My daughter asked, “Do you ever have any regrets, Mom?” And while I know she was asking this question on a philosophical level, my mind immediately went to this puffin sweater I saw in Iceland. It’s been 3 years since I saw it in a shop there, & I still regret not buying it.

Her comment struck a chord with the Twitterverse. Her post received hundreds of replies about similar missed shopping opportunities and garnered thousands of likes.

I have my own story about the same sort of regret, along with some ideas about living with no regrets.

On Saturday 5 March 1994, we were in Munich, Germany. I wrote in my journal:

I actually saw a poster advertising Barry’s European tour and his date in Munich. I looked around to see if I could find one pasted on a wall that I could steal! (Don’t judge me!) The one I saw was in a store window. Since the tour is postponed indefinitely, I may try to go back to the store (if I can remember where it is!) and try to buy that poster.

Alas, it was not meant to be. After touring Neuschwanstein Castle the next day, I wrote:

Once we got back to Munich, we walked up the Marienplatz trying to find the Barry tour poster. Either my memory is failing, or I just saw an overwhelming amount of stuff yesterday. In any case, we couldn’t find it again (sob).

I always regretted that I didn’t go in that music store and try to buy that poster when I was standing there! I looked for the poster for years to no avail.

On 15 February, I decided I’d finally put this remorse out of my life. Somebody in Germany had an eBay listing for the Hamburg poster in that long-canceled 1994 tour. Since I never found the one for Munich, I thought Hamburg would be close enough. I bought that poster!

In the glorious perfection of the Universe, 3 days shy of the 30th anniversary of my original sighting in Munich, the poster arrived at my house! It was in almost mint condition, as if it had been waiting for me for 3 decades.

I had it framed, and I can say without any bias that it looks spectacular! I hung it in my craft room with my other framed Manilow art. To be clear, when I say “I hung it”, I mean “Drew did the work while I watched!” We had to re-arrange that whole wall and move one of my other pieces to accommodate this new addition.

5 Ways to Live With No Regrets

I’m not sure it’s actually possible for me to be completely free of regrets. However, I’ve found these rules help me minimize and eliminate them:

1. When shopping, the time to buy it is when you see it.

One of the respondents to Celia’s tweet included a picture of a store interior in which the owner displayed a sign that read “Nothing haunts us like the things we didn’t buy.” Given the overwhelming responses to her tweet, I think it’s true!

2. The corollary to the first rule is “If I have it, I’ll find a place for it.”

Almost always, the thing in question would be an impulsive purchase. I used to talk myself out of buying things because I didn’t know where I’ll put it. Repeating this tenet out loud helps me know whether the item truly has lasting appeal and needs to be in my life or would be quickly forgotten if I walked away from it.

3. To quote my favorite line from Gone With the Wind: “Askin’ ain’t gettin'”, to which I always add: “If you don’t ask, you don’t get!”

You’ll never know what will happen unless you ask for what you want. You might be turned down. You might be ignored. But what if you get the answer that changes everything?!

This principle is very important in the Law of Attraction. You have to be very clear about what you WANT and ask the Universe for it or something better. 

Sometimes it’s hard to have the courage to ask, which leads to the next guideline.

4. Feel the fear, and do it anyway.

Susan Jeffers wrote an excellent book with that title that I found to be helpful when I read it years ago.

Resistance shows up in many ways, with the leading method being some type of fear. I don’t necessarily mean some big fear like the loss of a home or relationship. I’m talking about little — and possibly also irrational — fears, like worrying what someone will think about me or being afraid to audition for an audiobook because I might feel overwhelmed with the workload if I were cast for it.

I have to push all those types of thoughts aside and just DO whatever is in front of me.

5. Be kind and compassionate to myself and remind myself that I’m doing the best I can each day.

This rule is the most important and the most difficult to implement. I’m not always successful at it.

It’s all too easy to fall in the trap of “could have/should have”, which can lead to a downward spiral of negative thinking. Continuing to blame or criticize myself for my (in)action in some past situation doesn’t change the situation or help me feel better about the outcome. It only keeps me stuck and not living my best life in the present moment.

Do you have a shopping sorrow or a way to combat regrets? I hope you’ll share it in the comments!

The post Living with No Regrets appeared first on Karen Commins.

In the 1840s, this group of around 90 people had heard about the wonders of California and decided to travel west to seek their fortune.

Rather than following the rutted road of the hundreds of settlers before them, they took an unproven shortcut given by a person who had not actually made the trip he proposed and therefore had no business in directing others to go that way. None of the Donner party had traveled the route before, either, so they had no experience or knowledge to measure the shortcut against.

As a direct result of taking the disastrous advice about the shortcut, most of the party didn’t live to tell the tale. Those who did live endured unimaginable and grisly hardships in camp.

People today have heard about the gold rush in audiobooks, leading many to decide to become a narrator. While mistakes in audiobook narration don’t carry such severe consequences, they do have repercussions. Therefore, narrators participating in online forums need to be careful about the advice they give and take.

Regardless of the site/group and discussion, established narrators have the same goal — maintain and even improve the quality of the art form.

I can’t express how incredibly frustrating and maddening it is to spend my valuable time offering guidance learned through years of expensive training classes and hands-on practice only to have a newcomer dismiss my hard-won knowledge with the comment “in my experience” and/or an argumentative reply.

