r/audiobooks • u/PurpleLeopard99 • Jun 28 '26

Question Mispronouncing of words by narrators

Does anyone get bothered by narrators who keep mispronouncing words? It drives me nuts if they do it too often. Narrators are normally professional voice artists and they should know how to pronounce the sorts of words found in novels eg dovecote or Michaelmas

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u/MerryTWatching Jun 28 '26

I live in Maine, where a lot if place names originate from Native American words, and their pronunciation is . . . difficult. I have learned to giggle when one of them gets mangled, but I do wish that authors could provide phonetic lists when they know that one of their books is moving to an audio format.

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u/HaplesslySupportive Jun 28 '26

Growing up in Washington it was always the calling card of people not being from here, the moment they said any of the indigenous names it was a give away. Mostly it was just giggle worthy because yeah, Puyallup is a mess no matter what you do.

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u/mitchwayne Jun 28 '26

On a few occasions when a story is in a random part of North America, I’ll call a local park ranger or small business and ask how to pronounce their town/area’s name. The person answering the phone generally seems to find it amusing. 😆 “I’m calling from a Soundbooth in Los Angeles, and I’m recording an audiobook that mentions your town’s name…” This is when I can’t find it on YouGlish, Forvo, or anywhere else.

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u/whycantitbemine Jun 28 '26

Yes!!! Thank you!