Week 11 Prompt

What does the change in medium mean for appeal factors?

The change to audio can affect most of the appeal factors, as they are influenced by the narrator. The following are some ways that came to mind:

Character - The way the narrator reads the character's lines will influence how the characters are perceived. Hearing the narrator read the character's lines may give the reader a different impression of the character than what they may have imagined in their own mind. For example, a character may go from funny to sarcastic.

Storyline - Although the storyline doesn't change, the impression of it may. The listener may feel the storyline is more character driven for example, if the narrator really does an impressive job of making the characters come to life.

Pace - The narrator can influence this depending on the pace they read the story at. Do they speak rapidly or have a drawl?

Tone - The narrator's delivery affects the tone. Example: funny vs. sarcastic

Writing style - It's the same story no matter who reads it but delivery may make it seem different. Examples: Funny vs. Sarcastic or Serious vs. Carefree

Besides affecting all of the above factors there is the whole consideration of audio characteristics as a new appeal factor in itself. Is the audio energetic or laid back? Loud or soft? Etc.

If you can't hold a book and feel the physical weight of it in your hands how does this affect your knowledge of the genre?

One gets a good indication of the typical density, detail, and length of genres by holding the physical books and flipping through them. This is lost with electronic or audio versions.

How about readers being able to change the font, line spacing, and color? How does that affect pacing and tone?

By changing these visual aspects of the text itself you can change the impression of the pacing and tone. While the words are still the same there could be an illusion of the book not being as dense or detailed. The pacing may not seem as slow. Tone would be affected by changing font color. The tone of a story may not seem as bleak if it's in pink font :)

How about Audiobooks and the track length, narrator choice, and music involved?

Track length affects pacing. Music has a huge influence on tone, mood, and pace. Is it tense music or relaxing? Fast or slow? Etc. The narrator affects so many appeal factors, in fact all of them really. (see above)

What appeals are unique to each medium?

ebooks - ebook factors are basically the same unless the patron changes the visual text (font, size, color, etc) as mentioned above.

audiobooks - Audiobooks have several unique appeals. The music is one and narrator style is another. Is the reader energetic or laid back? These sort of reader factors affect the impression of the other factors even though the words are the same. The reader is such an influence because there is so much choice about the way they read the story. Someone can say the same thing in many different ways and this gives the same words slightly different meanings.

The reader is definitely an appeal all to itself because I have listened to stories that I previously read and did not enjoy the story as much listening to it because I didn't care for the reader's voice. A Max Lucado book comes to mind. There were parts in the book that were very touching when I read it, but then listening I was not as touched because the reader had an annoying voice and it just sounded cheesy. Admittedly, I have not listened to many audiobooks though. I think books read by the authors would be the best because they know just how they meant their own words to sound.

I was wondering if there any books with sound effects?