The "Scam"

Audiobooks. We all know what they are—the title is pretty much self-explanatory—but I, for one, had never given them much thought until someone claiming to represent  “Audible Studios” contacted me a few months ago offering to professionally produce my books,  Call Me Tuesday and Call Me Cockroach, to sell in downloadable spoken format.

Of course someone was trying to run a scam on me. What would Audible, the world’s largest seller of digital, downloadable audiobooks want with an indie author, who decided to go that route because she knew no big publishing house would want to take a chance on an unknown?  Yes, it has to be a scam, I thought, and shot back a snarky email that all but asked, how much? Even when the guy from so called “Audible” responded to clarify that they wanted to pay ME to produce the books, I was still skeptical. I Googled him and found his profile on LinkedIn. He was for real.

I was convinced that the offer was legit, but I still had questions. I’d run across other books in audio format and had casually wondered if the finished product was worth the money and extensive effort to produce it. With a reputable company like Audible taking on that burden for me, I figured I had nothing to lose. But I couldn’t help but wonder about the popularity of audiobooks. I could understand how they would be beneficial to the visually impaired, come in handy to someone who travels a lot, or make the time on a treadmill go by a little faster. Beyond that, I didn’t have a clue of an audiobook’s potential to reach readers who might be interested in my story, but I was eager to find out.  Some internet research led me to a staggering figure. Turns out, in this digital age, the audiobook industry is flourishing, estimated to be worth 1.2 billion dollars. Clearly that’s more than blind people and a few road travelers.

Audible serves customers in over 190 countries.  In addition to selling through Amazon, they are the exclusive provider of audiobooks to Apple's iTunes stores worldwide.  The Audible Service is compatible with hundreds of mobile players, including iPods, iPhones, Android-powered smartphones, BlackBerrys, Microsoft-powered smartphones, Kindles and hundreds of other MP3 players. Production values and narration quality of Audible's recordings are stellar and their efforts at creating superior audio productions have not gone unrewarded.  In 2014 they won 3 Audie awards, having been nominated as finalists in 32 titles across 18 categories.  They won Best Spoken Word Album at the 2013 Grammys (Janis Ian’s Society’s Child: My Autobiography).  Also in 2013, they won 9 Audie awards, including Audiobook of the Year (The End of the Affair) and Distinguished Achievement in Production (Dracula), having been nominated as finalists with 32 titles across all categories. This most recent Audiobook of the Year is their second, having won in 2008 for The Chopin Manuscript. With Audible Studios, I could be assured that my books would have the advantage of the best talent available in narrators and support from a great marketing team, in addition to top notch producers and engineers.

Now I was excited, embarrassed and feeling a bit stupid, but excited.  I’m all for getting my message out to as many people as possible, and if audiobooks will help accomplish that, “Then sign me up,” I said. Thanks to Audible Studios, (the real deal) a company willing to take a chance on an unknown indie author, Call Me Tuesday is now available in audiobook format through Audible: http://www.audible.com/pd?asin=B00W3ZKWKS&source_code==AUDORWS0416159DB3

Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Call-Me-Tuesday-Based-Story/dp/B00W5UF0EO/ref=tmm_aud_title_0

And also Apple iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/artist/leigh-byrne/id515690672?mt=11&ign-mpt=uo%3D4

Allyson Ryan is the narrator of Call Me Tuesday. She’s good. Her southern accent is awesome. Just listen to the sample here: http://www.amazon.com/Call-Me-Tuesday-Based-Story/dp/B00W5UF0EO/ref=tmm_aud_title_0.  She has narrated hundreds of audiobooks, and can also be heard in promos, commercials, and animation. She received an AudioFile Earphones Award for On the Divinity of Second Chances by Kaya McLaren and narrated the successful parody The Fifty Shames of Earl Grey by Andrew Shaffer. She also has an extensive stage and TV resume and appears as "Young Mom" in dozens of TV commercials.

Audible is providing a few free downloads of Call me Tuesday, the audiobook, in exchange for honest reviews or ratings on the Audible, Amazon and Apple websites. If you are interested in reviewing the audiobook please contact me via this blog, or at leighbyrne@wowway.com, and I will provide you with a code to claim your free book.

