PUNTA GORDA, Florida – Author Malcolm J. Brenner’s latest novel, Mel-Khyor: An Interstellar Affair, is now available as an audio book on iTunes, Amazon and Audible. The release marks the first dip into audio book production for Brenner and Eyes Open Media, his publishing company.
“Like most of my ventures, this was a do-it-yourself project,” Brenner said. “I chose to read Mel-Khyor because at just 210 pages the book is short and fast-paced.”
The audio was recorded with Brenner reading into an Optimus unidirectional mike while seated at his desktop computer in his living room. He recorded mostly at night to avoid ambient sounds outside, and even unplugged the refrigerator to avoid any trace of background noise.
“It took about two weeks to record the entire book,” Brenner said. He then spent a couple of months editing the recording to remove hesitations, fluffs and glitches. The process was interrupted by major surgery in April to repair abdominal hernias; Brenner was in the hospital for a week.
When editing was completed, Joe Seul stepped in. Brenner met him through the services of publicist and networker Tamara Patzer. “Joe took a raw recording, equalized it, optimized it and added a touch of reverb, which gives it depth and a slightly mysterious quality,” Brenner said. “All and all, he did a wonderful job with the book.” The completed recording runs a little over four hours.
Brenner was a novice at production, and it took him three tries to get the book accepted by ACX, the audio book distribution arm of Amazon.com. “The book was rejected for a minor background noise in one chapter and chapters that didn’t conform to the ordering format that ACX requires,” Brenner said. “Once I knew what they were, they were relatively easy to fix.”
Now that the audio book is available, Brenner is watching the results. “This is an experiment,” he said. “Even though the trade paperback copy of Wet Goddess outsells the ebook by about 10 to one, I know there are some people out there who prefer to read a book on their Kindle or listen to it during drive time. Making an audio book out of Mel-Khyor is an attempt to satisfy their desires.”
The author of Wet Goddess and Growing Up in the Orgone Box said he has no intentions at present to produce either of those works as audiobooks. “They’re both too long,” was his only comment.
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Malcolm J. Brenner 