.

[Azath Vitr (D'ivers]

Mark Lawrence, on 16 March 2025 - 03:27 PM, said:

Nope - audio books are very expensive to make, and thus only sensible where you anticipate selling good numbers of them.

Plus, it feels like another variable between me and the reader (rather like translations). I wouldn't know how to pick a good narrator. I don't feel I have an instinct for what's good or bad, audiobookwise.

Well here's hoping AI audiobook performers get better soon, and they allow each listener to pick their own (and also swap out or adjust any character voices (or accents) they don't like, and add in any music that they might (at least where it's indicated in the text---though IDK about adding sound effects for texts not intended to be "radio plays", probably better to let the listener imagine those in most cases)...).

In the meantime I think that Audible's "Virtual Voice" is probably inexpensive, but given the current state of the technology (last I checked) much as I love AI's potential I'd rather wait for a human (or better AI, that's better at simulating understanding what it's performing---which many human audiobook performers fail to do, even for very high-profile books iirc).

If someone really really wanted an audiobook version for personal use I think they could buy the ebook and run AI text-to-voice locally on their computer (provided they don't distribute it of course). Or they could record themselves performing it, if they want to hear it more than once (is that such an extreme case?... perhaps for an entire novel, maybe less so for a brief poem or speech).

This post has been edited by Azath Vitr (D'ivers: 16 March 2025 - 03:46 PM

[Macros]

Mark,
You should write a book about an AI thing murdering Azath, just so he gets the point

[Mark Lawrence]

Macros, on 16 March 2025 - 05:25 PM, said:

Mark,
You should write a book about an AI thing murdering Azath, just so he gets the point

I have written a book about AI (It's called The Chinese Room and it's on my patreon). My publishers made an offer on it last year but I wasn't happy with it so I put the book back in my electronic drawer.

Azath isn't murdered in it explicitly. Have to leave that to the voice actors' guild

[QuickTidal]

Currently on THE GIRL & THE MOUNTAIN By Mr. Marky Mark Lawrence, 1st of his name.


I've been slow walking this series so that I don't run out of Lawrence material (read The GIRL & THE STARS in late-2023 I think? Gods has it been that long?) as they always cure book hangovers, or help me out of reading funks when I land in them (I had recently landed in one) but now that I have all of this trilogy (hardcover biznatches!), and the 1st and 2nd book in the Library series as well...I figured 4 books of buffer should be fine so I don't run out when I need them.


Also, thanks Mr. Lawrence for the "Story So Far" bit, it's ALWAYS helpful to us readers, I want you to know that.


But yeah, it was easy to jump back in with Yaz, Thurin,

Spoiler

and everyone's favourite 5000 year old spirit inhabiting junk city parts robot? Erris.

And I'm already having a blast. The question will be if I go into MOON directly or not after this...I probably will.


Oh, and pre-ordered the last Library book (THE BOOK THAT HELD HER HEART) too, which comes out soon right....checks online...HOLY FUCK in 5 days?! Our cups runeth over you lot.

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 03 April 2025 - 02:51 PM

[worry]

QuickTidal, on 03 April 2025 - 02:46 PM, said:

Also, thanks Mr. Lawrence for the "Story So Far" bit, it's ALWAYS helpful to us readers, I want you to know that.

I haven't gotten to that particular series yet but this is very true. I love it.

[QuickTidal]

worry, on 03 April 2025 - 03:02 PM, said:

QuickTidal, on 03 April 2025 - 02:46 PM, said:

Also, thanks Mr. Lawrence for the "Story So Far" bit, it's ALWAYS helpful to us readers, I want you to know that.

I haven't gotten to that particular series yet but this is very true. I love it.

Yep, Tad Williams does it as well, so does James Islington...it's super welcome.

This post has been edited by QuickTidal: 03 April 2025 - 03:10 PM

[Abyss]

QuickTidal, on 03 April 2025 - 02:46 PM, said:

Currently on THE GIRL & THE MOUNTAIN By Mr. Marky Mark Lawrence, 1st of his name.


