Free Time and Experimentation With an "Audiobook"

If, as an author, you're online long enough, you accumulate a lot of subscriptions; free subscriptions in my case, because I'm no fool. Some book promo sites send a weekly compilation of writing-related articles; some professional orgs offer interesting tidbits of info. If I was working, there would be no way I'd ever peruse all this info.

Now, though, I often find myself looking for things to do, so reading or at least scanning articles has become a welcome diversion. That's how I learned about Spoken. I can't say that I'm entirely sure how it works, but since I qualified for its free beta program, I figured, why not give it a whirl? As best I can tell, it's yet another AI program for creating audiobooks, but it supposedly has advantages over the usual AI offerings. I don't know yet, because before I could test it out, several preliminary things needed to be done.

While the site's instructions specified a 14,000-word upload limit, I was disinclined to try splitting my novel's manuscript into pieces, so I tried uploading the entire thing, and it worked. I'm still assuming it will only turn the first 14,000 words into an audio project. 

Before I was able to upload, I had to add specific tags at each break (or in my case, chapter), and of course I didn't do it correctly. I added the tag as a line above each chapter heading, instead of on the same line, so I had to go back and redo the whole thing (and I have forty chapters!) Finally, the upload worked, but by then it was late and I wasn't in the mood to play around with voices or any of that stuff. Spoken did recognize that my story is character-driven and it offered me the option to choose multiple voices for narration. I thought, why not? So, it set to work (apparently) locating appropriate narrators.

Next day, Firefox wouldn't let me access the site. Had it become malware overnight? I tried pulling it up with the Edge browser, and that's when I learned that the site was undergoing maintenance. Maintenance lasted the entire day. Then yesterday I wasn't in the mood.

So, now I'm at the point in which Spoken separates characters in preparation for assigning voices to them. It's too dumb (no offense) to know that Leah, Layah, and Narrator are all the same person, but the app does allow me to merge characters, which I also had to do with "Leah's Mom", "Layah's Mom", and I think "Mother".  I am a bit perplexed by characters it has labeled as, "Oldster", "A Woman", "Singer", "A Guy", etc., because I'm pretty sure whoever they are, they're not vital to the story. There's even "Photographer", who doesn't even speak. Frankly, the app has listed every single name referenced in the novel, and I can't find a way to get rid of them. (FYI, Spoken, the ATM is not a character. Nor is "weather app".)

So, I'm already overwhelmed and I haven't even done anything yet. Its Editor Tips state:

Add a line break to separate a passage into two passages

Place your cursor at the beginning of a passage and backspace to merge passages

Add a line break at the beginning or end of a passage to create a new passages (sic)

Adding "----" creates pauses in narration.

Place words in (parentheses) to emphasize them.

Use Fine Tuning to change speed, volume, or padding (the length of the pause before the narrator starts the passage).

Add up to 3 seconds of break within the text of a passage by adding <break time="1.5s" />

To assign a passage to a new character, choose "Add New" at the bottom of the character list for that passage.

It all sounds far too complicated, and I haven't even begun to look for voices. The bottom line for me is, I can't be an audiobook do-it-yourselfer. I wish I could, because I certainly can't afford to hire a voice actor. 

But as I stated at the beginning, my free time allows me to explore things like this, whereas authors with actual jobs are already juggling too much. When I was working full-time, I skimmed (or simply deleted unread) communications, and I may have missed something valuable. Now, at least I'm "in the know".

I'm still a big believer in trying things, and thus I gave Spoken a spin. I don't know if I'll go back and choose voices for my (apparently) thousand different characters, but I really should, just for fun.

And AI will continue to get better and better, someday allowing penniless authors like me to compete. I'll keep reading to make sure I don't miss it.