13174: Grammar Girl, Audiobook Narration and The Public Domain

Raw transcript:

ever have your participle
dangle ever have your Clause be
subjunctive ever ever you know
surrendered to an Oxford comma Nazi
person is kind of thing well I am a
friend of proud to be a friend of and a
big huge fan of grammar girl the woman
who might be able to help you with all
that stuff and she’s a part of narrate
yourown book.com Inon Fogerty is going
to be with us in this episode of the vo
Heroes
[Music]
podcast minion Fogerty last time I saw
you in person was on stage at the
podcast Awards was it not it was I know
David H lawen the 17th I still have the
picture of you handing me a trophy on
stage love that it was in Vegas what
what what what happens in Vegas stays in
Vegas unless you have the internet in
which case it’s all over the place um I
can’t tell you what a joy you have been
in my life with the grammar girl podcast
with the books with the columns with the
newsletter just being able to pick up
the phone and ask you a question about
the differences between singular and
plural in the US versus the UK when I
was watching the World Cup a couple of
years ago I mean it’s just like you know
who would have
thought
that what you chose as your Prime
subject would be so
arresting and it just points out what a
geek I am but thank God you exist thank
you so much well thank you well I love
your work giving advice on how to do
voiceover and Audi book narration I’m a
big fan of of your videos on social
media I I I I will tell you that that
there are times when I say something and
I go did I say that right does grammar
girl say yes is that is that a is that a
yes for grammar girl for that um I you
know I think that what you do and and
how you do it has trained a whole lot of
people in a world online that can be
vicious and cutting and rude you seem to
be this island of fresh air and kindness
and joy that it just refreshes me every
week so thank you for that I I just
wanted to get that out there now thank
you I mean really important to me I
don’t judge people is I I aim to be
friendly and helpful and and
nonjudgmental I just want to help people
right better so I’m glad to hear you
yeah yeah it’s great now we uh have been
doing and by we I mean I have been doing
audiobook narration since the late 80s
and I’ve been training people on
audiobook work for most of the 21st
century wow does that make me sound old
okay and every so often an author would
sneak into either vo heroes or the ACX
master class and then they would
identify themselves as a writer not an
actor or a voice talent and I would have
to disabuse them of that notion because
once you start narring audio books you
are an actor whether you want to be one
or not and uh you uh openly said yeah
let’s do this when I presented to you
the opportunity to be one of our
Affiliates for narrate your own book and
I I was a little taken aback I was
expecting you know yeah I’m I’m a little
big for that now you know I’m a I’m a
I’m a celebrity I you know and but you
were like let’s do this this is great
and then I found out that you um had
narrated your own book but under
circumstances that were classically you
know
traditional tell me about that uh that
experience when your book came out and
what it was like for you to actually
narrate it yeah yeah I Nar Creed two of
my own audio books and the first I don’t
remember which is which but I did one in
New York in this studio it was amazing
because you know it’s in the middle of
downtown so you think it’s really loud
how could you possibly do that and it
was this Cube that was sort of floating
in the middle of a building it was isol
sound isolated studio and you know I was
in the booth with the paper and the
script and and there was a producer you
know giving me feedback um through
headphones while I was doing it it was
very exciting I felt very special and
important I have to say and then the SEC
the second time was in San Francisco and
um also there were two people there
there was a a a tech person and a
director and what I most remember is
they made me go buy a new shirt because
my shirt was making rubbing noises and
they’re like you need you need to go get
a different
shirt yeah you know you just reminded me
I got to put a lesson and narrate your
own book about what to wear and what not
to wear when you’re narrating jangly
Jewelry earrings necklaces uh sequins
you know some people are pretty
flamboyant and it can narrate themselves
into a problem in terms of the sound so
what it sounds like to me is that you
were in a situation where you were
totally being taken care of you had
somebody who was listening as you were
narrating and they would stop you and
say I know you you you meant say I’ll
see you on Tuesday but you said I’ll see
you on Thursday can you just back up and
pick that up again and there was an
engineer doing the work of how to manage
that process so that later someone could
