Hello Rebels, welcome back to The Rebel Author Podcast episode 23. Today’s podcast is with Jules Horne all about how to write for audio.
This week’s question is:
What is the best book you’ve read this year?
Book recommendation this week is our lovely guest Jules Horne’s Writing for Audiobooks: Audio-First for Flow and Impact
Kobo https://www.kobo.com/ebook/writing-for-audiobooks-audio-first-for-flow-and-impact-author-advice-from-radio-writing-method-writing-book-3
Amazon UK: https://amzn.to/2wMgtCf
Amazon USA: https://amzn.to/2JtfauF
If you’d like to help with the launch and be on the street team or read a review copy, you can. I have a short form which can be found here: https://bit.ly/AoPTeam
I was on the Alliance of Independent Author’s Inspiration indie authors podcast on Sunday. Listen here: https://selfpublishingadvice.org/sacha-black/
Listener Rebel of the Week is: Kathleen March
If you’d like to be a Rebel of the week please do send in your story, it can be any kind of rebellion. You can email your rebel story to rebelauthorpodcast@gmail.com or tweet me @rebelauthorpod
One new Patron today, welcome Julia Fortune. Thank you so much for joining me and thank you to all my patrons, who help to ensure that this podcast continues.
If you’d like to support the show, and get access to all the bonus essays, posts and content, you can from as little as $2 a month by visiting: www.patreon.com/sachablack
How to Write for Audio with Jules Horne
Sacha Black
Hello and welcome back to The Rebel Author Podcast. Today I am joined by Jules horn. Jules is an award winning fiction writer, playwright who performs spoken word as rebel cello. Love that. She is a passionate indie author and teaches on the Open University Creative Writing MA, welcome Jules.
Jules Horne
Hello, Sacha. really lovely to be on your show.
Sacha Black
And before we start, I am just going to make an apology. It appears my very inconsiderate neighbors have decided to stop building something today. So there are… I’m just peering out of the window, which is why the sounds go by. And there’s some sort of drilling cutting metal kind of device. So yeah, if you hear that, I apologize.
Jules Horne
It’s a bit inconsiderate, isn’t it? I mean,
Sacha Black
God some people work at home guys. Anyway, right. Let’s let me focus. Okay. Tell everyone Little bit more about you your writing journey and how you got to where you are now.
Jules Horne
Thanks, Sacha. Yes, I just wanted to it this is quite a long journey because I’m a bit elderly. So I just wanted to sort of really in a nutshell, but I think what’s always important is write your journeys as you find somebody who inspires you right at the start. And I think that happened for me in primary school. So there was this primary teacher, John stables, and he just, he just fed us with these amazing stories. I mean, we were at we were hearing about Lord of the Flies and all sorts of fantastical stories really early on. So I think that really got me my attention. And he got us creative writing as well, which I think in Scotland’s quite big thing, you know, you do examinations and creative writing, and it’s really part of your education from right young, and I think that sort of is fed into, and there’s a really fast forward, so I kept doing bits and pieces but never thought, you know, it’s that thing that you think oh, being a writer, it’s like way out of reach sort of thing.
But I did that an a writer in residence came into my life and I think that happens quite a lot of people as well again, and especially where somebody locally is maybe got a job in a library or something in this case, it was Tom Bryan was a Canadian Scots author and he came in and kind of said, you know, you know, just a helping hand. And that got me started writing short stories again after a very long period of kind of not being not being involved in writing. And then finally, what the final thing was, was the travers came to town, some traverse theater from Edinburgh, they came to our rural area, and said, because you’re quite isolated in a rural area, and so wondering, you know, how best to connect with writers and do it. And they came in, and they kind of really stirred my sense of heightened storytelling, dramatic storytelling, and I’m quite interested in the supernatural and fantastical things come from the borders, which is quite I think, I like to say it’s where the Game of Thrones was inspired by so it’s kind of kind of got that sensibility of lots of ruinous landscapes and things where you can project all sorts of stories on tour from from the history. So I think and then I started talking Mixing short story writing, which has always done with more of a sense of drama. And I started writing please go ahead a couple of BBC radio plays on, wrote some scripts for the stage for French shows and that kind of thing. So I’ve kind of gone via short story writing into dramatic writing, including radio. So that’s where I’ve kind of come full circle, and then kind of back to spoken word and ways to make writing kind of live in front of an audience. So yeah, so that’s, that’s it in a nutshell.
