So, what IS GraphicAudio?
A graphic audio book of The Way of Shadows (part 1 of 2) is coming out in April, with installments following it monthly.
But Brent, I thought you already have an audiobook.
Yeah, I do. But GraphicAudio does something different. GraphicAudio performs books with actors and sound effects and a sound track. The books ARE abridged: say if I wrote “It was raining,” instead of hearing someone narrate those words, you’d hear the sound of rain. In my mind, abridging or adapting is a creative work in itself. For example, remember that Leonardo DiCaprio movie “Romeo + Juliet“? A bit different than Shakespeare probably imagined the action–and yet totally cool in its own way. That’s how I feel about adaptations. GraphicAudio will bring its own vision to this book. And I, for one, am eager to see what they’ve come up with.
One geeky bonus: If you want to know how _I_ pronounce everything, this should be the authoritative source. As an author, I try to make my made up words look different on the page–among other considerations, of course–but I don’t care too much how you pronounce them. Take Vi. Pronounce it Vie, or pronounce it Vee. Your call. You might even think one is cool, and the other sucks. Naturally, I’d like you to choose the one you think is cool. To me, this is part of the co-creation of a world that happens between a reader and an author. I’m just an architect, folks. You get to pick out the drapes yourself.
A graphic audiobook has different demands, so I was delighted when the director called me up and went through a list of names and places and recorded how to say every single one of them. We had a great chat. He even asked my opinion on some of his creative ideas for music, accents, and the whole nine yards. This doesn’t always happen–once he buys the rights from my corporate overlords, he can do WHATEVER he wants with those rights. That’s how it works. So I appreciate the level of craftsmanship and passion he showed. It makes me eager to see the result. If you want to get a taste of what it’s like, they’ve posted THIS SAMPLE which is the first nine minutes/the first chapter of the book. Go ahead, you can go listen.