edit it and edit out the mistakes and so
on um when you were doing that did you
feel taken care of I did yes very much
it was fun yeah so today that still
happens happens all the time uh people
are brought into Studios uh audible uh
penguin r Random House there are other
studios around the country Dion
Brilliance up in in Michigan and so on
uh but most of the work that’s being
done these days is being done from home
not just because of the pandemic and the
lockdowns and all that which was just
you know it was kind of like a a dirty
little secret for those of us who do
voiceover we had been doing that for a
long time so it really didn’t bother us
so much and I’m sure you knew doing the
podcast that it didn’t change much about
your
process so with audio books now now
you’re in your closet or under the
stairs or in the basement you’re like
you know you’re a tiny little troll
doing your work you know and you’re
you’re you’re capturing money for
crossing the bridge um and the gear
that’s used is also uh very similar to
the gear that you’re using for your
podcast do you do your podcast from home
or do you do it from oh yeah I do it
from home yeah well in fact I have a
little Studio Under the Stairs you do
well there you
little cubby yeah and I think that more
and more there have been enough articles
in the Atlantic and The New Yorker and
the times about you know did you know
that most audiobooks are created under
the stairs you know that people the
general public have an idea of what
that’s like
today you are uh open and supportive of
this notion of writers narrating their
own books and learning how to do it the
same way actors and voice Talent have
have done that and that’s what we’re
doing with narrate your own book and
Minon has her own uh special link that
you can use to join us for the free
classes and also join us for the
registration of the
course it’s narrate yourown book.com
grammar and if you don’t spell it
correctly that’s okay we have you
covered um but narate yourown book.com
grammar it uh it gets you to uh the free
course that we are are uh that we put
together called how to narrate your own
book and then also gives you the
opportunity to register for the full
course where you not only get trained in
all this stuff but you also get the gear
as part of the uh as part of the
training I I showed this before we just
did an episode of Minion’s podcast and I
showed the gear and you know this is
what you get as part of it um when you
look at this you’re you’re looking to
narrate you said The Hardy Boys one of
The Hardy Boys titles right
yeah so uh as you look at this what are
the things that are
most uh concerning for you what do you
what are you sitting there going hm how
do I do this yeah well the thing that
and it’s funny because when you
approached me I think you were surprised
I was like absolutely yes I’m so excited
about this because to me the idea of
narrating an audiobook is just fun and
so I had um already started I had gone
to find a public domain book that I
could just narrate for fun but then as I
sat there look looking at it and I
started thinking about recording it I
started to get really intimidated
because you know I had narrated my book
I had even been nominated for an Audi
award but looking at fiction and
realizing there are characters with
different personalities and that I I
just suddenly felt like this isn’t just
what this isn’t what I’ve done this is
acting and I have no idea how to do that
so that that was where I got hung up but
you actually do have an idea how to do
that and you’re doing it right now if I
were to ask you uh so when you made a
mistake in the book that you recorded in
San
Francisco what did the director sound
like when they asked you to make that
correction give me an example of what
they would have said to you oh yeah they
would say well yeah you as you said you
said you said Tuesday instead of
Thursday can you just back up and and
redo it again there from that point okay
so you just did it you just
differentiated your language from their
language and you didn’t do a caricature
of them you know if they were an older
uh guy you would you didn’t say I know
you meant to say Tuesday but you said
Thursday you know you didn’t do
something over the top that would take a
listener out of the story you simply and
naturally and authentically
differentiated their voice and the way
they said it from your voice or even the
exposition of oh yeah and then he said
the attribution of what you were going
to say
you know again I have to thank you
because words like Exposition and
dialogue and attribution and uh you know
first person and third person these are
all things that I learned from you and
these are all things that I have been
able to use in my coaching that have
made me money so thank you um but the
the other thing is um you’re you’re
going to do a public domain book and
that’s a special case I’m assuming that
what you want to do is you want to uh
