@Jey
You are so kind.
The audiobook narration project is for a book about Octavia Walton LeVert … Such A Woman: The Life of Madame Octavia Walton LeVert by Paula Lenor Webb, who may be a brilliant researcher with her Masters of Library Science, but she’s not a good writer. I have a contract with the publisher who is a good friend’s husband. He’s a bit of a dodgy character, I’m learning.
The publication of my novel is more important to me, and I plan to print 25 advance reading copies by 8/10 for reviews and to request blurbs from some well-established authors. I’m already doing the marketing of my book (with a publication date of 9/15.)
I set the dates because I will have to go back on the road (i.e., travel for disaster relief) this fall (hurricane season is forecast to be active) to pay for self-publishing my novel. Thanks to Akimbo Writing in Community, I finished writing it in January, gave it to me beta readers in April, and I’m doing a read-aloud, line by line, to check for mistakes in the manuscript. That’s the long story.
I will narrate my own audiobook for Meet Me in Mumbai but I will wait until I don’t have so much on my plate.
The only reason I want to sub-contract the final audio edit on the book from hell (Octavia) is that it’s already “sunk costs” as Seth might say. It’s my loss leader into audiobook narration, and my folly as an inexperienced narrator that I underestimated the level of difficulty narrating prose from the mid 1800s.
Case in point… one of the easier passages (of countless quotes from primary research sources):
Dorothy Walton wrote to a niece in September 1822 and told of their situation, “You will no doubt know before this reaches you…the yellow fever
is in Pensacola, and be anxious to hear from us…Yes, my dear, that place has been visited with an overwhelming calamity. All those that did not leave the City at the first commencement have been swept off. (The American population I mean) We are the only family that remained any time after the commencement of the fever that have been spared. That we are spared is owing to the superintending hand of a merciful God.”
Jey, my thanks to you for all your support and encouragement! I hope you and your family are happy and healthy. Wishing you all the best!
Lovelace