Sacha Black
The thing that I love most about what you just said, is that we all have that person from our past, who really is the inspiration and I don’t think I’ve ever thought about it like that. But you are absolutely right, because I’m now immediately thinking of, I had an English teacher. I’m just trying to, was it? I must have been in high school, so I must have been. Yeah, no, it was high school. I was just trying to all the schools merge into one and I had a three tiered system unlike most people in the UK who only have like private School in secondary school sorry for all of the non UK people listening who will not understand our education system. But yeah, so this is in high school. So I was it’s Yeah, well anyway 13 until you leave for university. And I, I English was always my best subject at school. But he really fostered this love of story and analyzing story and learning how to write better and you know, so yeah, I just have a blast from the past that I’m so happy with memories now.
Jules Horne
Yeah, I think it’s really important to have that person that kind of sparks up for you remember going to a workshop once and it was Janice Galloway, the novelist, Scottish novelist and she said a librarian had kind of taken her into a corner and said, Look, Janice, this is for you. And that came out was that somebody actually recognized that later thing in that she was part of that world and kind of really fostered that and it’s just so important, because I think in my case, like say English teachers But that the young, the primary teacher was great. But when we did things like Shakespeare at school, and the Shakespearean Macbeth is amazing, it’s like really amazing supernatural horror story. But they kind of ruined it the way they really do at school and you need you need someone with the kind of imaginative leap that kind of helps you see the excitement of it, I think is really, really important.
Sacha Black
Yeah, and I will confess, I honestly, I’m a bit of a rebel, but so I never read any of the school textbooks that I was told to read. Ever. I don’t know how I managed to come out with like the A grades that I got. But obviously, like in class, you do the analysis and stuff and that was enough, but they just ruined them. They ruined my joy of, you know, doing that kind of stuff in school, but what he did do was foster my love of a)reading. Anyway, aside from that, because obviously they would encourage you to read all kinds of books but also the story and I actually I’ve just sort of I still have the very first story that I wrote of any significance in the world. Yeah, I just remembered like, Oh, I like going down memory lane. I’m so sorry guys, this is completely irrelevant to our, our podcast but yeah,
Jules Horne
that’s lovely it ties it ties into what your reason your why you’re talking about why and stop tapping into that thing it’s really important because sometimes you can get disparities when you’re going along with the rating the rating journey and just really tuning into that thing that got you going that catalyst I think is really important. So having that first story is just amazing.
Sacha Black
Yeah, I know I and I, yeah, I completely forgot until this point that I still had that story and but I’m almost certain I know, where it is in the loft. Anyway, right. We’re here to talk about audiobooks and writing for audio specifically. So you’ve written a book called writing for audio books, audio first, for flow and impact, which i well i say i read it. I listened. Is that what you do? It’s still a bit bit of a, you know, is it really a good question? But I listened to the audiobook in 2019. And I loved it. I have been trying to consume as much as humanly possible on this, you know, audio creation front. And but for those that haven’t read it, could you tell everyone about the concept behind the book? And? Yeah,
Jules Horne
yeah, well, it’s a massively exciting time for audiobooks, you know, because because it’s really taking off. And when I think that thing that you’re saying about not sure whether it’s reading or listening and where it sits, I think people are, it was really gobsmacking to me to hear from friends who were saying, I’ve read this book, and they actually had listened to it. And I think that’s really changing at the moment as it takes off. And so the book is really about exploring what’s the difference between writing for the ear and writing for print and ebooks, and I have a radio background so did some reacted radio news. I’ve been reading plays and thinking dramatically and how he writes scripts. Realizing that there’s actually quite a difference between how you how you write for the ear and how you write. So more generally for for the eye and for print. And so I wanted to just capture all those things that I learned, you know, from doing radio and from being you know, you work with them, you know, producers script editor, when you do you’re frustrated your script and they kind of take up and go do you know, any changes as you change this, and it’s really developing your understanding of what’s different. And I came back I thought, God, this is gold stuff that, you know, it was quite hard one to learn that because you have to go through that painful, you know, get heavily edited by a producer and go, Oh, I need to change everything. And so I wanted to capture all those things. I think they’re not out there enough. And, and for any authors who want to kind of make that transition and make make their fiction books for ready for audio narration, which obviously is a really costly process, you want to really make the best of it. So, so I just put all the things in the book. And yeah, it’s to help authors. Think about what the concepts are different and Get their book ready, if they’re planning to make that investment in an audio recording, you have the annual just checklist of Have you thought about this? Have you thought about this? And yeah, and it’s, that’s, that’s really the concept behind the book.
Sacha Black
So, obviously, you’ve said that audio is increasing in popularity, but why would an author write for audio first?
