Giving literature a listen

Michele Pagliei keeps a book on her nightstand and an audiobook in her car CD player.

Jim Curran bought an iPod so he could listen to music at work. Now he uses the MP3 player primarily to catch up on his "reading."

Pagliei, of Wyckoff, and Curran, of Pompton Lakes, are two of the thousands of North Jerseyans who have turned to books on CD, tape and, most recently, digital media, to create more time for literature in their increasingly busy lives.

Audiobooks, which started as an aid for the visually impaired, are now a nearly billion-dollar-a-year industry.

"At a time when reading gets crowded out of people's time, audiobooks become a way of enriching the reading experience," said Robert White, director of the Bergen County Cooperative Library System, which includes all 62 Bergen County libraries and 11 in Passaic, Essex and Hudson counties.

Curran and Pagliei, like many others, began listening to audiobooks when work, family and other commitments began taking precedence over their love of literature.

"It's become a hobby," said Curran, who listens to works that vary from the "The Lord of the Rings" and the "Harry Potter" series to a biography of Winston Churchill.

"I don't have time to sit and read an 800-page book," said Curran, the father of a 7-year-old and a 4-month-old. "That's why I enjoy audiobooks so much."

Pagliei said she was hooked on audiobooks from the first listen. "It's really hard to turn them off," she said. "Just like it's hard to put down a good book."

Library patrons use audiobooks to catch up on new titles, keep current with their book clubs and revisit or discover the classics.

Though children's books are also available on CD and tape, some use the format as a way to introduce children to more mature literary works.

Teaneck resident Carol Shaw recalled playing books on tape during family road trips to New England 20 years ago. Her children, about 10 and 5 years old at the time, passed the time in the car listening to such classics as "The Call of the Wild," "The Wind in the Willows" and "The Hound of the Baskervilles."

"I wanted to familiarize them with good literature," Shaw said. "Things that they would enjoy."

Shaw still listens to books in the car, albeit on CD. Most libraries no longer order books on cassette.

The future of audiobooks, like music, lies in the digital format, White said.

In December, the Bergen County cooperative launched a program that gives patrons access to more than 1,100 titles that they can download to their MP3 players.

Nearly 1,800 people downloaded more than 3,500 books through the end of February, White said. In Passaic County, the Wayne Library offers digital downloads to township residents.

Ringwood Library Director Andrea Cahoon said the Passaic County Library System, PALS Plus, plans eventually to offer digital audiobooks throughout the system.

"It sounds like a great way to go," Cahoon said. "We won't have to find room to store them and we won't have a problem with broken tapes or scratched CDs."

PALS Plus will be participating in the Highland Regional Library Cooperative project that will be offering downloadable audiobooks to all PALS libraries beginning in June, said Claire Houghton-Kiel, executive director of PALS Plus.

However, the planning board at Morris County's library system, MAIN Morris Automated Information Network overwhelmingly voted not to go with the downloadable system.

"At least, not at the present time," said Barbara Owens, director of the Kinnelon Library, "but it is on the back burner."

Owens cited the lack of demand from library patrons plus the high cost of purchasing the system as two of the main reasons.

A major advantage of downloadable audiobooks is that titles can be downloaded simultaneously. Patrons never have to worry about waiting for an audiobook that has been checked out.

"If there are 10 people who want to download a title, they can all have it on the same day," said David Franz, Hillsdale Library director. Franz, a digital audiobook enthusiast, wears his own MP3 player around his neck with a tag that reads, "Ask me about DOWNLOADABLE AUDIOBOOKS."

The digital files are copy-protected and can be played only during the free, three-week loan period, White said. But renewals are also free and instantaneous.

The main drawback to the digital program: It is not compatible with the iPod, Apple's ubiquitous MP3 player.

Apple's model for selling audio downloads is cost-prohibitive, White said.

Those with iPods get around the restriction by uploading audiobook CDs that they buy or borrow onto their computers and transferring the files to the iPod, a practice White discourages when it comes to library loans.

"While your iPod user may have ripped the files to get them to his iPod, he is basically stealing intellectual property," White said.

The cooperative tested several MP3 players to see which worked best with its software. Its recommendations, and instructions on downloading audiobooks, are listed on its Web site, bccls.org.

Librarians are being trained to help people through the process and libraries will soon have computers with download capability Wayne already has one. That's especially helpful for patrons with low-speed, dial-up modems, which are cumbersome for audiobook downloads.

Though some critics say listening to audiobooks is a passive experience that discourages reading, Waldwick Library Director Patty Boyd prefers to look at the positives.

"There are people who don't consider listening [to be] reading," Boyd said, "but you're still bringing meaning to, and taking meaning from, the book.

"You're still being presented with material that you have to process," Boyd said. "I think all of these formats are important."

Boyd also said that many audiophiles are avid readers who listen to add to their reading experience, not to replace it.

On the commercial end of the spectrum, audiobook sales topped $830 million in 2004, the latest year for which figures are available, according to the Audio Publishers Association.

