The latest LibriVox community podcast has the story of how Greener Than You Think became a public domain audiobook. Have a listen |MP3| (the account begins about 7 minutes in).
To subscribe to the LibriVox community podcast plug this url into your podcatcher:
http://feeds.feedburner.com/LibrivoxCommunityPodcast
Posted by Jesse Willis
Springtime! And thus the bi-weekly ritual (or so) of trimming the grass. Personally, I think it an old-fashioned, uninteresting, and ultimately pointless ritual. But, if you’ve a lawn, or in my case, if your mother does, you’ve got a job to do. It’s a noisy job too, but, with a pair of hard-shelled earmuffs, some earbuds, and an audiobook it needn’t be an altogether unpleasant task. Thankfully, LibriVox narrator Lee Elliot has something very appropriate to pipe through those earbuds. A novel about unstoppable grass (like I said, very appropriate):
“A triple-genre combo of science fiction, horror, and satire, Greener Than You Think is a forgotten classic that resonates beautifully with modern times. This is a faithful reading of a 1947 first edition text.”
I’ll be listening while mowing today.
Greener Than You Think
By Ward Moore; Read by Lee Elliot
45 Zipped MP3 Files or podcast – Approx. 14 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: May 22, 2008
Do remember reading a panic-mongering news story a while back about genetically engineered “Frankengrass” “escaping” from the golf course where it had been planted? That news story was foreshadowed decades previously in the form of prophetic fiction wherein a pushy salesman, a cash-strapped scientist, and a clump of crabgrass accidentally merge forces with apocalyptic consequences.
Podcast feed:
http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/greener-than-you-think-by-ward-moore.xml
Posted by Jesse Willis
The Beasts of Tarzan is the third of Burrough’s Tarzan novels. Don’t start with this book, go back to the original (also done up by LibriVox). First published in serial for in All-Story Cavalier Magazine in 1914, it was bound into hardback paperbook in 1916. LibriVox is also working on the 2nd novel in the Tarzan series, but it’s not yet cataloged.
The Beasts Of Tarzan
By Edgar Rice Burroughs; Read by James Christopher
21 Zipped MP3 files or podcast- 5 Hours 20 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: May 21st 2008
This is the third of Burrough’s Tarzan novels. Originally serialized in All-Story Cavalier magazine in 1914, the novel was first published in book form by A. C. McClurg in 1916. In the previous novel Tarzan reclaimed his name and title as John Clayton, Lord Greystoke. In this novel he finds that proper society is just as vicious as the jungle when greedy men threaten him and his new family. Jane and her infant son Jack are kidnapped by Tarzan’s enemies, Nikolas Rokoff and Alexis Paulvitch, who then trap Tarzan himself and attempt to exile him forever on a primitive island, bereft of all those dear to him. There, however, Tarzan gains new allies in the panther Sheeta and the ape Akut, together with Akut’s band. With their aid he tracks down his wife and son. . .and his arch enemies Rokoff and Paulvitch.
Podcast feed:
http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/the-beasts-of-tarzan.xml
Posted by Jesse Willis
Ace Books published Storm Over Warlock as F-109 and F-329 in paperback form in the 1960s. Nearly a half century later the first audiobook version was published – today! Narrator R.J. Davis also has another Norton set for release very soon too.
Storm Over Warlock
By Andre Norton; Read by R.J. Davis
19 Zipped MP3s or Podcast – 7 Hours 18 Minutes [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: May 15th 2008
The Throg task force struck the Terran survey camp a few minutes after dawn, without warning, and with a deadly precision which argued that the aliens had fully reconnoitered and prepared that attack. Eye-searing lances of energy lashed back and forth across the base with methodical accuracy. And a single cowering witness, flattened on a ledge in the heights above, knew that when the last of those yellow-red bolts fell, nothing human would be left alive down there.
Get this free audiobook via podcast:
http://librivox.org/bookfeeds/storm-over-warlock-by-andre-norton.xml
Posted by Jesse Willis
I really like the attitude of the people over on LibriVox.org. In one thread on the LibriVox forums a first time poster makes note that ‘LibriVox titles are being sold on eBay for $’. Like that guy I too was quite shocked and a little dismayed when I found that out. Here’s me thinking:
These audiobooks are available for free and yet some people are actually SELLING them!?!?! How dare they!
But as Puffin1, a long time LibriVoxateer so sensibly points out…
“It’s okay. We [LibriVox] don’t mind. Everything we do is in the public domain. Thanks for your concern. Welcome to LibriVox. Have fun!”
How cool is that?
It really sums up the LibriVox attitude too. Another LibriVoxer, David Barnes (AKA earthcalling), pointed out that… ‘the seller credits LibriVox … and is providing a service that LibriVox doesn’t provide – namely audiobooks on CD.’
Their whole attitude is positive and relaxed, their idea is “the more recordings are ‘out there’, the better!” As it turns out, it’s actually a very good thing that a lot of the sellers on eBay are selling these audiobooks. eBayers looking for audiobooks can discover LibriVox that way.
One such person is a Texan named R. J. Davis (aka Rick).
Rick described himself as “mostly retired” and a “two year cancer survivor.” I’d describe him as one cool mostly retired cancer survivor who narrates audiobooks. Rick found LibriVox through one of these eBay retailers, and has, since joining in December 2007 (!), started narrating public domain Science Fiction for LibriVox! He’s already read individual short stories like:
“Time and Time Again” by H. Beam Piper
“Warning from the Stars” by Ron Cocking
“Stairway To The Stars” by Larry Shaw
And he’s solo-completed entire novels like:
Key Out of Time by Andre Norton
The Time Traders by Andre Norton
And Rick’s got two more Norton novels forthcoming…
Storm Over Warlock by Andre Norton
The Defiant Agents by Andre Norton
Rick is what I’d call a real audiobook fan. LibriVox makes being cool look easy, and that’s pretty amazing because narrating an audiobook is bloody hard work.
Posted by Jesse Willis
Complete, unabridged, and with a single narrator! What more could you ask? Perhaps only being able to get it for free. Friends, all your wishes are granted for here it is. The latest LibriVox audiobook to catch my eye is a classic H.G. Wells novel…
The Food of the Gods and How it Came to Earth
By H.G. Wells; Read by Alex C. Telander
12 Zipped MP3s or Podcast – Approx. 6 Hours [UNABRIDGED]
Publisher: LibriVox.org
Published: April 2008
Two stuffy English scientists, always looking to further their scientific knowledge, create a substance called Herakleophorbia, which in its fourth incarnation – known as Herakleophorbia IV – has the special ability of making things increase greatly in size. As the scientists begin experimentation on some chicks, the substance is misused by some “country folk” who don’t take it seriously and soon Herakleophorbia IV is running rampant throughout England and then across the globe, creating giant plants and animals that wreak havoc on the land and then the people. Then the first giant babies are revealed and for the first time humanity has to contend with the existence of a new race of giant people. How humanity deals with this shocking new creation is revealed in The Food of the Gods and How it Came to Earth.
Subscribe to the podcast via the feed:
RSS FEED FOR The Food Of The Gods And How It Came To Earth
Posted by Jesse Willis