L = Listening

Today's blog post is about listening, more specifically listening to audiobooks.

Audiobooks are simply books that have been converted into an auditory narration. They're often preferred by people who don't have time to sit still and would rather utilize those headphones to listen to a good book, rather than use their eyes.

I know there are people who exclusively listen to audiobooks, but I'm not a big audiobook listener. My attention span is a little too short to concentrate on the narration, my ears eventually reducing the voice to white noise. I've only successfully completed 4 audiobooks in my life: World War Z's unabridged audiobook, which was done entirely with voice actors and was a format I loved best. I've listened to Astrophysics for People in a Hurry, Midnight in Chernobyl: The Untold Story of the World's Greatest Nuclear Disaster, and I've listened to my favorite novel Call of the Wild. 

Audiobooks are a bit controversial among diehard readers. Some people maintain the argument that listening to audiobooks is not the same as reading. Audiobook fans maintain the argument that it absolutely qualifies. Oral tradition began long before the written word so I can kind of see why people are arguing. I myself am a flip-flopper on the debate: I simply can't decide whether listening to an audiobook is the same as looking at a hardcopy.

At the end of the day, I just hope everyone enjoys a good story, one way or another.

Do you listen to audiobooks? Do you believe it's the same as reading?