Jules Horne
Yeah, I think I mean, I think there’s a sort of material reason which that it’s really taking off. And, you know, they’re saying audiobook sales. I mean, if you if one of the things about writing writing a book is it’s your IP, and so you want to make the best of it on different platforms. So having haven’t done the work, I’ve written the book, this is another platform. And so I think just materially speaking, it’s a good time to consider that and, and also to just, I mean, I think the the skills that you learn through writing for the ear actually really kick ass editing skills. So it can help kind of it can help clarify your writing and make it more make it bolder, because you have to be bolder, you have to be clearer and crisper when it’s just audio and not visual. So yeah, so I think it just helps your editing skills generally. So there’s the material reason and then there’s the the clarity and understanding and enjoyment. The other thing is obviously, it’s really fun. Forget that aspect is really fun to write for the year and to have an audiobook performed, and to hear it kind of come across in that live way narrated. It’s just a really fun medium.
Sacha Black
So obviously, I think audio listeners will be able to maybe subconsciously, maybe consciously, I don’t know, but they will be able to tell the difference between something that’s been written for sight versus something that’s been written for the ear because obviously, as per the title of your book, and you know, flow and impact. Do you think if somebody is writing for audio first that sight, readers would feel the difference? Do you think they would feel like it’s been written for or audio or do you think it is? It is that you know, sight readers are much more forgiving?
Jules Horne
I think it can. Yeah, I think it’s really interesting question because I think some writers for some, for some writers who write fiction for example, you they are the kind of writer who’s so tuned into audio types of writing types of storytelling anyway that you maybe wouldn’t notice a difference. But you can certainly tell when someone hasn’t thought about the about your storytelling and its musicality, for example. I mean, there’s people like I would say, like Philip Pullman and Neil Gaiman and they, they write in a way which has various got a certain kind of musicality, and a lot of writers who are natural born storytellers, they’re almost from from that campfire storytelling tradition where you, you’re really aware of audience and of the sort of musicality of performance. They do that naturally anyway. And I was really interested to hear it was Pullman on some, you know, documentary on the BBC or something he was talking about the kind of musical shape of his writing that he kind of could anticipate what the shape of it that was coming up, even though we didn’t know quite what was going into that sentence, you could sort of feel where it was heading. I thought, well, that’s, you know, he’s got that kind of innate thing when he edits. So some people do that anyway. I think with other writers yet, you could tell and you could see, you could really improve your script for narration that your book for narration, and I think that’s a key slip, because actually, it’s, it is a script, I think that’s the key thing, it becomes a script, which is for performance. And you can tell if people haven’t thought of that, because because of the writing can be yeah, more forgiving, as you were saying it can be more forgiving in, in writing for sight, because it can have really long baggy sentences. It can have loads of which clauses and nested clauses and asides and backflips. And if you if the reader loses their way, they can always kind of nip back and have a quick Oh, yeah, that’s that correct. sort of see where we are. And whereas audio, you don’t have that kind of ease of just checking back and forward, flipping back to linear in unfolds in that way. So you can sense that someone has written with that in mind with that kind of performance, performative aspect of mind. Yeah.
Sacha Black
Okay, so what? What are the key differences then between writing for sight and writing for the ear?.
Jules Horne
I think that that performance idea is one of the key ones. So, you know, most writers are aware of origins. But I think that people who write for the era where of audience in a very particular way, because without the audience there, and that awareness, it’s not, it’s not a performance. So you really, really have to imagine that that person that you’re speaking to, and write for them and to them, so I think that’s the key thing that’s sort of that conceptual thing like it’s, it’s a performance to an audience.
