this post was submitted on 06 May 2025
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Just finished a re-“read” of Neuromancer by William Gibson, audiobook form this time. I hated the way the reader performed, especially his shitty attempt at a Jamaican dialect for the Zionite characters. Book still rules though.
Now I’m onto How to Be an Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi, read by the author. Picked it up in physical form last month but never got to it. The audiobook is based on the paperback version, with edits and notes that are helpful and further enlightening. Great stuff.
I once tried listening to Iain Banks himself reading one of his Culture novels. Boy it's bad. Nothing as stereotypical as "Jamaican accent", just ... weird. Little or counter-intuitive inflection, weird rhythm, and when he does an accent it's ... weird. It's kinda cool to listen to though. I mean the man was a genius and somehow it still reflects in his reading style.
Weird attempts at character voices can tend to take me out of audiobooks too. I think there's a good balance somewhere between one reader doing all voices and the audio play-style ones for some books where in the future one could have effectively studio artists like the ones they used to sit in on albums to handle parts like that in books without the entire thing having to be a different person for each character.
I just wish somebody had pulled this guy aside and been like, “Dude, he’s a Rasta space trucker, not fuckin Tonto.”