iTunes: "Audiobook" vs. "Spoken Word": The NEW Winner Is You!

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio News

Conquer The WorldFor better or for worse iTunes and iPods go together like two nesting spoons and with so many people getting iPods these days an audiobook company can not afford to ignore the trend. Independent providers like Podiobooks.com, TellTaleWeekly.org, and Fictionwise.com all have files that will work on iPods too – but frankly only the extremely savvy audiobook readers out there have even heard of any of them. If you want to generate a sizable listenership, you really need to be listed on either audible.com or iTunes. But just knowing this doesn’t mean your problems are over. The sad fact is that iTunes has contracted to get all of it’s audiobook content from audible.com – you cannot get around this exclusive contract if you produce auidobooks. Worse, audible.com gets nearly all of its content from only a few big publishers – that wasn’t always the case, but they really have some weird corporate thing going on there these days. So, if you can’t break into audible.com you’re stuck without iTunes distribution and therefore most iPods won’t ever have your audiobooks on them. But there’s a little loophole that you should know about, an indie music record label is releasing “spoken word” albums on iTunes!

Conquer The World Records* is releasing what amount to audiobooks in everything but the actual name “audiobooks.” The first fiction author to take advantage of this scheme is the world’s savviest podcast novelist Scott Sigler. His first podiobook EarthCore is available for $9.99 through Conquer The World’s “spoken word” album release on iTunes. Do a search in the music store for “Scott Sigler” in the artist category.

Science Fiction Audiobook - EarthCore by Scott SiglerEarthCore
By Scott Sigler; Read by Scott Sigler
20 Files – Approx 15 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Provider: ScottSigler.net / Conquer The World Records
Released: 2006
PRODUCT #: CTW – 32
Priced at: $9.99 USD on iTunes

Even better, two great Science Fiction shorts from Deuce Audio, SFFaudio’s co-editor Scott Danielson’s own audiobook company, are available now on iTunes:

Science Fiction Audiobook - Shed Skin by Robert J. SawyerShed Skin
By Robert J. Sawyer; Read by Stephen Hoye
3 Files – Approx 45 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Provider: Deuce Audio / Conquer The World Records
Released: 2006 – AVAILABLE NOW
PRODUCT #: CTW – 37
Priced at: $2.99 USD on iTunes
Do a search in the artist field with the search term “Robert J. Sawyer”

Science Fiction Audiobook - The Retrieval Artist by Kristine Kathryn RuschThe Retrieval Artist
By Kristine Kathryn Rusch; Read by Stefan Rudnicki
5 Files – Approx. 2 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Provider: Deuce Audio / Conquer The World Records
Released: 2006 – AVAILABLE NOW
PRODUCT #: CTW – 38
Priced at: $4.99 USD on iTunes
Do a search in the artist field with the search term “Kristine Kathryn Rusch”

Conquer the World will soon follow with a some other interesting titles:

Bang! A Love Story by Anthony Mora

A World of Assassins by Neil Davies

Johnnie and the Demon Queen by Erick “Fox” Braun

Controlled Chaos by Michael S. London.

And finally, SF author and Fordham University professor Paul Levinson has signed a deal to produce an exclusive release, entitled Spun Dreams, is currently under production (with Levinson performing it himself). The work is a collection of his short stories. The release will retail for $9.99 USD.

Enjoy folks!

*warning this is a slow loading myspace domain

UPDATE: SFFaudio contributor Esther rightly points out that there is an interesting iLounge about the iTunes/audible.com situation here:

http://forums.ilounge.com/showthread.php?p=878912&#post878912

She also particularily draws our attention to the “Audible Cranks It Up” article link and the “September 2005 issue of Publishing Trends” and their article on audiobooks. The PDF file contains the details of the terms of the audible.com agreement with iTunes (which runs through 2007 but which Apple can terminate given 6 months’ notice). Esther seems better informed on this issue than myself and was surprised to hear that Audible was “no longer working with small publishers” – I should point out that this last point is my personal anecdotal observation and is not drawn from any detailed study comparing the audible.com acquisitions from a few years back to the audible.com catalogue of today. I think however that I can say this, in the Science Fiction and Fantasy audiobook category of audible.com there are more small publishers with publication dates in the year 2000 than their are in 2006. Given the number and quality of new audiobook companies producing Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror audio today I think I am justified in my position of saying audible.com’s current catalogue restrictions are detrimental to SFFaudio listeners.

Posted by Jesse Willis

BBC Radio 4 Documentary Series Imagining Albion: The Great British Future

Jesse Willis

Online Audio

Online AudioAn SFFaudio reader has graciously tipped us to an cool sounding show upcoming on BBC Radio 4. Roy writes, “You might care to note what looks like an interesting series (4x 30mins) starting on BBC Radio 4 22nd June (11:30 UK time)….”

Imagining Albion: The Great British Future
“[The] first programme is about H G Wells’ views of the future, but I believe later shows will feature living writers. No doubt more info on BBC sites such as Radio Times from which weekly magazine schedule I have noted this item.” Roy also reminds us that this program “should be available on ‘listen again'” service.