And the second thing is it’s it’s physical. It’s actually, you know, it’s actually physics, you’re hearing a voice in your ear, it’s kind of it’s kind of embodied in that, in that very physical way. And all these things that are true for music are also true for writing for the ear. So it’s things about rhythm, flow, repetition, and, you know, the kind of melody of a voice and kind of, in the way, it has different intensities and that kind of thing, a different kind of pattern making. So anything that’s true of music is also true of writing for the ear. So that’s, I think that’s a key difference. And, and also, I just think, voice is really important and the whole sort of distinctiveness of who you are and how you’re, how you relate and how you how you shape your worldview by it comes across so much more clearly when it’s anchored to a voice. So I think for authors, this is such a great thing because not only are you able to write, you know, for sight but you can also get that whole, that whole distinctiveness that comes through your manner of speaking and One your personality and your color that comes in your choice of words that kind of magic dust that makes each voice distinctive, I think. Yeah, I think that’s one of the real joys of, And one of the real differences is the fact that you can physically hear that that human person coming across
Sacha Black
I think voice is a very, very interesting topic. And I’m just gonna tangent off just a little bit on this because I find voice fascinating. I listened to both audiobooks and podcasts. And originally, I didn’t know you could listen on high speeds. So I consumed them for probably about a year at normal speed before I then realized you could increase them. And I was very, very, very particular about who I would and wouldn’t listen to you because some people’s voices are really annoying. And you know, you just you can’t listen. To them, and obviously that is going to be a huge consideration for anybody who’s picking a narrator and not and choosing not to narrate themselves but and what I find interesting now is voice has less of an impact for me. And I don’t mean to the author’s voice or the characters voices, I just mean the narrating voice and this is why I say it’s a tangent. But because I listen on high speed so actually the voice usually sounds if not like a chipmunk, then it is distorted at any rate. And and I just wonder how, how important narrating voice is going to be for the future. When I know that our you know, our attention pan at attention pans, yes, our patterns, our attention spans are shortening, and we’re trying to consume more faster. So I it’s just a tangent, really, but
Jules Horne
I think it’s a really interesting one because this is developing so fast as they’re kind of they’re kind of, you know, digital ways. And, you know, Kindle is Got your voice speaking we were saying to bring your book across so and also this thing about speeds which a lot of, I’ve heard actors really railing about this the fact that you can do it. But I know I do it too. Yes, listening faster and I suppose it depends on the genre and what you’re, you know why you’re listening what you’re listening for. And also you tune in don’t you you get used to different speeds. It’s amazing how you don’t really hear a chipmunk. So voice you’re actually just focusing really hard. And you you get you hear you hear it just as well as amazing how quickly you get sort of into that which is a bit frightening, really.
But I also think there’s a thing about, you know, in the spoken word realm, one of the things is the whole the whole distinctiveness of character and voice and and you’d be listening for different reasons in that so. So there I would say for example, if you’re a Scots language speaker and you don’t have many chances to get people don’t like reading so much in the Scots language because it’s it’s quite Difficult it’s like the Spelling’s all different, and all that kind of thing. But with spoken word you can go directly to, to the voice as as, as it’s used in everyday life. And so I think for that kind of which is a different genre than maybe information type books or nonfiction type books, it that’s a real opportunity as well. So two divergent things may be the the people who want to read really fast and it’s about information and, you know, really, you know, devouring a book really quickly, for example, and I’m not sure and then there may be things like spoken word, it’s a slightly different market and a different reasons. So yeah,
Sacha Black
yeah. I agree. Because interestingly, I can’t listen to fiction audiobooks. I yeah, so I only consume nonfiction in audio and podcasts, which are equally information giving audio and but it’s funny he was saying how you get used to it. I actually I now think some of the podcasters that I listened to sound bizarre with a normal voice because I’m so used to hearing them at double speed, but it is it you you very much get used to it and, and it didn’t take me very long to be able to go from one speed to speed to even a fraction faster sometimes. Yeah, just, you know, children you have to conceive when you can, can’t you? Okay, so how can writers create better flow for audio?
Jules Horne
Well, I think I think the key thing is read it aloud. And it sounds really obvious. But I think quite often when people are preparing their book for audio, they’ll read they’ll read aloud in a way that’s kind of to themselves. So they’ll kind of mumble it to themselves. And that’s not the same as reading aloud, which is projecting and really trying out how it feels and really sort of projecting into the room. So I’d say reading aloud reveals one thing that’s quite fundamental, which is sentences are usually too long. So that’s really one thing. It’s just a human limitation of your breathing. You know, it’s like so sentences are too long so that I think that’s the first thing, too. Yeah, that’s that’s a subject just create better flow by breaking up your sentences more. Some words are a bit of an indicator like things like which clauses, which are relative clauses. So it’s kind of an aside explaining something, then, you know, the man went down the street, which was at the far end of the da de da, and you can, these are kind of like net bags, net shopping bags, where you can put loads of stuff in and then get back to the verb you know.