I’ve been a member the Facebook Indie (ACX And Others) Audiobook Narrators and Producers group for almost 8 years. Recently, I have pulled back a lot from responding in this group because it looks like so many people don’t do any research before dashing off their basic question and only want to be validated in their approach. I repeatedly see questions that are answered in the group FAQ, in the ACX Help Center, and/or on NarratorsRoadmap.com.

I’d much rather help someone who has made some effort, done their research, has a more informed and thoughtful question, and shows a sincere desire to become a great narrator. They say things like:

* I followed your advice, but this is where I got stuck.
* Can you clarify what you meant about this topic?

Instead of gratitude for the assistance received, I see a steady stream of complaints from newcomers about the “snark” from longtime group members and our “vitriolic”, “toxic” comments. People say they are afraid to even ask a question because they don’t want a “mean” answer. Veterans are constantly told we should be more supportive.

No other competitive, artistic field is as supportive as audiobook narrators are to each other! The fact that so many well-established narrators spend our precious spare time trying to help newbies for FREE shows that we want you to succeed.

Why do you insist we reply to you in a way that makes you feel good about yourself? That sense of entitlement stops many veteran narrators from participating.

Why do you expect us to be warm and soothing in our responses, especially when we see bad advice being handed out and adopted?

We despair when newbies authoritatively advise each other; it’s like “the blind leading the blind”. If a veteran’s answer seems harsh, it’s because we’re jumping in for the umpteenth time — maybe even today — to save the blind from going in the alley and being beaten up at the end. Sometimes niceties get dropped for a very good reason.

We know what casting people expect. We know what listeners expect. We know you won’t get jobs from publishers or good reviews by implementing the bad habits and practices we’re trying to stop.

No one gave most of us any shortcuts. We paid for classes, read everything we could find, attended conferences which usually involved travel expenses, and took many other actions for years, all to improve as a narrator.

We learned from our own and others’ mistakes and now strive to save newbies from breaking with industry standards and heading into the wilderness. Unfortunately, we might guide 1 person down the safe path of best practices while 20 others run to the “do whatever you want” camp.

It’s not my job to offer info, advice, and encouragement to people on the trail. It’s my CHOICE.

If my advice is not respected and appreciated, I’ll choose to do other things with my time.

Before complaining about the icy tone of a response, just think how it would be if every veteran in the group felt as I do and simply left all the newbies to fend for themselves.

Rather than moving forward in your career as a narrator, you might just find yourself sitting out in the cold.

The post Thoughts About Advice in Narrator Groups appeared first on Karen Commins.

I’ll discuss the workshop and share those 2 powerful writing prompts in a minute. First, I want to discuss my plans for this blog going forward.

I want to write more frequently, and I want to write shorter pieces sometimes.

I also give myself permission to write more about my own journey as a recording artist, writer, and owner of a membership site. While I’m changing my format and focus somewhat from more substantive content that I’d call “teachable moments” — I will still write those, of course! — I think the lessons I learn and observations I have along the way will still be relevant to other narrators and authors who are publishing their work in audiobooks.

With that said, let me tell you now about the workshop yesterday.

I could say that I only learned about this workshop through accident.

On 29 December 2020, I saw a post in a Facebook group where someone referenced this Twitter thread that Krista Vernoff wrote about having a life in the arts. I confess that I did not know who she was when I clicked the link.

I connected to what she wrote and saw that she was hosting this workshop. Her guests were actress/director/dancer/choreographer Debbie Allen, actress/writer Nia Vardalos, and author Cheryl Strayed.

I knew the phenomenal accomplishments of these ladies and thought the afternoon would be entertaining, if nothing else. I signed up.

When the event started, I felt excited to be in the presence of these creative powerhouses! Within a few minutes, their genuine natures had crossed the ether in the casual Zoom atmosphere and made me feel like they were mentors and friends I had known for years.

Of course, I took a loooong page of notes in Evernote! Almost every utterance from each of these accomplished women was a golden nugget of wisdom. Listed below are a few of the gems I heard:

• The most important thing is to learn how to take a note even if you don’t like it. — Krista Vernoff
• If the phone doesn’t ring with a job offer, call yourself and do your own project. — Nia Vardalos
• Don’t reject yourself. Don’t let someone else’s opinion or criticism come for you. — Debbie Allen
• Part of creating art is letting it go. — Cheryl Strayed

A Compelling Case Study

One part of the conversation was particularly thrilling to anyone in a creative field as we all can follow similar steps to our own destiny!

Early in her career, Cheryl wrote a series of essays as if she were an advice columnist named Sugar. She wrote them for free to create content for a friend’s web site.

At some point, she repackaged and repurposed those essays into a book named Tiny Beautiful Things: Advice on Love and Life from Dear Sugar.

Some time later, a director urged Nia to read Tiny Beautiful Things. Nia had a highly emotional experience in reading the book; she used the phrase “it unzipped me” to describe it.

Nia decided she wanted to adapt it for a stage play — not that she had any experience in stage adaptations.

She laughed as she said she had the AUDACITY to ask Cheryl Strayed for the permission to develop that adaptation.

Not only did Cheryl say “yes” to the adaptation, but she asked Nia to play Sugar in the stage production! Although Nia hadn’t even given herself permission to ask that question, she had no hesitation in her answer: “Yes, please!”

She and Cheryl lived on opposite coasts, so it cost Nia money to fly back and forth for meetings with Cheryl and later the Broadway production.

