AudioBooks with JD

“A Bad Case of the Stripes” picture book reading!

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin -- Chapter 8 (Part 2)

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin -- Chapter 8 (Part 1)

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin -- Chapter 7

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin -- Chapter 6

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin – Chapter 5

For an explanation of the intention of this recording, click here (written) or here (spoken)

As you may have noticed, I did not do any of my usual rambling at the beginning or end of this recording! As a testament to how important it is to communicate with me if there is something I can change (because there’s a 98% chance I will do what I can to change it), this is based off some feedback I received regarding the fact that it is difficult to listen to multiple recordings in a row with my chatting, because it messes with the flow and distraction of the story. So I will not be doing that anymore, AND if you want to listen to my Harry Potter chatter-free, chapters 1-6 are right here and the rest will happen soon!

Anything I do need to chat about will be down here, easy to ignore. If you have concerns about things being written vs. spoken, please express that to me and I can link to separate audio posts sharing any info I write.

1) In the future, recordings will not have chatter before/after -- instead, anything of note will be written in the description. If this is problematic to anyone due to difficulties with processing written information, please let me know; I can post two recordings on tumblr on any given day, so I can consider still providing short audio notes separately.

2) I am editing my Harry Potter recordings to not have that chatter involved. So far, I’ve dealt with chapters 1-6, which are in one three-hour-long YouTube video [linked here]. I will get the rest of the chapters up soon, too, but it’s not a super fast process and I figure three hours of the book could hold folks over for awhile until I finish up the rest!

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin -- Chapter 4

If you listen to this -- or intend to in the near future -- please hit the “like” button. With no proof at all that anyone is actually listening, there is no reason for me to keep recording. The project is for y’all, not for me, so if I’m the only one involved with it....there’s not much sense to keeping it going!

The most basic explanation here is that, after feedback saying that I have a “soothing voice,” I’ve started posting recordings two or three times a week of juvenile chapter books which have the ability to maintain someone’s focus or distract from something else, but which does not necessarily require a lot of brain power to use. From there, you are welcome to actually use it however you wish :)

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin -- Chapter 3

Just so you know, this is only the second recording being posted from this book -- so if you missed the first one, it’s not a big task to catch up! You can find the first recording here :)

Here I’m just going to write a little description of what the heck I’m even doing; if you would rather hear the explanation via audio for whatever reason, click here

This tumblr came to be due to two pieces of feedback I received from people on my personal tumblr, some time back; that I have a “soothing” voice, and that listening to a recording I’d put out of myself reading an audiobook was helpful and comforting to listen to when they’d been having a bad night with anxiety and what-not. So I came up with this idea, to post recordings of myself reading from juvenile chapter books; something which had the ability to take up someone’s focus and keep their mind off other things, but which did not necessarily require a lot of thought processing or focus. Despite my original intention, I’m 100% content for anyone and everyone to use this in any way they wish!

I have recorded four other books already; Holes by Louis Sachar, Sideways Stories from Wayside School by Louis Sachar, Loser by Jerry Spinelli, and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stoneby JK Rowling (each title is linked to the masterpost for that book). Moving forward with this book, the intention is post a 10-15 minute recording every Monday/Wednesday/Friday -- that’ll sometimes be one chapter, sometimes two. Sometimes a bit shorter, sometimes a bit longer. No rigid guidelines!

The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin – Chapter 1 and 2

Since this is the first recording of the book, I’m going to explain a little bit what’s going on here, since some of you may not be familiar. I typically explain everything that I’m about to type at the beginning of the first few recordings of each book; since I did not do that this time, please click here if you would still prefer an audio explanation.

I started this tumblr in April 2015, and have already read the entirety of four books – Holes by Louis Sachar, Sideways Stories from Wayside School by Louis Sachar, Loser by Jerry Spinelli, and Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone by JK Rowling (each title is linked to the masterpost for that book). A few months ago, I posted a video of me reading a picture book on my personal tumblr, because I love picture books and I love sharing things with tumblr! I received (entirely unexpected) feedback from many different people that, apparently, I have a “soothing” voice; one person specified that they had been having a very rough night, but listening to the recording repeatedly had been very helpful as a comfort and a distraction. I kind of took in this feedback, and let it morph into the idea for this tumblr; I thought that perhaps I would read some juvenile chapter books to the internet – since picture books, while nice, are awfully short…as well as the added video aspect may require more focus/energy/spoons/etc. than one may necessarily have to offer – and that this could be used as a constantly-accessible coping tool or distraction. I thought that the combination of my “soothing” voice and of content that forms a legitimate and entire story – but is intended for a younger population and as such is typically pretty simple to comprehend – could work as a tool that may keep someone’s attention from other things but not necessarily demand too much from them. Or, alternatively, could be a background noise to some other activity – or could be a way to enjoy stories when processing written information is too difficult – or could just be something to do for basically any reason at all whatsoever. I started this project with a specific intention to be used as a coping tool or distraction for mental health struggles, but in reality it is 100% up to you what you do with it. If it is of use to you in any way, I have succeeded, as far as I’m concerned.

I post these recordings – aiming for ten to fifteen minutes long, though sometimes longer (such as with most of Harry Potter) – on a typical Monday/Wednesday/Friday schedule, each time at 5PM. This is a casual project for me, so the recordings are typically done in only one take, including me stumbling over words or pronouncing things horrifically wrong. Sometimes my bird tries to help by peeping a bunch, too…

Explanation of this tumblr

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone(FINAL READING!)--Chapter 17(Part 2)

Well, it’s been forever, but it’s finally here! Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone has been read, start to finish. It took literal months, but I think it was perhaps sort of worth it? If you’ve listened to any or all of these recordings, I just wanna say THANK YOU and I hope that it was somehow helpful, enjoyable, or whatever else. If you listened to any or all of these, and you wanted to send me a message with any sort of feedback, thoughts, feelings, questions, at all, anything....well, that would be phenomenal. But, of course, no pressure :)

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone -- Chapter 7 (Part 1)

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone  -- Chapter 16 (Part 2)