I’ve check the website but haven’t found any more details yet. Wish I had a subscription to the Radio Times. Hopefully we’ll know more as the 22nd approaches. Thanks a bunch Roy!

posted by Jesse Willis

Review of Rally Cry: The Lost Regiment by William R. Forstchen

admin

SFFaudio Review

Rally Cry: The Lost Regiment #1Rally Cry: The Lost Regiment #1
By William R. Forstchen; Read by Patrick Lawyor
11 Cassettes, 12 CDs or 1 MP3-CD – 15 Hours 30 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: Blackstone Audio
Published: 2006
ISBN: 0786145056(Cassette), 078617199 (CDs), 078617658X (MP3-CD)
Themes: / Science Fiction / Military / Civil War / Aliens / Early Civilizations / Alien World /

— Click here for an audio sample —

“When Union Colonel Andrew Keane led his blue-coated soldiers aboard the transport ship, he could not have foreseen that their next port of call would be neither in the North nor the South but on an alternate world where no human was free.”

In this exciting Military Science Fiction book, we find a regiment of Union soldiers swept away into a tunnel of light to find themselves on an alien planet. These are battle-hardened and battle-weary soldiers who have paid the terrible price of war. Their leader, Colonel Andrew Keane, has not only lost an arm but also his only brother in conflicts with the South.

Their first encounter on this new world is with a society of humans. The society originally came from Earth through that same tunnel of light that brought Keane and his men to this planet. These people were transplanted out of Medieval Russia. The nobles and the Church rule over the peasant serfdom. Conflict ensues as these two different societies battle with weapons from different eras.

There is also a nomadic alien race that lords over the humans of this planet. They are coming to take one out of every five humans as their tribute. What do they do to these humans? Mostly they eat them.

This is the first novel in a long series known as The Lost Regiment. The action is strong and convincing. Patrick Lawford reads the novel with a good range of voices and accents. The story is written in third person omniscient, so we get into the heads of many of the characters. Each character has their own motivations that justifies their actions.

The only disappointment was the lack of alien-ness to the aliens and setting. Sure the aliens are tall fangy creatures that eat humans, but their culture is not much different than many primitive nomadic warrior tribes. They measure their virtue in bravery and prowess in battle. Maybe it’s not fair to expect an alien culture to be different, after all I haven’t encountered any real ones. Maybe primitive cultures of different planets would share many of the same traits, if they are universally advantageous to that species. The setting also lacks in alieness and is very much like Earth except that it has two moons.

Overall, this is a rousing tale with plenty of action. The battle scenes are exciting without glorifying war. The characters suffer real losses, and we feel their anguish. If you are Civil War buff or like Military SF this is a book not to be missed.

The audiobook is only available in library editions. This means the packaging is sturdier and more permanent. Unfortunately this makes the price expensive. A more affordable download version is available at audible.com. Better still, make a request to your local library to carry it (with dozens of other SFF titles, of course).

posted by The Time Traveler

Teaching Company Course – Science Fiction: The Literature of the Technological Imagination

Scott D.

SFFaudio News

Teaching Company - Science Fiction: The Literature of the Technological ImaginationTwo nice pieces of news from The Teaching Company, which publishes excellent college courses on audio and video.

First, their title Science Fiction: The Literature of the Technological Imagination can be purchased on cassette for only $15.95. Our earlier SFFaudio review of that course can be found here, and the direct link to purchase it is here.

Second, many of their courses are now available as MP3 download. Sweet!

posted by Scott

ANNOUNCING A New Horror Fiction PODCAST By The Escape Pod Team!

Jesse Willis

SFFaudio Online Audio

Podcast 411Rob Walsch, host of the uber-awesome Podcast411, had podcast pioneer Mur Laffery on the show again this week. While Rob and Mur gabbed about Mur’s Geek Fu Action Grip podcast and her new show the I Should Be Writing podcast, Mur let slip the juciest nugget of pure goodness Podcast 411 has ever received – in my opinion – Mur said, she and Steve Eley are working on a brand new companion magazine to SFFaudio’s favourite ever podcast Escape Pod! The new show will follow a very similar format to the Science Fiction Podcast Magazine, but will be soliciting Horror and presumably “dark fantasy” authors for their short stories instead of SF&F. The new show will be called “Psuedo Pod” or “Psuedopod.” The domain (http://pseudopod.org/) is still under construction at this time but we hope to have more details as launch approaches!

HERE‘s a direct link to the MP3 interview. Skip ahead to the 23:34 mark in the interview to hear the complete announcement.

UPDATE: Steve Eley informs me that PseudoPod will be edited by both Mur Lafferty and Ben Phillips (of the band Painful Reminder) and that the show will be a paying market ($20.00 for short stories) using volunteer narrators. As with Escape Pod it will be “donation-driven” and may start as a Bi-weekly podcast. The first instalment could air as early as July! More details forthcoming.

UPDATE 2: Woops in my excitement over PseudoPod I forgot to mention that Mur Lafferty also told Rob that she’s scored a special interview with Neil Gaiman! It will go live sometime soon on her I Should Be Writing podcast. Mur recorded it at the recent Balticon Science Fiction Convention where Gaiman was the Guest Of Honor. Cool!

posted by Jesse Willis

New Releases – Enderverse

Jesse Willis

New Releases

Children of the Mind by Orson Scott CardWe missed a great title in our recent New Releases post. Just in from Audio Renaissance is Orson Scott Card’s Children of the Mind, which completes the original 4-volume Ender series, all on unabridged audio! Preceding this book are Ender’s Game, Speaker for the Dead, and Xenocide. Audio Renaissance has page dedicated to the Enderverse on audio – click here to see it.

posted by Scott