The Voice Behind the Microphone

I have a special guest with me today. Her name is Sharon Blumberg and she's a narrator for ACX, the audio leg of Amazon. Since I normally interview authors, I thought this interview would take us into, and shed light upon, a mostly unknown world to us.

As I've mentioned in previous posts, I've uploaded my books to ACX to be made into audio versions. My nonfiction book, Stop Procrastinating - Get Published! is narrated by Sharon and is now available on Amazon--in print, Kindle, and audio. In fact, for a short while you can get the audio version at no cost to you! (Go to www.amazon.com and type in my name, then click on the book title.)

Welcome, Sharon! Thanks for being here today.  Can you tell us what it took to become a narrator for ACX?

I trained for about five months with a voiceover coach through online training, but it could also have been done in person. We worked together as I practiced reading scripts, recording them, and sending them to him, so he could listen to them. I also had to learn how to edit what I recorded, so it would have a great sound. Then I signed up to set up my voiceover artist profile, to become a narrator through ACX. Before June of 2014, I was a Spanish and English teacher for over 20 years. In addition, I'm also a writer.

How long have you been narrating for ACX?

About two years.

You narrate about how many books a year?

In the past year and a half to two years, I have narrated a little over 20 books.

That's a lot. When you narrate a book, is it difficult to do the different voices?

It can be difficult, but once you get into the character and feel comfortable doing it, it gets easier.

Do you read the book through first before starting the narration?

Yes. I either read through the whole book first, if it's a children's book, or I go through the book by chapters. I also color code the characters' lines.

Do you need any special equipment?

I use my Mac computer, and online recording and editing systems such as Audacity and Twisted Wave. I also use a plug in microphone and an interface that connects to the computer and microphone.

Do you like being a narrator?

Yes, very much. But it often gets a little disappointing, when you get rejections from your auditions. There are also other forms of voiceover work, and I aspire to do more of that also in the future.

I'm sure my readers want to know if a person can make a living doing narration?

Yes, once you do it full time with some big projects, the income can build up over time.

What’s your favorite part of the process?

My favorite part is the relationships I create while working on projects, and completing projects I feel proud of having created.

How do you feel the process could be improved?

As I narrate and produce audio books, I feel there are still more things I can learn about, and that's one thing I look forward to. We can always learn more by taking classes and training programs.

Of the books you’ve narrated, which one did you like best?

I have a number of books I enjoyed in different ways, but what I loved about your book, Linda, was that it was the perfect length, and it is such a darling book that not only can serve as a training manual for new writers, but it also serves as a novel as well. I thought it was so cleverly written, that I chose to audition for it. I am so glad that you chose me to narrate for you! 

I'm glad, too! Thank you, Sharon, for inviting us into your world and giving us a glimpse of the voice behind the audio books microphone. For more information on having your book narrated or being a narrator, go to www.acx.com.

Quote of the Day: If a nation loses its storytellers, it loses its childhood. Peter Handke

Old Ladies Need Their Sleep

I just got home from a two-week vacation immersed in family. Good, warm, loving, God-fearing, decent people, all of them. And all of them spread across the state of Connecticut.

Tammy and Curtis

Cyndi and Bill

Cyndi and Bill were planning to drive up and invited me to hitch a ride with them. They didn’t have to ask me twice! We arrived in Manchester, CT, east of Hartford, on a Thursday night. My daughter Tammy and her husband Curtis were waiting for us with open arms. The beds they provided were welcome after a fourteen-hour drive. We made ourselves at home there for the next few days. It seems, however, that we left the warm weather of the south behind; the days at Tammy’s were bitter cold and windy. There was even talk of snow right there in mid-May! Thank heavens we didn’t see any.

Tammy and Cyndi with
cousins Bob and Nancy

Sunday we attended a wedding of my kids’ second cousin. The ceremony was outside in the cold and wind but, thankfully, the reception was inside where we thawed out and enjoyed getting reacquainted with family members we hadn’t seen in a while. It was topped off a few days later with a lunch with my sister-in-law (we married brothers many years ago.)

Mike, Monterey, Kari

Not to bore you with our family home movies, but let me say we spent a good day in Seymour, CT with my son Mike, my grandson Monterey, and Mike’s fiancee, Kari. 

Cyndi, Mike, Tammy

 Then we went to my sister’s house in Fairfield, CT where we stayed for the rest of the time. Mike and Monterey and Tammy came down on a Friday for dinner and a lot of clowning around.  

Donna and Linda, the old ladies

One really funny thing happened during our week in Fairfield. I’m 75 and my sister Donna is 77 and more and more when we look in the mirror, we see our mother looking back at us. That would be okay, except occasionally this last week I would slip up and call Donna “Mom.” And as if that wasn’t bad enough, she did the same thing to me. She’d ask Cyndi to “Go ask Mom what she wants to eat.”  Sometimes we didn’t catch ourselves until one of us erupted in laughter. 

She and I spent a relaxing afternoon one day having a manicure/pedicure, then lunch outdoors (it had warmed up by then) at Panera’s. The person giving us a pedicure asked if we were twins. At least she didn’t ask if I was Donna’s mother! I went to church Sunday with Donna and Joe at a small New England country church--white steeple, trees all around. Wouldn’t you know, I fell asleep. With only twelve people in attendance, I couldn’t very well hide behind someone! It’ll be a while before I live that one down.

This bridge is 17.6 miles long and
 includes two tunnels under the
 water

We took two days to come back home in order to take the coastal route and go over the Chesapeake Bay Bridge which also takes you through the tunnel that goes under Chesapeake Bay. Now that’s an experience! You try very hard not to think of what would happen if a crack should appear in the tunnel wall.

We’re home now with happy memories of quality time spent with family including Curtis serenading us on the guitar, a trip into the country for ice cream, thrift shop shopping, and birthday celebrations with Curtis and Monterey.

And that is why I’m now on the East Coast!

I guess it’s time to get back to writing.

Quote of the day:  The little world of childhood with its familiar surroundings is a model of the greater world. The more intensively the family has stamped its character upon the child, the more it will tend to feel and see its earlier miniature world again in the bigger world of adult life. Carl Gustav Jung