Thanks to Kindle Nation citizen Barbara-Lee, who wrote in with a question about the Kindle’s text-to-speech
I have a question I hope you can answer. Does every book I download come with audio? If so, how do I access it? If not, how do I get an audio version of the book when I order it? I appreciate any help you may offer.
Barbara-Lee
Well, Barbara-Lee, it turns out you may have asked a timely question, and I’m glad to answer.
First, the audio feature that Amazon launched in February 2009 for the Kindle 2 and the Kindle DX is called text-to-speech. It does not come with every book you download, but you can always tell, before you purchase a Kindle book, by looking at the bulleted points just below the price, where it will say “Text-to-Speech: Enabled” or “Text-to-Speech: Not Enabled.” If a book does have text-to-speech enabled, just open the ebook from your home screen, press the “Aa” font key to the right of the spacebar on your Kindle keyboard, and use the 5-way to click on “turn on” next to “Text-to-Speech.” Once it is on, you can pause or resume by pressing the spacebar, and you can go to the same “Aa” screen to regulate the reading speed or select a male or female robotic voice.
I hope that helps.
But now that I’ve said that, I just noticed for the first time today that a long-time nonparticipant in the Text-to-Speech feature, Random House, is apparently beginning to participate. When Amazon launched the feature early in 2009 Random House was the most notable abstainer, causing a serious controversy that even included demonstrations outside its Manhattan headquarters. The Random House website made it clear that none of its titles would feature Text-to-Speech, much to the chagrin of many Kindle owners.
Perhaps I have missed something, but my curiosity was piqued this morning when I noticed that I was able to listen to Text-to-Speech of Elizabeth Edwards’ Resilience: The New Afterword
However, that was enough to set me off on a minor research project when I should have been doing other things this afternoon, and I am happy to report something that certainly qualifies as news to me: about 5 to 10 percent of the newish, bestselling titles that I have been checking from Random House and its various imprints are showing “Text to Speech: Enabled.” Although 5 or 10 percent is far less than what we’d like to see, of course, perhaps it is the first trickle of a coming wave? Here are some of the Random House listings that are showing up with Text-to-Speech:
- Greedy Little Eyes
, Billie Livingston, Vintage Canada
- The Art of Fiction: Notes on Craft for Young Writers
, John Gardner, Vintage
- The Echo
, Minette Walter, Vintage
- Corduroy Mansions: A Novel
, Alexander McCall Smith, Pantheon, pre-order
- The Widower’s Tale
, Julia Glass, Pantheon, pre-order
- THE LAND OF PAINTED CAVES: A Novel
, Jean Auel, Crown, pre-order
- Casting a Spell: The Bamboo Fly Rod and the American Pursuit of Perfection
, George Black, Random House
I’ve got an email in to Amazon, but I haven’t heard back from them about whether there’s anything interesting going on here. Meanwhile, I’d be interested to hear from anyone who has noticed anything similar, or noticed it long before me….
One last thing I noticed, and didn’t like: some of those Random House pre-order prices look ominously like agency model prices. Say it ain’t so, Random House!
