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When You're The Audiobook Narrator, Who Are You, Really?  (This article is excerpted with permission from the new Part 2, Audiobooks A-Z, in the author's voice over training program, The Power of Five.)By Vanessa Hart Voice Talent and Trainer Who is an audiobook's narrator? Lots of new narrators will say, "It’s me.” Well ... no. With some exceptions (for accents, etc.), you will want to use your own voice, but the character of the narrator is not you. That gives you nothing to hang your hat on. No point of view that furthers the story line. NARRATOR IS CHARACTER, TOO I had a lot of difficulty with this in the beginning and got smacked down pretty hard in a Masters Class. Now I know that I need to make choices – strong choices – for my narrator, just as I would for any other character in the book. There are many different schools of thought here. I can only share with you what works for me. ANSWER THESE QUESTIONS First-person manuscripts will give you most of the information that you need. You know whose voice it is and you’ve done your prep work, so you know quite a lot about this main character. You have answered all the Guideposts questions. What you probably aren’t told in the book is the answers to the following questions: 1. Who are you telling the story to? 2. Why? 3. Where? 4. How far removed are you from the actual events in the story when you are telling the story? Last week? Yesterday? Twenty years ago? These are important questions to answer. WHO'S TALKING? If the book is written in the third person you have one additional question to answer – WHO is talking? Now here is where most people get stuck. Why? Because you have to make it up. Yo |
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