In its review of the play, the New York Times awarded a Critics Pick designation.

Nia commented that she’d made the least money on that play than any other professional pursuit, but it gave her the most professional satisfaction.

Now, the play has been done in numerous other cities and theatres. I’m sure when Cheryl wrote all of the columns originally way back when, she never would have dreamed that her creative output would take on the life that it did.

By the way, Nia did an incredible reading from the libretto that had us all in tears. Cheryl’s words and Nia’s interpretation left me breathless and further motivated me to continue improving my acting ability in order to bring even more nuance to my narration.

The Writing Prompts

At the workshop’s conclusion, I no longer thought of this workshop as an “accidental” find. It was more a case of “when the student is ready, the teacher appears.”

You’ll remember that I said Cheryl gave us 2 writing prompts. In writing the second one, I found marching orders to guide my path going forward!

She explained we must trust the clarity of our deepest inner truth. Every day, she has to face down the inner critic and start new. Cheryl said, “Every time you do it, you evolve. You hand yourself the key to your next becoming.”

The writing prompt she gave us was:

Dear [your name here],

This is your deepest inner truth, and here is what I know.

In her prelude to the second prompt, Cheryl stated that your power/strength/love is at the root of your desire. She encouraged us to not think about the obstacles we face, but to instead think how it feels when you have stepped into your power and are creating your art. “Who are you when you are doing what you are most deeply, divinely called to do?”

Here’s the writing prompt:

Dear [your name here],

This is your power, and this is who you are when you own me.

In both cases, you should set a timer for 10 minutes and then write everything that comes to you as fast as you can. Don’t stop to edit or fix mistakes. Just keep writing.

For me, the last 3 sentences I wrote about my power contained truths I knew but had tried to ignore.

I won’t ignore them any more.

If you do these 2 exercises, did you learn something about yourself? I hope you’ll share your comments below!

The post Commit to Creativity Workshop appeared first on Karen Commins.

Happy 20th anniversary to me!

I launched my voiceover business 20 years ago.

Since my last post was about using my journal, it’s only appropriate that this one goes back to where it all began, my first entry in my first book.

Saturday 8/28/1999 9:25pm

I’m spending my evening copying the CD of my first voice-over demo with the plan to mail a few to agents on Monday. How I got to this point and where I go from here will be the subject of this journal.

Friday 9/3/99 10:15pm

On Wednesday, September 1, 1999, I mailed 3 CDs to [3 Atlanta VO agents]. It was such a huge step, and I felt a tremendous sense of accomplishment and excitement to have pushed the dream out to people who could do something about it!

The past 20 years have been a remarkable evolutionary journey, to say the least! As I was reflecting on all that I’ve seen, read, written, voiced, and otherwise done in that time, I decided a blog post of 20 things I’ve learned would be a great way to celebrate this milestone!

So here’s the list, in no particular order. By the way, you’ll find more private journal entries sprinkled throughout these articles!

1) As I wrote in my journal on 8/30/99 (the part highlighted in green is from that journal entry), all of your family or friends won’t necessarily support you in your efforts to follow your dreams. That’s okay. People are in your life for a reason, a season, or a lifetime.

2) Like so many people, I mailed my first demo to VO agents without first establishing I was a marketable commodity who could offer them something they didn’t already have among the people they represent.

3) My library has a smorgasbord of material that will help me move forward in this career.

4) Every freelance voice talent/audiobook narrator needs a web site so people can find you. You wouldn’t believe how many times I see people asking on Facebook for contact info for a certain audiobook narrator. For what it’s worth, I’m on version 4 of my web site, and it probably won’t be my last.

5) Being a creative person in the public eye means that bad reviews go with the territory. If the reviews reveal a trend, it’s time to work with a coach to improve. Otherwise, shrug off the criticism.

6) I learned 6 valuable lessons from my first voiceover job.

7) If you don’t have work, create your own, and then do it again.

8) When the idea fairy hands you an inspired idea, act quickly because ideas love speed.

9) People who are price shoppers will cause you to spend the most time on their project, aren’t easily satisfied, brag to their friends about beating you down on price, and are often the slowest to pay. I don’t compete on price but instead market my strengths to prospective clients.

10) I’ve read a lot about the Law of Attraction. I constantly must remind myself to not complain and instead think/speak/write what I want into existence.

11) I’m naturally an organized person, but creating and using a central repository for ideas was a game changer.

12) Every passion shouldn’t necessarily lead to a career choice, but the ones that do can fill you with boundless joy and an incredible sense of accomplishment!

13) As a strong introvert, I have a lot of natural resistance to meeting new people. However, I’ve found some ways to feel more at ease in —and even enjoy — those situations.

14) Stop the comparisons! It is the most self-defeating, self-negating behavior many of us have. I strive to be like Mel Fisher and maintain NOW thinking.

15) Every moment has meaning, so I decided to not only be grateful for the day job, but look for ways to actually find happiness when I hated that job.

16) One of the most exciting days in my life yielded 10 observations about marketing in a crowded marketplace.

17) I always look to see how other situations can apply to me and my business. I’ve drawn parallels and discovered secrets to success from my hair stylist, a tree service, our surfing instructor in Hawaii, movies like this one and this one, a TV show, and even during my time in swimming laps at the gym pool.

18) Acceptance of my life was the key to being in the flow. I don’t have to force things to happen. They will occur when the time is right.