I've been slow walking this series so that I don't run out of Lawrence material (read The GIRL & THE STARS in late-2023 I think? Gods has it been that long?) as they always cure book hangovers, or help me out of reading funks when I land in them (I had recently landed in one) but now that I have all of this trilogy (hardcover biznatches!), and the 1st and 2nd book in the Library series as well...I figured 4 books of buffer should be fine so I don't run out when I need them.


Also, thanks Mr. Lawrence for the "Story So Far" bit, it's ALWAYS helpful to us readers, I want you to know that.


But yeah, it was easy to jump back in with Yaz, Thurin,

Spoiler

and everyone's favourite 5000 year old spirit inhabiting junk city parts robot? Erris.

And I'm already having a blast. The question will be if I go into MOON directly or not after this...I probably will.


Oh, and pre-ordered the last Library book (THE BOOK THAT HELD HER HEART) too, which comes out soon right....checks online...HOLY FUCK in 5 days?! Our cups runeth over you lot.

Mark's work reads best for me when I can marathon a whole series. I have the first two LIBRARY books standing by so thank you for that update QT i had prelaunched an audible credit then forgot to check, psyched now!


As for THE GIRL, yah, don't wait, it's a brilliant trilogy and the books flow directly into each other very effectively.

[Tiste Simeon]

I have the second Library book on Kindle and am awaiting the third via Broken Binding. Haven't actually started the Girl series (I think I have them all) so thanks for the reminder!

[champ]

Abyss, on 03 April 2025 - 05:04 PM, said:

QuickTidal, on 03 April 2025 - 02:46 PM, said:

Currently on THE GIRL & THE MOUNTAIN By Mr. Marky Mark Lawrence, 1st of his name.


I've been slow walking this series so that I don't run out of Lawrence material (read The GIRL & THE STARS in late-2023 I think? Gods has it been that long?) as they always cure book hangovers, or help me out of reading funks when I land in them (I had recently landed in one) but now that I have all of this trilogy (hardcover biznatches!), and the 1st and 2nd book in the Library series as well...I figured 4 books of buffer should be fine so I don't run out when I need them.


Also, thanks Mr. Lawrence for the "Story So Far" bit, it's ALWAYS helpful to us readers, I want you to know that.


But yeah, it was easy to jump back in with Yaz, Thurin,

Spoiler

and everyone's favourite 5000 year old spirit inhabiting junk city parts robot? Erris.

And I'm already having a blast. The question will be if I go into MOON directly or not after this...I probably will.


Oh, and pre-ordered the last Library book (THE BOOK THAT HELD HER HEART) too, which comes out soon right....checks online...HOLY FUCK in 5 days?! Our cups runeth over you lot.

Mark's work reads best for me when I can marathon a whole series. I have the first two LIBRARY books standing by so thank you for that update QT i had prelaunched an audible credit then forgot to check, psyched now!


As for THE GIRL, yah, don't wait, it's a brilliant trilogy and the books flow directly into each other very effectively.

Got it on preorder can't wait. I'm ready for an emotional rollercoaster!


But aye QT, definitely go onto Moon straight away, you won't regret it, quality book with plenty of shenanigans!

[QuickTidal]

While I await my copy to TBTHHH to arrive and join the Lawrence queue on my shelf, I realized I was remiss and he's released a short story collection of Jalan and Snorri stuff called THE RED QUEEN'S WARD (TALES OF MISSPENT YOUTH), so I ordered a copy! Huzzah!

In case anyone else was looking for what it is I speak of, LINKY.

[Tiste Simeon]

Broken Binding have told me that the book has shipped 😎

[Abyss]

QuickTidal, on 08 April 2025 - 05:03 PM, said:

While I await my copy to TBTHHH to arrive and join the Lawrence queue on my shelf, I realized I was remiss and he's released a short story collection of Jalan and Snorri stuff called THE RED QUEEN'S WARD (TALES OF MISSPENT YOUTH), so I ordered a copy! Huzzah!

In case anyone else was looking for what it is I speak of, LINKY.

SOLD!