To Believe or Not to Believe

A few days ago, I was scanning over some of the recent Amazon reviews of my first book, when one in particular jumped out at me. The reviewer started out by stating that she (or he?), too, had been a child abuse victim, and fully understood the incidents described in Call Me Tuesday. That, alone, is nothing out of the ordinary. It saddens me to write that I receive correspondence—through email, Facebook, and my blog—practically every day from fellow abuse survivors, many of whom suffered through almost exactly what I did. The thing about this review that struck me, really pricked at my heart, was what the reviewer said next. She said she would love to find the courage to write her own story but, “some of the incidents are too unbearable to comprehend that people could do that to a child and people would choose not to believe it rather than to try to understand there are heinous monsters in this world disguised as loved ones.”

Her childhood was so horrible, so incomprehensible that she’s convinced there’s no use writing about it, because there would be people who wouldn't  believe her. And the dismal truth is she’s probably right. If she were to write and publish her story, there would be many who would have no problem calling her a liar. I know, because I get it all the time. Not so much to my face, but I’ve read comments online and reviews saying they think the events described in my book were either all made up, or exaggerated. It used to bother me. Make me cry. Hell, who am I fooling? It still bothers me. Still makes me cry. But I’m getting tougher. And I needed to thicken up my skin some, so for that I can thank the non-believers. Truth is, they are the reason I, and most abuse victims, never told anyone what was happening to us when we were kids. We were afraid no one would believe us. And now as adults, when we’ve finally mustered the courage to tell, those of us who’ve chosen to write it all down must live out that childhood fear again and again with every “I don’t believe” review.

Really, in defense of non-believers, most child abuse stories are unbelievable. The majority of the population (thank God) has difficulty processing such information because they can’t fathom harming a child under any circumstances. Others just don’t want to face the truth that such terrible things happen. Possibly another reason abuse books garner doubt is because, besides their obvious, sometimes jaw-dropping, descriptions of inhumane treatment of another human being, the author almost always changes the names and locations. Why? I believe I can speak for all child abuse memoirists when I say the intent of telling our stories was not to inflict harm or cast blame, but rather to help, to heal. The true names are not essential to the message, and incriminating the individuals involved, after the fact, would not be beneficial to anyone except for the purpose of revenge, which in my experience has always been a waste of energy. Using real names would only cause trouble and pain, and Lord knows we former victims don’t need any more of either one of those things in our lives.

There are probably some authors who have pulled a James Frey and published fabricated material to get attention or make a few bucks. But I can’t imagine why anyone would do this because there are too many other, more pleasant and profitable subjects to write about. Abuse memoirists actually lose a large portion of the reading population because many people would rather not read about something so depressing. Whether or not some of the books out there are exaggerated, I don’t know. Speaking for myself, I can tell you that I wrote the way I remember feeling at the time. But, as with my fellow child abuse memoirists, I was a child, and when you’re young, things do sometimes seem larger than life.

The people who never doubt stories of abuse are other abuse survivors. I remember how I reacted when I read a Child Called It, by Dave Pelzer. It’s been a while, but if my recollections are correct, the author was stabbed, forced to drink bleach and eat the contents of a dirty diaper. Unbelievable, right? Not to me. I knew his account was true, every word, because I had once faced the same evil. At the time, Pelzer’s book was one of the few of its kind on the market. Today there are many touching and inspiring memoirs and novels about child abuse available to the reader. Like with any other genre, there are some good reads and some bad ones. If you are interested in the subject, a couple of noteworthy books to consider downloading to your reader, or adding to your personal library, are Spilled Milk, by K. L Randis, a lovely novel in which the author artfully recounts how she brought her abusive father to justice, and Ghost No More, by Cee Cee James, who, unlike me, was able to rise above her abuse with dignity and grace. 

In my opinion, there can never be too many books on the subject, because volume heightens awareness. I encourage every abuse survivor to write your story, and if you feel so inclined, publish it, even though by putting something unbelievable out there for the world to read, you’re setting yourself up for some harsh ridicule. Still, the rewards are worth the risk. Publishing my books has been one of the most emotionally fulfilling experiences of my life. And probably the most therapeutic part, aside from the actual catharsis, has been connecting with other child abuse survivors.

As for the non-believers, if our shocking childhood stories don’t ring true to you, please know, we didn’t write them for you. We wrote our stories for our brothers and sisters who suffered in secret right along with us, to let them know they were not alone after all. And for the boy in junior high school who decides to speak up when he recognizes that a classmate’s actions bear a resemblance to a character's he read about in one of our books. We wrote them for those of you who want to learn, to know the signs of an abused child, and be made aware so you can attempt to make the world around you a better place.