19) The majority of audiobooks posted on ACX.com have royalty share contracts. I look for certain criteria before accepting one.

20) Helping other people achieve their dream has greatly helped me get even closer to fulfilling my own. I’m so very grateful for and humbled by all your kind comments here, on social media, and in person about how my articles and Facebook responses have helped you.

I feel like I’m barely scratching the surface with this list! Check out my blog archives for even more lessons learned!

Now that I’m heading into my 21st year of my business, it’s fitting that I’m stepping into an exciting new level of my destiny! My new site NarratorsRoadmap.com will be unveiled this month. Whether you dream of becoming an audiobook narrator or already are one, this site will be THE designation for narrators of all levels! Sign up for email updates or follow me and/or NarratorsRoadmap on Twitter to be alerted about the grand opening!

The post 20 Things Learned in Last 20 Years appeared first on Karen Commins.

Earlier this week, I re-tweeted a great comment from casting director Dana Bowling:

Since several people asked me about my journaling process, I thought this post with a few ideas might help you start or further your own.

In short, there are no rules to keeping a journal.

Dana Bowling listed some meaningful journaling prompts in this follow-up tweet.

I’ve shared a number of journal entries on my blog (mostly 10 years older than the article date) and added some take-always. You can read them in the This Date in My History category. You might want to start in reverse order.

I also added journal entries in this post. I often add pictures and ephemera as in this example.

Lots of people are following the Bullet Journal method. I started journaling long before Bullet Journaling became a thing.

I prefer to follow Jim Rohn’s wealth of examples and instructions in his fantastic audio program How to Use a Journal. Here are a few of his golden nuggets from my copious notes when listening to that program:

• If an idea is worth reading, worth listening to, worth remembering, then it is also worth capturing in your journal.
• A journal is a textbook of self discovery and self-awareness.
• When you have written about what your eyes have seen and what your ears have heard, go one step further and describe your feelings. Capture the joy of your victories and agony of your defeats.
• Whatever you create on paper in your journal, you can, with enough belief, discipline, commitment, and desire create in your life.

For a while, I kept a physical planner/idea repository, which I have since moved to Evernote. My ideas and necessary information used to be scattered in different apps and in my journals. It was a game-changer to start saving everything in a central on-line depository so it’s accessible anywhere using any device. Since most of my journal entries are too personal to put on-line, I often take a picture in Evernote of my hand-written journal entries that I want to refer to often or repurpose in another form.

You add what you want to your book in whichever way you want. You can simply write, or you can do anything your creativity calls you to do. In addition to the entries I write almost every day (which includes a gratitude list of at least 5 things), I’ve copied quotes, affixed business cards and stickers, drawn pictures, and created collages in mine, like this one I shared in my June 2019 newsletter:

The daily practice of journaling offers a bounty of benefits, including:

• improving your communication skills
• magnifying your excitement and diminishing your fears
• relieving stress
• keeping you on track
• allowing you time for self-reflection
• visualizing your future

Do you keep a journal, or are you about to start one? I’d love to get your take on it in the comments!

Immediately after I posted this article, I noticed a couple of recent stories I wanted to add to it:

• Evernote discussed writing down your routines as a start in changing your habits.
• In a brilliant marketing move, superstar Taylor Swift released excerpts from her private, handwritten journals in 4 deluxe versions of her new album. Fans will buy all 4 to get all of the entries. I loved seeing the sneak peek into her process in this New York Times story.

The post How I Use My Journal appeared first on Karen Commins.

The biggest problem is thinking of problems as problems. Successful people know that when you focus on problems you have more problems, but when you focus on possibilities you have more opportunities.

It’s true. Our thoughts and words have tremendous creative power in shaping our lives. In fact, in one of my first blog posts 10 years ago, I wrote that nothing is more powerful on this planet than the words you think and speak. Everything that exists now was first a thought in a person’s mind. Speaking the thought out loud gives it creative power.

Wayne Dyer used to say, “What you think about expands”, and “You can’t get enough of what you don’t want.” When we’re repeatedly talking about something with energy and emotion, we’re actually telling the Universe, “please send me more of this.”

That’s great when we’re enthusiastically and excitedly talking about our latest audiobook contract or marketing plans. However, the same principle is at work when we’re animatedly griping about the leaf-blowers in the neighborhood.

An army of leaf blowers is coming soon to your neighborhood!

I can’t count the times when I’ve read posts from audiobook narrators in Facebook groups in which they whine about the external noise from the neighbors cutting their grass, planes flying overhead, nearby construction projects, or any other thing that interrupts their recording sessions. The people bemoaning these (first-world) problems seem to expect empathy from everyone else. If challenged, the complainer would say he’s merely venting off steam with people who understand the situation.

I never respond to those types of posts. If I did, I’d say, “Quit your bellyaching, and DO something about your recording space! It’s not up to the world to be quiet in order for you to have a cocoon of silence for recording.”

Before anyone gets offended at my harsh statement, let me add that I have walked in the naysayer’s shoes. In order to solve my multiple issues with an extremely noisy environment, I replaced all of the windows in my house and custom-built an additional room on my house with soundproofing techniques.

More importantly, I don’t respond because constant complaining really goes much deeper and has a more pronounced effect than most people realize.

Have you ever noticed that, when you’re sick and you tell and re-tell the story about all of your symptoms to everybody you know, you feel worse with each telling?