So which clauses are a bit of a culprit and quite often, if you look out for words, there, which clauses started by which clauses you can kind of chop them up a bit, that helps flow. And another thing is to look out for spans and arcs of attention. So you can use things like that there’s these words in grammar called connectives. And that covers things like first and firstly and secondly, so firstly, big baggy net bag where you can put loads of stuff in. And then secondly, big baggy net bag. And those can be expanded infinitely, but they also create spans of attention. So looking out for connectives, and that’s even things like but then and, and so on, they really help you create a sense of flow. It’s almost like the structural glue, have, you know, of paragraphs and so on. And I was thinking, yeah, and things like touches and something are called touches, which is something weird thing about radio is that if something’s not mentioned, it’s literally invisible. So if you’ve got a radio drama scene, and you’ve got, say, three characters in there, and two are speaking away, and the third character is kind of on the edge of the room reading or something like that. Because they’re not mentioned, they’re not speaking, they’re not vocalizing any in any way. They’re, they’re literally invisible. So the actors have to have to kind of vocalize Greg, and, you know, just remained, you have that presence. And that’s our kind of catch that, you know, just it’s like a firefly that kind of refreshes the memory of that person, or thing being there. And it’s the same with audio writing and fiction. If, for example, you’ve got, I don’t know, there’s say you’re in in some kind of wardrobe or whatever, and there’s a dog, and you’re hiding from somebody, and you’ve forgotten to mention regularly that the dog is there. And then we really can’t see it in audio. So you have to keep popping up these these touches that keep the picture alive. Because the whole thing is about creating pictures in the in the readers mind, and it’s keeping the aspects of the picture alive that are important for the story. So I think touches is a thing that’s, that’s really important. And maybe you need a bit more of that in audio writing than you do in, in the in fiction generally.
Sacha Black
Yeah, and I think I can compare that to so I do developmental editing and one thing I often see writers do is they’ll bring a character in, and sometimes they’ll describe them, sometimes they won’t. But if they have described them, that’s it, you get one description, and then nothing for the whole rest of the time. And actually, and so I’m writing a book called The Anatomy of Prose. And one of the tips in there that I was talking about a couple of days ago was to do these touches, just little things, little reminders, even if it’s body language, or you know, or how, you know, you don’t have to continually describe everything, but just little touches to keep the image of that character what they look like what you know, they’re there, how they interact with the world alive in the readers mind. And so I love that that is one of the things you need to do in audio as well that makes a lot of sense to me.
Jules Horne
Yeah, absolutely. It doesn’t need to be like you say the dog and then you see the dog again Yeah, in an oblique way by referring to its you know, wet smelly pelts or, and these sometimes with characters they have totemic things that are attached to them. Yeah, you know, Sherlock’s pipe or something. So ya know, it’s a kind of Totem for that character, etc. ways to make the visual live in a way that’s quite theatrical as well because when you’re thinking about what’s what you’re trying to think what can read well on stage, what can read really clearly on stage? And so, you know, Shylock on his pipe clearly. And so, you know, already know, Beckett’s tree or something, you know, these kinds of things, are they, it’s a bit like that in fiction, I think and translating it into audio to keep those two totemic visual things alive. It really helps the reader to have their picture. Yeah, kept going with these little Firefly moments. Absolutely. Yeah.
Sacha Black
And so any other sentence level tips and tricks you can give listeners to improve their prose for the ear?
Jules Horne
Yeah, I’ve got a tip sheet tip sheet on that. And I think the which they mentioned is an important one. I think breaking things up which and that clauses, there are two concepts which are really helpful that can come from drama, and I think one is called one is landing and that’s where the sentence lands. So if you’re reading aloud, it’s useful to think sometimes I see, you know, like a watch of prose, which is very dense. And somewhere in the middle of that is a knife, which is the word or the murder weapon. And it’s kind of so buried within that text that’s kind of really dense all around it, that you don’t notice the knife. So it was it was, I mean, it’s like somebody sort of going up the stairs, and then there’s a knife and a little anything. And it was just a night was that was that because it’s important. And if you don’t land, clearly on that word that needs to be salient for the story, it just kind of goes under. So I think the idea of where something lands is really important so the beginnings and ends of sentences in audio writing a really, really important bit like you know, you know, they can in poetry, you have a line and often what happens at the end of the line is got more prominence because of where it is. So kind of looking out for that. Sometimes it’s putting it’s just putting something at the end of a sentence or at the beginning or But in some way or at the end of paragraph, but in some way, using space a bit more to allow the salient things to really pop out. Okay, so that landing things a good one.
Yeah, and the other one is attunement, which I think it’s like it’s used in meditation. So, or in meeting sometimes in meetings, people have this moment of attunement where you’re kind of settle and focus. Well, there’s a kind of equivalent thing in audio writing, which is and then read your writing, which is the recognition that you don’t really get straight into the sentence at the beginning. And you need a little bit of time. So when you hear radio news, for example, here, and in other news to go on, ‘and in other news’ is totally unimportant. That’s a phrase, but it kind of gets your attention. And then the next bit is a panda has escaped from, you know, it’s like it’s, it’s that kind of thing. And if you think about it, once upon a time, is a bit like have that attunement freeze. It’s kind of once a All the time. And then it’s there was a, you know, young girl in red, hooded coats going into the forest. That’s a terrible thing that was never, you know, I mean, it’s like later. Yeah, yeah, exactly that little time of attunement and transition, which then puts the focus on the next bit. So there was another and this happened, and it’s just getting a sense of giving that little bit of time. So landing attunement, I think are two useful sentence, sentence level editing tips.
