SHAUN TAYLOR-CORBETT: What had it been like, sitting there while the buffalo flowed down through the air within arm's reach, bellowing, their legs probably stiff because they didn't know for sure when the ground was coming? What had it felt like bringing meat to the whole tribe? (SOUNDBITE OF AUDIOBOOK, 'THE ONLY GOOD INDIANS')

You might be a good reader or speaker for 1-hour chunks, that might be your strength, but don't forget to consider how you'll have to change up your style as things get longer.Sometimes what you need isn't to read a good book it's to listen to one. 11 hours of college lecture spread out over 11 weeks is doable, but compressed into an audiobook timeframe? It's rough.ĭelivery styles that work for, say, an hour, become unpleasant after 5 hours.

The problem is that it lasts almost 11 hours. Kendi is an academic, so it makes sense that his delivery feels a little like a college lecture. That one clocks in at a brisk 1.5 minutes per page.

To put this in perspective, I listened to a long mystery set in the west where we’ve got a bunch of laconic cowboys and such. Kendi reads his book at a pace of about 2.3 minutes per page. That’s how it felt, anyway, so I did the math. In the audiobook version of How To Be An Antiracist I was bored, okay? Bored in a way I wasn't bored by the text. What happens when an author reads their own work? When should authors read their own audiobooks? And when should they turn it over to the pros? I’m on the march through an audiobook read by the author, and let me tell you, it’s about as painful an experience as getting a vasectomy.Īnd the vasectomy has a slight advantage because it only takes 15 minutes.

We hear audiobook