When I used to gripe about people yakking loudly on their cell phones or children screaming in restaurants, it seemed more and more of them would show up around me. OF COURSE THEY DID! I repeatedly focused my attention and poured lots of negative emotion in my comments about how much those situations annoyed me! I had an epiphany one day when I realized I had been saying, “We are a magnet for obnoxious children” — literally summoning the very condition I wanted to avoid!

I’ve learned — not that I’m always successful at it — that I have to keep my attention focused on WHAT I WANT, not what I don’t want.

The loud children and cell phone talkers in public are still around, but my reaction to them has changed. When I find myself getting annoyed by them or other irritants, I speak out loud affirmations like, “I am focusing my attention on what I want, which is a pleasant, enjoyable dinner.” Almost immediately, the environment — or at least my perception of it — shifts for the better.

Frequent grumbling doesn’t just steal your joy (and that of others around you) in the moment. You can be setting yourself up for an unfulfilled life.

I’ll leave you with these profound thoughts from Elizabeth Gilbert’s book Big Magic: Creative Living Beyond Fear: 

Quit your complaining. It’s not the world’s fault that you wanted to be an artist. It’s not the world’s job to enjoy the films you make, and it’s certainly not the world’s obligation to pay for your dreams. Nobody wants to hear it. Steal a camera if you must, but stop whining and get back to work….

…most important, you’re scaring away inspiration. Every time you express a complaint about how difficult and tiresome it is to be creative, inspiration takes another step away from you, offended. It’s almost like inspiration puts up its hands and says, “Hey, sorry, buddy! I didn’t realize my presence was such a drag. I’ll take my business elsewhere.

…I have felt this phenomenon in my own life, whenever I start complaining. I have felt the way my self-pity slams the door on inspiration, making the room feel suddenly cold, small, and empty. That being the case, I took this path as a young person: I started telling myself that I enjoyed my work. I proclaimed that I enjoyed every single aspect of my creative endeavors—the agony and the ecstasy, the success and the failure, the joy and the embarrassment, the dry spells and the grind and the stumble and the confusion and the stupidity of it all. I even dared to say this aloud. I told the universe (and anyone who would listen) that I was committed to living a creative life not in order to save the world, not as an act of protest, not to become famous, not to gain entrance to the canon, not to challenge the system, not to show the bastards, not to prove to my family that I was worthy, not as a form of deep therapeutic emotional catharsis . . . but simply because I liked it. So try saying this: “I enjoy my creativity.” And when you say it, be sure to actually mean it.

Photo: Hector Alejandro/Flickr
 

The post Stop Complaining About Noise appeared first on Karen Commins.

“I’m hoping the powers-that-be realize this (and care) and we’ll see more audiobooks being narrated by dual-gender narrators.

And I don’t mean simply dividing up the chapters between a male and female narrator to read…I like the dialogue narrated by the relevant gender.”

I can tell you why most books have a solo narrator: COST.

I produced and co-narrated the 4-book Blue Suede Memphis mystery series (fun, cozy mysteries with romantic elements) where I voiced the narrative and all of the female parts, and a male actor (my husband Drew!) voiced all of the male parts — a narration style known as DUET.

A DUAL narration occurs where 2 actors narrate all the characters’ lines in the chapters associated with their main characters’ points of view.

While I love the sound of the finished product and agree that having both genders makes the production so much more interesting, it’s a very time-consuming and tedious process to create an audiobook this way.

First, you have to have production rights to even be able to do a multi-voice production. One mid-size publisher told me that we couldn’t use 2 voices on a particular book because they didn’t have the production rights for it. I guess the production rights allow you to make a play or movie from the book’s text and are somehow different than audio rights.

Next, you cast the 2 actors and must coordinate their recording schedules. If I weren’t married to my co-star, the scheduling step alone could have derailed the production. The schedule is less of a consideration when the narrators are reading whole chapters instead of performing dialogue.

Once the schedule is worked out, you turn to the cost of studio time, both for the recording and the editing/mastering. The Big 5 publishers can afford real-time studio hours in big cities for their high-profile, bestselling titles. Everyone else — small and mid-size publishers and indie authors — usually looks to control costs by casting narrators with home studios. Depending on the project, the editing might be done by the publisher, the narrator, or an editor sub-contracted by the narrator.

Normally, my rule of thumb is that it takes 2 hours in real time to record 1 finished hour and 3 hours in real time to proof/edit/master for 1 finished hour. With the books in this series, we spent at least an additional hour on both phases. A book that runs 10 hours with 1 narrator (or 2 or more narrators who read different chapters) therefore might require 50 hours in real time to record and edit. The same book with 2 narrators and interspersed dialogue might require 70 hours of production time.

Studio time isn’t the only cost consideration. I also have the opportunity cost of other projects or promotion that I can’t do when an audiobook requires more time than usual to complete.

In this series, I did all of the narrative portions and the female voices. I left airtime in the dialogue where male characters spoke. As Drew directed me, he mouthed his lines and cued me in for my next sentence.

Then, we switched places; I directed him as we recorded his parts:

• I cued him by playing my audio in his headphones.
• I pressed Record in the software.
• He delivered his lines. Everything true of solo narration is true here, too, as far as re-recording to fix inflection, accent, flubs, etc. In fact, it may be harder to be the 2nd person because you’re kind of coming into the dialogue cold. I think that person has to work harder to connect to the text because they weren’t immersed in the story to that point.
• I stopped recording before he spoke over my next line.
• Sometimes we originally left too much time for his parts, sometimes not enough. Sometimes his delivery caused me go back to my part and re-do it to change some nuance.