Several dynamics factor into the growing commercial sales of audiobooks, said Karen Whitten, editor and publisher of AudioFile,an industry publication.

The growth of large, chain bookstores such as Barnes & Nobles and Borders in the past 15 years has given audiobooks greater visibility, Whitten said. And libraries are ordering more books on CD than ever before, she added.

But the popularity of audiobooks mainly comes back to people carving out time for literature in a hectic world.

"Audiobooks," Whitten said, "can be a lifesaver."

Staff Writer Cathy Krzeczkowski contributed to this article.

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Listeners often judge a book by its narrator

Tom Stechschulte pores through books as if they were scripts, jotting notes about characters and pronunciation in the margins as though he were preparing for a stage role.

In a way, he is.

Stechschulte is an award-winning audiobook narrator. The Teaneck resident has given voice to more than 100 novels, biographies and non-fiction works over the past decade.

"I approach reading audiobooks like any other acting role," said Stechschulte, a stage actor who has appeared on Broadway and in movie and television roles. "You read the book. You hear what other people say about your character. You learn as much as you can."

Stechschulte's specialty is characters from the South and Midwest. They're a good match for the salt-of-the-Earth baritone and Southern twang that the Pittsburgh-bred actor perfected by appearing in numerous plays staged below the Mason-Dixon Line and in the heartland.

"I think my heavy theater background helped an awful lot," Stechschulte said.

Indeed, most audiobook narrators have acting backgrounds, said Claudia Howard, executive director at Recorded Books, the company for which Stechschulte mainly records.

"It is the stage actor who has the ability to handle massive quantities of language, to recreate characters, to deal with foreign dialogs and accents," Howard said.

"Their skills have been honed."

Taking home a paycheck for reading may seem like easy work, but narrators must be able to engross and entertain listeners while taking on multiple characters, male and female.

The narrator must become the characters, not just a person reading lines.

Just as readers might discard a book if not interested after a couple of chapters, audiobook listeners are just as picky with narrators.

"If I don't like the narrator I'll turn it off," said Carol Shaw, a regular audiobook listener from Teaneck.

Stechschulte is working on the audio companion to "The One That Got Away," the memoir of former New York Times Executive Editor Howell Raines.

His recent recordings include "The Big Oyster," Mark Kurlansky's look at the history of New York City seen through the oyster business, and "No Country for Old Men," Cormac McCarthy's bestselling modern-day Western.

Stechschulte's work on "No Country for Old Men" is reviewed in this month's issue of AudioFile magazine.

The critique praises Stechschulte's "smoothly superb pacing" and "gruff manner" that "captures the men weathered by the lives they've led, keeping them as individualized as necessary."

"He can bring a variety of characters to life within a single story and they can all stay quite distinct," said Karen Whitten, editor and publisher of AudioFile.

Stechschulte said that he reads about 5 hours per day, from two to five days a week, when recording.

It can take anywhere from two days to three weeks to finish a project, depending on the size of the book and the deadline.

Willie Nelson's "The Tao of Willie," which is due out in May, is an exception.

Stechschulte recorded it in one full-day session, and paid the price.

"I really came to understand the expression, 'My brain is fried,' " Stechschulte said. "I walked out of there and I didn't have a cell left. Your mind goes before your voice does."

E-mail: aberback@northjersey.com

(SIDEBAR, page L01)

What you're listening to

Here are the top five downloaded titles in the Bergen Cooperative Library System for the past three months:

* "1776," by David McCullough, 136 downloads

* "Angels & Demons," by Dan Brown, 68 downloads

* "Just Wait Till You Have Children of Your Own!" by Erma Bombeck, 64 downloads

* "The 11th Element: The Key to Unlocking Your Master Blueprint for Wealth and Success," by Robert Scheinfeld, 45 downloads

* "Bringing Down the House: The Inside Story of Six M.I.T. Students Who Took Vegas for Millions," by Ben Mezrich, 37 downloads

Source: Bergen County Cooperative Library System

Audiobooks by the numbers

Library statistics for 2005

Bergen County Cooperative Library System (73 libraries)

* Books on CD and tape in collection: 65,126

* Number of times checked out: 264,178

Passaic County Library System (21 libraries)

* Books on CD and tape in collection: 21,289

* Number of times checked out: 56,597

Sources: Bergen County Cooperative Library System, Passaic County Library System

(SIDEBAR, page L03)

Spotlight

Name: Tom Stechschulte

Occupation: Audiobook narrator/actor

Credits: Has given voice to more than 100 novels, biographies and works of non-fiction over the past decade. Won an Audi Award in 2005 for his contribution to "My Sister's Keeper," by Jodi Picoult.

Hometown: Teaneck resident for 11 years. Raised in Pittsburgh.

Family: Married, one son

Quote: "I approach reading audiobooks like any other acting role. You read the book. You hear what other people say about your character. You learn as much as you can."

(C) 2006 The Record, Bergen County, NJ. via ProQuest Information and Learning Company; All Rights Reserved