Sacha Black
Amazing. And they came in a way they sort of contradict themselves in a way so it’s obviously it must be about getting a balance because if you’re, if you’re if the important thing is what’s at the beginning and the end, but then also you need attunement time. That is definitely a balance that you need to strike what there’s, there’s there’s a psychological concept called primacy and recency effect, which I think is is what’s behind that. And you know, where you put the word knife, which is the important thing for foreshadowing. And yeah, I that’s my key here. I didn’t mind my degrees is in psychology. So that’s the only reason I know that. But yeah, fascinating. I’m really looking out a bit here.
Jules Horne
That’s a brilliant one and there’ll be another one, but she’ll love as well, which is this Zeigarnik effect. The idea that it if something starts and it’s got closure, and that kind of, you know, even like in hooks and whatnot, you plan to hook and then people are waiting to see where that leads, and in scriptwriting everything called plant and pay off. So at story level, there’s the plant something like, it’s like the check, I don’t know, that gun check off gun on the wall or something. It’s got to go off, it’s a plant and pay off. And then so I’ve heard of this. And it’s really fascinating. Let’s say garlic effect is like the human need for closure. So if something is started off, it needs to kind of have its answer at some point. And you can use that idea to create these sort of spans. And when you do your Firstly, secondly, whatever. That’s actually the Zeigarnik effect. I think that’s harnessing the Zeigarnik effect, because it’s kind of going we’ve got Wait for this next thing. And when I did, I did radio, radio interviews sometimes with politicians of local radio, and they were really been quite well trained in this kind of thing where they would go. Okay, there are three answers to your question, firstly, and then you go, Oh, no, I’ve got you because it created a spike.
Sacha Black
Yeah. And you couldn’t interrupt.
Jules Horne
Yeah. Yeah. So but it’s interesting from a sort of positive perspective of how do you sustain attention and and so I think, yeah, that primacy and recency effect and I think that that all ties in some posts, actually interesting.
Sacha Black
And is it that Zeigarnik you said? Yeah, yeah, that effect also, I think is and you see that in books that are really Pacey. So they’ll leave something unanswered at the end of a chapter so that the brain has no choice but to continue reading. I love love what a book does that I hate it but I love it. Yeah, yeah, you bastard I’ll just have to keep reading until 3am. Okay, what mistakes Do you see writers making? When trying to write for audio?
Jules Horne
I suppose I suppose the first thing is sort of being aware that that it may be different and and kind of approaching it differently. So I guess the first thing is really preparing your script because I, you know, audio is so expensive to produce the going into a situation where you’re getting your audiobook recorded, and not having done that prep. I think that’s a mistake, because it’s just a really costly thing. And knowing that sound editing is really quite involved and isn’t the same as like Quicken up a word, which you would do if you were if you had a written text. So I think the thing is to really edit your script, practice it and tighten it up for audio and use markup just underline where you would, where you would emphasize things. And I think I think that’s a mistake, not actually acknowledging that it’s different and going into that situation without having done some prep. That I think that’s the main thing. Oh, and also also in the rating, the actual physical duration of your own book, I’d say people have maybe an idea of how to perform or project which is a bit different. I mean, you like being, I think you’ve got to think of it not as an audience. That’s your huge, you know, loads of people out there but more specific friend and actually, that’s a really nice thing. But, you know, radio writing because it’s, if you’re an introvert, particularly it’s got that intimacy. So what I do is, I post a picture of, in my case, it’s Robert Louis Stevenson. He’s on my he’s on my wall, but it’s somebody who’s, who I really love and want to speak to about what, what excites me in the in the book and I use that as a kind of projection. So I think that’s a really good thing not to think of it as a kind of declamatory way of reading but actually more an intimate one to one and you can really help that by pinning somebody pinning somebody on your wall.
Sacha Black
I think that’s a great tip. I’d never thought of that.
Jules Horne
It really helps. It’s funny. It’s like you’re speaking to them and it makes you point it out a little bit more. Yeah, yeah. And you’ve gotten some joy in who you’re speaking to as well, which is nice.