As a result, editing the dialogue is EXTREMELY time-consuming. When I am narrating all voices, as is customary, I naturally leave the appropriate amount of time between characters. The editor is not constantly adjusting the timing to make the conversations flow smoothly and naturally. In these productions with true M/F dialogue, the editor’s job was even tougher given the timing issues.

Due to the considerable amount of time needed for this kind of production, I’m not too eager to produce another one. Instead, I’m looking for dual narration projects with 2-3 1st person POVs (romance or mystery) where each narrator is responsible for entire chapters.

Do you like hearing books with 2 narrators? Do you know of a book for which you’d like to hear a dual narration in the audiobook? Please leave a note in the comments!

The post Dual Gender Narrations in Audiobooks appeared first on Karen Commins.

I’ll be honest — before yesterday, I had never given this sort of presentation. I had done presentations in my government career, of course, so I had no fear of speaking to a group.

I raise the point about this kind of presentation because a more experienced public speaker might have been able to avoid the technical and communications problems I encountered. I therefore thought it might be helpful to share some things that could have gone better to save others from a similar plight.

1. Only go when you are INVITED.

In January of 2014, I sent a message to the Georgia Romance Writers to inquire about speaking to their group about audiobooks at a monthly meeting and/or the annual conference. The conference chairperson responded that I could submit a workshop proposal for the conference. If my proposal was selected, I would have to pay the conference registration fee for attendees.

I responded that I was unwilling to pay registration fees since I wouldn’t be an attendee. My thinking was that I was offering to HELP them for free. I certainly was not going to PAY for the privilege of spending my time, energy, and creativity in developing an engaging and informative talk and then more time at the actual presentation.

In March, after the proposal window had closed, the conference chairperson wrote to me:

Are you still interested in presenting at the Moonlight & Magnolias conference in October? We have an opening in the workshop schedule, and since you’re local and provide a service to authors, we’re willing to waive the registration requirement.

My gut whispered to me that they didn’t want ME. They just wanted someone to FILL A SLOT and were SETTLING for me “since I’m local and provide a service to authors”. I chose to dismiss those thoughts, telling myself they were just my own inner resistance to stepping outside my comfort zone instead of a warning signal. I responded that I would be delighted to accept the slot.

2. Ask for equipment to transmit both the computer video and AUDIO.

I had to submit my equipment requests in June, long before I started creating my slide show. Even though my topic was AUDIObooks and AUDIO is my life, I didn’t think to specifically ask for equipment to transmit my computer AUDIO along with the screen display.

My snazzy slide show included 4 terrific videos that demonstrated key points. As I practiced my speech last week, I suddenly realized that the projector might not transmit the computer’s audio. I wrote to the conference coordinator, who said they only had a projector, and she didn’t think she could get speakers for my computer. She referred me to the hotel contact person to solve the audio problem. I’m guessing that no one at previous GRW conferences has ever had a multimedia show, so no one ever thought of or asked for audio equipment.

The hotel was only providing a microphone and podium. However, it could easily include the additional sound mixer configuration for my computer audio for an additional $130. GRW apparently was unwilling or unable to pay the additional fee.

]I had to solve the audio problem. My choices were:

• Pay the hotel the $130 to set up the additional equipment.
• Take an external speaker from home, perhaps even a studio monitor.
• Remove the videos from the slide show.

I decided to take a Bluetooth speaker. I had to hold my microphone in front of the speaker in order to project its sound throughout the large ballroom.  I’ll have more to say about this solution in subsequent points.

3.  Test and re-test every aspect of your slide show.

My laptop worked well with a Bluetooth speaker that we had purchased from Williams and Sonoma. Unfortunately, I didn’t realize that it must time-out after a certain amount of inactivity. When I got to the 2 videos at the end of my presentation, the Bluetooth speaker wouldn’t play the sound. I might have discovered that fact if I had played all of my videos with the external speaker during my rehearsals.

4.  Ensure that your name and presentation name are the way you want them to appear on the schedule and program.

When I received the conference schedule in September, I just looked for my name to see the date and time of my session. I didn’t notice that my session title was listed as the very bland and vague “Audiobook Presentation” instead of the name I had given it “Setting Sail In Audiobooks”.

Of all the presentations, mine was the only one with such a non-descript name. The other presentations retained the names given them by the speakers. Some of the presentation names contained more characters than mine, so my presentation name would have fit in the space provided.

I only noticed this undesirable and unauthorized change on Thursday night before my Friday session. Sure enough, the printed program listed my presentation name as “Audiobook Presentation”. This name probably translated into a lower attendance level for my session.

At least my name was spelled correctly.

5.  Visit the room where you’ll present and know how the equipment will be configured at least 1 day before your session.

I did visit the hotel the day before the conference. I stood on the stage at the podium in a ballroom of 25 tables with 10 chairs at each table. I envisioned the room full to capacity of people who were interested in my topic and excited to get my information about using ACX to create audiobooks.

The hotel A/V director told me that GRW had not ordered a screen for Friday. I had to send yet another message to the conference chairperson about the screen. She assured me that they would have a screen for Friday.