create a Kindle version of the book and
then do the audiobook through ACX is
that right yeah that’s what I was
thinking actually I was thinking about
just doing the audio book it didn’t
occur to me to pair them but that’s a
good idea too you you could do that
there is one rule that you need to be
aware of and that’s that you have to add
at least
10% of the content that exists in the
audiobook as commentary or footnotes or
here’s what life was like in those days
when The Hardy Boys were playing with
Pen Knives in their back back backyard
it’s a requirement of ACX to put a
public domain book out there on
Audible uh to add uh additional content
from your perspective oh I had no idea
this is incredibly helpful information
already yeah well they would have told
you that had you uploaded the the thing
from and I don’t know where you got the
copy of it maybe from Project Gutenberg
or or somewhere else but um but that’s
one of the requirements now you can
certainly
do all the work and just offer it on
your own on your own website or on its
own website that that you create for it
that’s what I did for War of the Worlds
which is a story that I talk about all
the time one of the courses in vo Heroes
is called creating your own content and
I talk about back in 2004 knowing that
the next you know iteration of the War
of the Worlds remakes was coming out
with Tom Cruz and thinking to myself
wait a minute War of the Worlds is
public domain 1890s hgls you know I can
narrate this and take advantage of all
this promotion that Paramount is doing
for the movie and I did and I did and
you know in those days there was no ACX
there was no audible there was no
requirement to do 10% more I just built
a little tiny mini website and offered
it there so you can do that if that’s
what you want to do um the the so have I
have I allayed your fears about the
about the characters or do you actually
need to do some work on that to to to
get it going no I think that’s good I
mean I I mean certainly I’m going to try
and um you know see how it sounds and
then what’s great about the course is my
understanding is that you will listen to
some of it and tell me if it’s good or
bad oh yeah absolutely so what we do
with the course is not only do we teach
you how to do this but we we follow the
model of VO Heroes which is monthly uh
live group sessions so you bring to
narrate your own book uh a paragraph or
two from your work and narrate it and we
give you feedback we have a whole team
of coaches you can choose whichever
session you want including mine um and
you perform live in front of your other
students as if you were in a class and
doing an acting class where you perform
the scene in front of not only the coach
but also the students the other actors
and so hopefully everybody learns from
what everybody does and we also are
doing this and this is really important
as we release this podcast we’re about a
day away from the end of the early
action bonus season session part of
it where if you jump in and join the
course via uh Minion’s uh link which is
narrate youron book.com grammar uh if
you jump in before Tuesday
night the 9th of April at uh at 9900 PM
Pacific you’re going to get two hours of
private coaching with me so four 30
minute sessions use them whenever you
want you can use them for performance
you can use them to help you get your
your equipment balanced and set up
properly uh whatever you want to do talk
about how to do things on ACX whatever
you want to do but you can do that and
that’s only through uh that Tuesday
night at 9:00 P PM so just be aware of
that if you’re if you’re thinking about
it it’s a good to do before that ends
but uh yeah the feedback that you’re
going to get is likely going to be
around the notion of acting is going to
be around the notion of the technical
side of things are is there noise in the
background or uh did you take that
character and really help it find help
that character find what it wants rather
than what you as the narrator want you
know there there’s so many different
things around that is there anything
else
that you have concerns about that that
you’re you’re maybe thinking how do I do
that yeah I mean I know that ACX exists
I’ve known about for years but I don’t
know um well obviously I didn’t know
about the 10% rule and I’m wondering you
know what else um do I need to know I
mean even just thinking about how coming
up with a book cover that I’ll need to
put up there you know the the
nitty-gritty of like actually taking
this thing I produce and then getting it
up there like all all of what I would
need so uh one of the lessons is
actually how to produce the audiobook
artwork um you know and I’ll just tell
you 2400 by 2400 pixels it’s uh 72 dots
per inch and what I would do is remember
that people are going to be looking at
that artwork this big and so you don’t
want to skimp on the size of the text
you want it to be a little bit more in
