Listen to any good books lately?

Of late, I've stumbled upon on the of the greatest gems of the internet age: Podcast audiobooks.

I've been a fan of podcasts for some time, I like hearing about the latest news in astronomy, learning the intricacies of beer appreciation, or even something as mundane as interviews with authors. But the idea of podcasting a novel didn't strike me as the best idea in the world. In fact, I thought it was stupid.

And did I mention that it was free? Even stupider, it assures that not only will the product be crap, but those poor souls that worked for so long to produce their crap won't see a measly little penny for it.

I had assumed the literary quality would be horrendous, the voices would be annoying and the whole affair would be a large embarrassment to the internet at large.

Boy, was I wrong.

The first book I attempted to listen too didn't work out too well. I had technical difficulties and never really enjoyed the storyline or the presentation. Strike one.

Then I chanced upon a book by Scott Sigler, he's become a bit of a phenom due mostly to the populartiy of his podcast novels, and he is one of the first, if not THE first, to even attempt to tell a story in this format. He managed to turn his experiment into mainstream success, a big book deal, and a movie in pre-production based on his novel, Infected.

But I chose The Rookie, I was familiar with the novel after I heard an interview with Mr. Sigler (on a podcast, of course) and thought I would give it a shot.

Before I knew what was happening I was looking for excuses to listen to the next chapter. Any excuse. I was spending extra time at the gym, taking the long way home from the store, wearing my ipod to do yardwork or housework, any excuse I could find.

I was hooked. It was a home run.

The best part... it's all free. Scott has, and will, certainly make his money from me. I've purchased Infected at the bookstore and I'll be pre-ordering The Rookie as soon as it's available later this month. That stupid "giving it away for free" method really worked.

And what a brilliant idea it was. I knew all along it would work.

Listen to him tell the story himself


For anyone interested, Podiobooks is where I've been listening. Since I finished Mr. Sigler's book I've moved on to others and have generally been impressed. They even have a dandy little donate button if you're so moved to do so.

Til next time.