I naively thought that in the ballroom setup, the screen would be ON THE STAGE, behind me at the podium. I didn’t know until I got in the room for my session that the screen was a small thing set off in the far corner with a projector on top of a table! I asked them to move the table and screen closer to me so that I could still use the podium. I didn’t want to hold the mic for the entire session while also bending down to the table to read my presenter notes from my computer.

On Monday, I had asked the conference chairperson what kind of cable connected to the projector. I didn’t get that answer until I walked in the room on Friday.

6.  Plan for all contingencies.

Take all kinds of cables and adapters that you might need. I had both HDMI and VGA cables and adapters so that I was prepared for any projector connection.

Print your presentation notes. Thank heaven I had taken this step because Powerpoint on my Mac never gave me the option for dual monitors. The attendees viewed the slide show, and I referred to my paper notes.

Make sure your printed presentation notes include the latest tweaks. I had changed the order of a couple of notes on Friday morning but didn’t print them. I was a little thrown during the presentation when the sequence was wrong.

7. Learn your moderator’s name and go over logistics and details the day before your session.

If I were a conference chairperson, I’d make sure that:

• every session speaker knew the name and contact info of the session moderator
• the moderator would ensure that the speaker had everything she needed and felt welcome
• the moderator would be on hand to help the speaker get into the room

The GRW conference chairperson sent me no information other than the fact that I would have a moderator. She also said she’d be around to help connect the computer to the projector.

As a person outside of the organization, I expected more consideration and communication than I received. I’m sure it’s a big job to plan a conference, so perhaps the chairperson was overwhelmed by the task. I can see now that I should have been persistent with my questions until I got answers.

I met my moderator about 3:55pm for my 4:00pm session.

8.  Be self-reliant.

I can thank my parents, perhaps especially my mother, for teaching me this lesson early in life.

No one from GRW met me after I arrived at the hotel to help unload my car. I had already planned to get one of the hotel luggage carts to unload my briefcase with computer, a box of postcards for my door prizes, and a gift basket and 4 gift bags for door prizes. Fortunately, the bellman said I could use the cart for the next hour. I actually kept it for 2 hours since I didn’t have time to return it before I started my presentation.

I met my moderator as we were walking in the door. I appreciated her help during the setup, and the conference coordinator did come back and help her move the table and projector. I thought I was going to have to do it.

9.  If you are giving away door prizes, offer raffle tickets as people walk in the door. 

To celebrate my latest audiobook and first romance FOR A GOOD TIME, CALL…, I made 4 gift bags and 1 grand prize gift basket containing some cool swag that ACX and Belle Books generously provided to me along with all of the types of candy mentioned in the book. I had printed postcards and attached stickers to 5 of them. My plan was to pass out the cards at a certain point during the presentation and determine the winners before I ended my talk. I inserted the marked cards throughout my box of postcards.

I was shocked and dismayed when only about 25 people showed up for my presentation.

My moderator passed out my cards at the appointed time. When it came time to determine the winners, no one had a winning card. I was reminded of Michael Scott’s “Golden Ticket” idea in The Office. His hidden golden ticket idea didn’t work out well for him, and my specially-marked postcards didn’t work out well for me. It would have been so much easier and cheaper if I had just handed out raffle tickets to give away my door prizes.

10.  Give your best to the people who came to hear your talk.

The show must go on, so you’ve got to make lemonade….or something like that. Even though the size of my audience was not optimal, I knew that the people who were there came to hear me and wanted to learn about creating audiobooks. I did everything I could to make my presentation outstanding.

Well, I mostly did everything, but I wish I could’ve done something about the Bluetooth speaker so they could hear my last 2 videos. Those videos featured Colin Firth and Steve Martin. Just think — I was sharing a stage with Colin Firth and Steve Martin, but no one in the audience could hear them!

The people in the ballroom before me didn’t finish on time and wouldn’t leave the room until my moderator ushered them out after 4pm. I was late setting up, which made me even later in starting. I wanted to finish on time so I wouldn’t be rude to the person who was scheduled to speak at 5pm. Perhaps if I hadn’t felt so rushed for time, I might have troubleshot the Bluetooth speaker for a moment.

I really appreciated the attendees’ interest. A few people asked very thoughtful and intelligent questions at the end, and I had a delightful hallway conversation with one author as I was leaving.

I didn’t leave any business cards or my stack of postcards in their goody room. My hand-out in their binder included a copy of my business card and a link to a document I’ve compiled of audiobook resources for authors.

*******************

I spent months researching and collecting ideas for this presentation and weeks in creating the slide show. It would be a shame if all of that time, thought, energy, creativity, and money only benefitted the people who were in the room yesterday. Therefore, I’m going to convert my show to a video and add narration to it.

I may not ever present in person again at GRW, or any other writers’ organization, but I will continue to help authors through my blogs, videos, and forum posts.

The post 10 Things I Learned About Speaking at a Conference appeared first on Karen Commins.

Long before the word “smartphone” was coined, I had several iterations of PDAs, and I remember my to-do list application on each one was always ultra important to me. My need to keep track of all my actions and ideas didn’t end there. In looking back through my journals to find entries for my blog series This Date In My History, I realize how often I wrote a to-do list.

These to-dos were all related to some aspect of my voiceover business.

Oh, I had to-do lists on my day job, too. However, someone else usually set the priority of the projects on those to-do lists. As a network and email administrator, I often would be working on a project that would get sidelined by a user support call. I rarely wrote about those actions in my journals. I knew they would always be waiting for me the next day. Creative ideas that held the possibility of moving us forward couldn’t be implemented without committee meetings, testing, and managerial approval. They became a project.