Sacha Black
All fear if you, you know, put your old boss up there or something. Yeah. But I’m evil. So you know, I that’s the first thing I thought. Okay, so you actually narrated your audiobook as well, didn’t you?
Jules Horne
Yes. Gosh, that was a learning curve. Yeah.
Sacha Black
Well, okay, well, maybe I should also make mistakes. You know, what, what tips would you give for authors wanting to narrate their audiobooks?
Jules Horne
Yeah, well, I made a lot of mistakes. So the first tip is, don’t underestimate what it involves. Because it was I thought, Oh, yeah, how hard can it be? Okay, you’re just speaking and reading aloud. And actually, yeah, it was it was quite, quite involved, needs a hell of a lot of stamina. And so the tips would be to really practice and prepare your script and to mark it up, but I think there’s the first step, and there’s some sort of things that I’ve discovered. Yeah. God, really be hydrated. And what I realized was that you, your body doesn’t. It takes a while to process liquids and that kind of thing. So what voice artists do apparently because I was reading up on all this once I discovered how tricky it was, was drink loads the evening before. So, so that you’re really, you know, your voice is not going to get hoarse. And yeah, you can’t just sort of swing on the tape and expect it all to be really, really good. It’s better to kind of be, you know, have sustained hydration so that was a useful thing. And also discovered coconut oil on your lips is really good because, yeah, yeah, some things like that people swear by a slice of apple or to know, yeah, coconut oil was the thing for me. That was really good. So
Sacha Black
That is fascinating. I am always keep lip balm in here and I always lip balm on before I go. on the podcast, that’s usually the last thing I do. But I’d never conscious I don’t do it consciously. I just obviously it must be my subconscious brain going. Your lips are chappy today love, you know.
Jules Horne
But I think I think what’s different about Coconut oil is what I realized is you can actually kind of, you can use it as a kind of mouthwash. So it sounds quite gross. I know. But it’s like, yeah, it sort of works. Whereas lip balm, you’d have to kind of crunch it up. But yeah, the general idea is assume Yep.
Sacha Black
A coconut oil has a plethora of different uses, though. I know you can use it as like a hair mask and all sorts. Anyway,
Jules Horne
lots of calories though that’s a drawback. Yeah,
Sacha Black
yeah. And so I write both nonfiction and fiction, but specifically for my nonfiction. I have a lot of graphs or tables or images. So obviously those aren’t going to translate into audio. What What would you do in a situation like that for for authors, have extra things in their books.
Jules Horne
Yeah, because then numbers and URLs and that kind of thing are really don’t come across that well, in ear so people have different techniques for that. But if you’ve got loads of things like that, and things that might might go out of date, for example, what’s great about audible is that you can put them in a PDF, and that’s attached to your books, it’s kind of like a downloadable, that’s just related to your book. And people can get that. So you can use that to capture anything like graphs, or hyperlinks or stats, or anything that’s maybe not completely evergreen and needs to be updated every now and then. So yeah, that’s what I would do with with any of those things. And you can also radio tends to say don’t use long numbers, but round them up and down. And, you know, similar with stats use comparisons rather than loads of long strings of numbers because the the mind can’t take in too many numbers. You know what it’s like when you’ve got phone numbers and you’re trying to remember them. It’s a bit similar with audio, so anything that you can capture outside that and then that lesson loaded on you having to put that into the audiobook itself. PDFs are key thing. Yeah,
Sacha Black
I definitely don’t do numbers. I yeah, I caught the other day I recorded a, like quarterly goals post and I had like 19 goals or something I could not even count. I couldn’t keep the numbers in my head while I was talking. But anyway, I was mortified. And this is The Rebel Author Podcast. So tell us about a time you unleash your inner rebel.
Jules Horne
Oh, heck, right. Well, I think I think the funny thing is like, Rebel in author in the author world, being an indie author is a rebel thing anyway, because you’re kind of going against the traditional publishing and kind of trying to carve your own path, which I think you know, I think is intrinsic to the whole thing that you know that you’re about and that many of us are boat, which is really doing our own thing. And but there’s a specific example here because I actually play and though you play cello as well, so I play I play cello by really badly. And I discovered it has another use in spoken word. So I actually play under the name Rebel Cello, which involves playing the cello sideways with a strap on so that it’s kind of like a guitar. And I use that in a spoken word context. So it’s great because you can play sort of little bass riffs and little he can use the bow, but it’s all kind of sideways. And yeah, I’ve had so much more fun ever since I’ve kind of picked out that way. Then when I was trying to do it in a, in a kind of classical way in an orchestra. So never really had the technique to get beyond you know, fourth position or whatever. I wasn’t really that great for classical music, but in the sort of folk and spoken world and spoken word world. You can you can just kind of do your own thing. So yeah, I’ve really enjoyed doing that. So yes, standing on stage with a cello sideways, doing some some of my poetry and actually spoken word is great for people who want to practice reading their word out alone. So, yeah, really was trying to short and there’s no huge commitment and you can just try it out.