your face than a natural print book
cover might be you know print book cover
you might have a subtitle or a blurb on
the front cover or a quote from a
reviewer that is in Fairly tiny text you
have to actually get close to the book
to see it you don’t want to take that
risk when you’re doing artwork for the
audiobook because people are going to
see the artwork on audible.com and on
their Partners but not necessarily in
fullblown you know size like to fill
their screen they might see it in a
little tiny version on the app for
example when they go to buy it so just
bear that in mind as you compose that
work but it’s pretty simple if you use
canva or if you use uh Photoshop or if
you use I use something called graphic
converter which another friend of mine
created a long time ago and it works
great and it’s
easy um but yeah we talked about that
what we’ve done with narrate your own
book is we’ve created a super annuated
version of what we teach actors and
voice talent in vo Heroes and the ACX
master class and we add things like how
to claim your title which a narrator
wouldn’t be able to do uh we leave out
things like uh creating an inviting
profile because you’re doing the work
for you unless you want to do the work
for other people then we’ll show you how
to make a profile but you don’t need to
do that um you know we have a whole
section in the other courses on a
welcome kit how to deal with your rights
holder how to take care of them how to
you know that you don’t need that
because it’s you we will talk about
taking care of yourself your vocal
Health your
stamina are you worried at all about how
you know absolutely that’s another
concern um I’ve been I’ve actually been
seeing a speech therapist because I have
been having some trouble with my voice
but I want to do all this stuff and so
one of the things she actually told me
is that I should read aloud a little bit
every day so I’m like well there you go
I’m going to narrated an audio book and
I’m doing my speech therapy but I am
worried about straining my voice so what
advice do you what what do you have for
me there so I don’t think you need to
worry about that at all I think that you
will know when your voice is becoming
fatigued I love that you sip is that tea
it’s actually just water it’s just water
that’s fine that’s great and you know
one tip that I make sure people know is
that hydration begins hours before you
need it so now you’re hydrating yourself
for a couple of hours from now and so as
you start working what you don’t want to
do is sit down to narrate your audio
book and then gulp down a bunch of water
because number one it’ll cause you know
gurgling and it may and it’ll also
activate your salivary glands in a way
that you may not like um what you want
is slow sipping over time so that you
are hydrated when it’s time to do your
work and then sipping while you’re doing
it as well there are people who say make
sure you have you know a lip balm uh
maybe um uh lenes that you can suck on
in between things the way we teach you
how to do this this process is to do
your recording using the stair step
method and then take a break and edit it
and assemble it all together and that
does a couple of things it gives you a
break from the narration it gives you uh
something to keep your mind occupied
while you’re uh preparing for the next
chapter it gives you kind of a a look at
what you did and how you did it and lets
you uh gather a bit of Pride about
getting that final chapter put together
and then getting ready to upload it and
master it um and proof it you know
you’ll be proofing your audio the same
way that you’re proofing a written
passage you know where you’d use a proof
reader we teach you how to use a service
called positron where they will proof
listen to what you’ve done interesting
they use AI to do it you know you upload
your manuscript and you upload your
audio and it compares the two and it
gives you the diff for those of you that
are tech people you know you know what
the diff is between two segments I’m
surprised it can do that huh yeah so and
and then it also does something really
cool it gives you a pickup packet that a
marker kit that you drop into audacity
right below the audio and it takes you
right to those points where you need to
do your pickups and and make the
correction it’s so easy that’s amazing
oh my gosh yeah so you you’re you’re G
to love that part um the other thing
that you have going on is you don’t have
a deadline right unless you impose one
yourself so when you’re going to do the
Hardy Boy book you kind of can do it
when you want to so if you want to do 20
minutes a day for the next I don’t know
10 weeks or so you can or if you decide
no you know what I’m going to do is I’m
going to put out the Hardy Boys with
additional commentary by grammar girl
Min Fogerty uh at the same time the same
day and date as the audiobook version
and you can do that you can coordinate
