Are you an audiobooks listener? And if so, what sorts of books do you listen to?
I’m afraid the audiobooks I listen to are my own. I don’t read my own books, but when I get the new audio tape, I listen to it because I get a different view. It is different than reading it.
So are you listening for a different interpretation of your work?
It’s not so much the different interpretation. I want to have that one-removed to see that I actually said what I think I said. You see, that’s a problem that is very difficult for any writer. It’s a problem that your editor helps you solve. You know what you intended to say. You know what you meant. And the fact that you perhaps didn’t put it down clearly enough for someone who doesn’t know what you meant to understand, that can be a problem. My wife Harriet is my editor, and she’s very very good at being able to say, “You didn’t convince me here.” Or, “I don’t understand what you mean here. You have to do better.” Because that’s the point where I know what I meant, and because I know what I meant, it read fine to me. But to someone who didn’t know what I meant, it didn’t read fine. Well, I can also spot some of that in listening to the audio. And because I can spot it in listening to the audio, I know that, ahh, I thought I had put a bit of foreshadowing for something of the future here, and it doesn’t come across clearly, I must do something about that in the next book to make sure that I do have that foreshadowing.
If you are viewing this on github.io, you can see that this site is open source. Please do not try to improve this page. It is auto-generated by a python script. If you have suggestions for improvements, please start a discussion on the github repo or the Discord.