Actions for my voice-over business could be individual tasks or pieces that form a major project. I’ve always had great ideas that I wanted to implement, as well as time-sensitive actions to take, like auditions, sessions, software updates, invoicing, correspondence….   You see how easy it is to get in list mode?

The problem with these to-do lists is that they quickly became unwieldy. I began to have paralysis by analysis. I would have so many things that I COULD DO competing with things I SHOULD DO that I would find it difficult to pick something to start on.

I tried labeling each action as A, B, or C in priority, with the As being the things that must be done and the Cs being the ideas I wanted to capture and do sometime. I found that I usually didn’t need to write the As because they tended to be in the time-sensitive, mission-critical category of things to do. It was hard to assign something as a B. The Cs ended up being things I never got to. My journals are littered with fantastic ideas that I didn’t pursue.

As an example, my 2006 journal starts with a collage I made about creating a podcast. The word podcast was added to the dictionary in 2005, and I intended to be one of the frontrunners in creating a show. I started by writing lists (yes, list mode again!) of topic ideas because I didn’t want to start a podcast and then run out of steam after 3 episodes.

For what it’s worth, I had the same sort of worry before starting this blog. I decided I wouldn’t put pressure on myself to post on any schedule or only on certain topics. What freedom to just write something when I have something to say!

Although I gave myself this permission to write when the muse spoke, I found that the muse would often speak to me at a time when I couldn’t do anything about it. What did I do? You guessed it — added the idea to my to-do list. Even today, I add ideas for blog posts to an Evernote notebook. Unfortunately, like my podcast idea, many of them go in the folder and are forgotten.

The podcast idea was actually a recurring one, so let’s fast forward to 2011 when I attended Faffcon2 in Atlanta. Five years had passed since I first had the idea about creating a podcast, yet I was no closer to creating one. I was completely thrilled when someone suggested we collaborate on a series that could have endless, easy-to-create episodes. This idea could be IT!

After we parted company at Faffcon, we had several calls to firm up the plan. I immediately bought some new equipment that I would need to accomplish my part. Due to other demands like my day job, some time passed before I could test the equipment. By the summer of 2011, my collaborator and I both had our plates overflowing with other, more pressing things. The idea that so completely captivated me when I heard it eventually fizzled out to nothing, and I’ve since sold that piece of equipment.

Eight years have passed since I first decided to create a podcast, yet I still haven’t done it.

Which brings me to my first tip…

Ideas Love Speed

I’ve always heard the old saying “the early bird gets the worm.” It was proven to me when I used to sell a lot of my Barry Manilow collectibles on eBay. I noticed that the first seller who posted a unique item was usually the one to get the most money for it. Nike’s slogan of Just Do It is based on the premise that ideas love speed.

I recently listened to a program from Dr. Joe Vitale in which he explained the reasons why ideas love speed:

1) The idea comes with passion and excitement. That energy is available to use only if you act THEN. Use that energy to help propel you to get it done. When I look at the podcast collaboration idea in 2011, I see the truth of this statement. The further away we got from the original idea, the less inclined we were to implement it.

2) The Divine gave you this idea as a gift. You are honoring the idea to take action. Doing so comes with a blessing. He even said, as I observed with my eBay listings, the first one to act on an idea is usually the one to profit from it the most.

3) The Divine gives the idea to more than 1 person at a time, knowing that most of them won’t act on it. How many times have you had and ignored an idea, only to later see it implemented by and making money for someone else?

4) The more you act on and honor ideas, the more ideas you get.

Take-away straight from Dr. Vitale:

Act on the next idea that comes to you. Write it down and take action on it.

Act on Ideas That Wake You Up

I’ve read Dr. Wayne Dyer’s books and watched and listened to his programs. One quote that he often repeated was from Rumi:

The morning breeze has secrets

Don’t go back to sleep

I started writing this post around 5AM on a winter morning where it’s 30 degrees outside. Believe me, I really wanted to stay in my warm bed and go back to sleep, but I kept thinking about this post. If I’m going to think about it, I might as well get up and write it, especially since I’m guaranteed to have no interruptions.

And now it’s done before sunrise! Anything else I do today is just a bonus!

Photo:  iStockPhoto/Fourtheexposure
 

The post 2 Tips to Tame Your To-Do List appeared first on Karen Commins.

I only applied to one college and commuted here in Atlanta. While I got a great education and never regretted my choice, hearing about this girl’s experiences both in picking and living at college have made me think about things I may have missed in my college years.

One thing I missed was going to football games. My college didn’t have a football team. I had played piccolo in high school marching band and would have enjoyed playing in the band on college football Saturdays.

A big advantage to being an audiobook narrator is that I can vicariously live through other people, even when they are fictional characters. For instance, in the fun, cozy Dixie Diva mysteries,  Trinket Truevine, the first person narrator, and her cousin/best friend Bitty Hollandale went to Ole Miss. In fact, the latest book in the series Divas and Dead Rebels revolves around a dead professor on campus.

In one scene, the ladies attend a tailgating party at The Grove. I decided to make a video of that scene for an audiobook trailer and was thrilled to do the Hotty Toddy cheer for Ole Miss right along with some students!

The post The Ole Miss Hotty Toddy Cheer appeared first on Karen Commins.