with ACX and with Amazon to do a
simultaneous release of both of them you
can do that this with a book that you’ve
written as well um so you have that
opportunity so in terms of the strain of
your voice you can choose to do it
slower you can choose to do it more
deliberately so there’s a lot of options
you got a lot of options I’m so excited
for you yeah yeah I have to go write
that extra 10% but um so how so you’re
saying probably 20 minutes a day is a
reasonable um goal perhaps so 20 minutes
a day if you want to stretch it out over
a longer period of time yeah but
certainly 20 to 30 minutes at a time you
know what I don’t want people to think
is that they they have this uh burden
this mountain that they have to climb of
hours and hours of talking every day for
three or four days to get the book done
now that’s what happens that’s likely
what happened when you went to the
studio in New York and the studio in San
Francisco you were there for for a few
days right two days yeah yeah so that’s
the way it happens when you go to a
studio but you weren’t engineering your
work you weren’t producing your final
product you were just doing what’s
called a straight record where you
record until you make a mistake and then
you are told to do a pickup and you pick
it up and you keep going right um you’ll
do something similar with whatever book
you produce
yourself but it’s done in what I call
like island hopping you know you’re not
running
Marathon you’re running some leisurely
jogs for like 20 30 40 minutes at a time
and then break taking a break for as
long as you want and if you feel up to
it and you want to you know put the the
thing that you just did together and
then maybe half an hour later start a
new one do it again great if not go do
something else you don’t have to get it
done all at once and you
won’t yeah so and and I’m curious you
know I know for podcasting it it
generally takes me I don’t know like
three-ish minutes of work for every one
minute of finished
audio I what but that doesn’t include
some other some of the backend things
that we have to do but but what is it
generally for an Audi book is it the
same or is it
different so Audible and ACX do uh
yearly surveys of their narrators and on
average narrators tell ACX that it takes
them between seven and 10 hours to do
the work now those aren’t my students
those are people who are trying their
best to do the job with what they know
and have not gone about the the process
of trying to hone and refine that that
sort of thing and with the stairstep
method what we want people to be at is
two three four hours per finished hour
just like you’re saying two or three
minutes per finished minute of a podcast
you want the same thing and that includ
everything that includes the the
principal recording so the recording of
your uh your raw audio putting it
together by by editing out the the
mistakes as you go back through the
project exporting a raw wave file with
your edited finished copy and then
asking positron to give you that marker
file to compare it and give you the
errors that you need to do pickups and
then in the case of narrators that I
train that are actors and voice Talent
sharing that with the rights holder so
they can approve it
you know make sure that it’s all
correct or with a narrator that’s doing
their own book listening to it one last
time to make sure that you have
everything the way you want it and then
you’re done you know you’re you’re Off
to the Races and and putting all your
chapters up and your opening and closing
credits and your retail sample we even
show you how to pick a great retail
sample how to do that leaving an open
loop um and so and we we talk about
things that writers are actually
familiar with like fly leaf content and
blurbs and first chapters How many first
chapters have you read that end along
the lines of and when he opened the door
he couldn’t believe what he
saw chapter two you know and then you
get you know you’re introduced to the to
the cop that’s going to figure it all
out right there things are designed so
that when you open up a book you’re
Enchanted and you’re excited and you
want to know what happens next and you
do the same thing with your so you put
all these things up you give it to ACX
to review technically they don’t review
your performance they review your
technical stuff and we provide for free
as part of the package a piece of
software that I helped develop called
audio cupcake audio cupcake you
basically just drag your wave file onto
it and it spits out the MP3 file that
ACX will approve because it’s perfect so
yeah so and then you’re like okay now
what do I to promote it what do I do to
Market it what kind of you know uh do I
you know what are what are Bounty codes
what are what are promo codes used for
you know can I hold an event you know
can I draw people to uh Amazon or to
audible the day it’s released you know
all these things so yeah did I answer