Sacha Black
When you when you told me you were called rebel cello I was like all of the high fives I am Yeah. Wow. No so that’s what I was gonna say. So I played for I think seven or eight years when I was at school and I loved loved loved playing and actually on my bucket list is to get another cello but to buy one because when I was at school I didn’t you just have like you rent them kind of thing from the school. And and so I do so yes on my bucket list. I would love to get a cello again and to play. But when I was at school you if you wanted to play, so I played I think for six years and then for the last year they changed the policy, that if you wanted to play an instrument and have lessons through the school, you had to play in the orchestra.
Now I don’t really do people, even less so in a bloody orchestra where you have to keep time with everybody. And everybody’s like, you know, you know, anyway, my orchestra were really militant about being orchestral, and I was not orchestral, I played for me. And for me only it was just I had a love of, of music and the strings and a love of practicing and just being by myself with that music. And anyway, so I went once and I was humiliated. The I remember the orchestra music teacher humiliated me, in front of everybody. And so at the end of the class, I said to him, I am not coming to the orchestra. And he was like, well, either you either you play in the orchestra, or you don’t pay at all so I handed him the cello and was like, Well, fuck your cello then. Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I know. And I walked out and that was the last time that I played and I, how dare he, how dare he ruin a child’s love of music like that just to play in the orchestra. In fact, I’m now furious at the time. I was just like, wow you know screw him blah blah blah demonstrative little teenager that I was but now I’m like how dare he? Like I could have you know, I could have you know, ended up
Jules Horne
Yeah, that could have been such a sort of rich part of what you what you did all the rest of your it’s such a rich created creative outlet what’s what’s brilliant i think i think you should get back into it I think the thing is, what’s what’s no there’s such a sort of alternative cello movement so a lot of people are using it in different ways. And there’s this amazing guy who kind of leaps about and does mosh pit tape things. Just some really wild stuff happening with cellos and particularly with the liberation of being able to play him standing up and wandering around just fabulous for storytelling, and you get to be all electronic as well, which is for me, that was just great. You remember Electric Light Orchestra, and they used to think well, I want to be you know, something like that. But because they had electric cellos. And, and no, you can, you can do that. You can have a sound effect. You can have a looper and the great thing about loopers is you don’t need to be like a sociable person because you can play…I really love the fact I can layer music. I mean,
yeah, you’d love it. You absolutely love it.
Sacha Black
Now, the key question is, obviously for branding, do they do them in purple?
Jules Horne
They do? Yeah, you can get all sorts of electric Chang all sorts of electric shells. And some of them are really quite sculptural. They’re not they don’t look like normal tailors. They’ve got like hollow strew shapes and things like that. So yeah, it’s amazing how much has changed recently, a guy called Mike block online who sort of does it, I suppose it’s like the alternative cello scene and, yeah, so he’s just Yeah, he’s really inspiring. So I think I think you’ll I think you’ll enjoy that. And oh, god, it’s such a shame not to have that kind of Avenue closed off for you at that time. I know. Definitely check it out. Yeah, I mean, yeah, we can do it sometime.
Sacha Black
I don’t know. I think I did quite a lot of practice before I got back to that level, and tell listeners where they can find out more about you your books and your audio books
Jules Horne
Well I have my own site which for my creative work, which is Juleshorne.com, my name is J U L E S like Jules Verne. Horne with an E. JulesHorne.com and where my nonfiction books are his methods writing and site. So it’s method hyphen, rating calm. And there’s various kind of downloadables and things on there, including a rating for the ear tip sheet, if anyone’s interested in that, so yeah, thanks.
Sacha Black
And thank you for your time today. Also, thank you to all of the show’s patrons who support the show and help to keep it running. If you would like to get early access to all of the episodes, you can do so by visiting www.patreon.com/SachaBlack. Thank you very much listeners.
Jules Horne
I thanks very much. Sacha sort of spoke over there. Thanks very much, Sacha. It’s been great.
Sacha Black
Thank you. I’m Sacha Black. You were listening to Jules Horne and this was The Rebel Author Podcast.
I really enjoyed this interview! So much helpful information contained within it, I probably should listen again. Thanks to Jules for sharing her experience!
ahhh yay I’m so glad you enjoyed the episode 😀