your question I don’t know if I answer
your question no no you did at the very
beginning because you said it’s about
three about three-ish three or four
minutes and so I’m thinking okay if I
have this Hardy Boy book and I’ve
estimated I thought it was going to be 4
hours but now maybe it’s going to be
five with the extra stuff so I’m looking
at you know 15 to 20 hours of work it
sounds like so you said the Hardy Boy
book would be about four or five hours
long what leads you to think that um I
put I put the word count in a script
estimator oh okay so the number there is
9,300 so if the word count is
93,000 words mhm then it’s 10 hours 9300
is typical uh pacing and it’s uncannily
accurate even when you have people that
are really hyped up energy-wise and
they’re doing non-fiction books they
still sometimes calm down a bit to give
you a a Moment of Zen right or when
somebody’s doing an exciting scene in a
fiction book and it’s a little bit
faster paced than it would be with a
love scene or a a moment of anger or who
knows mhm so um yeah so that’s a good
that’s a good estimate and um your first
one might be a little bit longer yeah
that’s fair that’s fair but then it gets
easier and easier and easier I just did
a five hour a book for one of my clients
and I actually give people a uh a Google
sheet that lets you for a number of
reasons if you’re a narrator doing it
for a rights holder you have to know
what to charge if you’re doing something
by the hour if you’re doing a per
finished hour book or a royalty share
plus book um and so that sheet does that
but we also make sure that you keep
track of all your time so that you
actually can see what your work
hours to finished hours ratio is and I
love when my students are posting in our
private Discussion Group oh guess what I
did this is what it was I would caution
you not to play the game of how do I
make that as small as possible you know
just be be
gracious to yourself be generous to
yourself and know you’re going to get
better at it over time it’s going to be
easier and easier and
easier uh the muscle memory will occur
and you’ll have the joy of doing new
material every time you do a new book
either one of your own books or a book
that you do for um public domain work so
right yeah and like you said I’m I have
I’m I have no reason to rush because I’m
just I’m doing this because it sounds
like fun yeah yeah or maybe they’re
going to come out with a Hardy Boys
movie you know at some point if that
happened you know please take a page out
of my playbook and create your own
content from that book because that’s
what Disney does all the time that’s
what a lot of big production companies
do all the time they don’t want to pay a
writer to come up with new new
characters and a a new world you know
they want public domain stuff that they
can reconstitute and uh and apply Dei to
and apply modern sensibilities to and
maybe be a little bit more gritty with
who knows uh all these things are
possible these days and just having this
skill set is something that you can
lather rinse repeat with over time and
just get better and better and better at
it and I can’t wait to hear what you
come up with because you have this
really distinct voice that immediately
makes me want to turn in my home
homework on
time and not see any red marks on it I’m
just
saying you can do it good job yeah thank
you thank you for the for the positive
reinforcement um I I want to thank you
for being a part of uh this project it’s
the first time we’re offering
this uh I think that uh your audience is
is a very interesting and specific
audience that could benefit from it the
people in the audience uh people that
are watching this are are uh the public
my followers my my students and and
clients and I want you to take advantage
if you’re going to do this of of
Minion’s link which is narrate yourown
book.com grammar and uh you’ll you’ll
find that um she’s she’s said she’s
going to take the course as well which I
just are you really I am of course I am
okay I could not be more excited about
it so be like Mong take the course um is
there anything else I can help you with
is there anything else that that
has concerns or or anything that as you
embark on this no we’re good I I I’m
looking forward to getting started cool
well if you who are watching this uh
have any questions or if you’d like to I
don’t know hit the like button or
subscribe to the channel or cling the
notific if ation Bell like this yeah uh
please go ahead and do that and uh I
want to thank Min Fogerty Grammar Girl
for being on the the episode um uh her
link one more time is narrate your
narrate yourown book.com grammar and uh
I I so appreciate you for all that you
do thank you so much for being with us
thank you David thank you so much I’m
David H Lawrence the 17th I thank you so
much for watching and for listening and
I will see you in the next episode of
the vo Heroes podcast
[Music]

(from YouTube)