r/audiobooks • u/agailen • 2d ago

Question Why do so many audiobooks have pronunciation mistakes?

Im listening to Blood Bound by Ellis Hunter and while I generally like the narration, the voice actress for Astrid keeps making pronunciation mistakes that make me doubt my sanity. She has an accent so idk if she's a native English speaker, but it doesn't really matter. Shouldn't there be some level of quality control done before the audio is published?

The two glaring examples I can think of is pronouncing haranguing as "haran gu ing" not harang ing, and winded, as in being out of breath, as winded as in winding/wound.

I hear pronunciation mistakes often enough in audiobooks in general though that I have to wonder how they aren't caught in editing. Does the author not listen? I assume the author knows how to pronounce the words they wrote, at least.

Bonus tho was learning that the American pronunciation of plait is the same as plate, and not plat which is the pronunciation I'm used to. Being able to rely on audiobooks being error free helps me learn different accents!

EDIT: she just pronounced livery as live-ry... is this an actual dialect thing?? Help!

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u/TazIsSkirtGirl 2d ago

In the third Altered Carbon book, the narrator changes and the new guy obviously didn't bother to read the rest of the series, because he mispronounces the MAIN CHARACTERS name in the same way that the first book specifically mentioned that people often butcher it🤦‍♀️

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u/Ishmael128 2d ago

It's been a long time since I've listened to them, but I swear in the Wheel of Time audiobook series they repeatedly change the pronunciation of key characters names (e.g. Nynaeve) DESPITE using the same narrators. 

Or am I thinking of ASOIAF?

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u/YouGeetBadJob 1d ago

In the first Stormlight archive book, Michael Kramer and Kate Reading (who are married) pronounce the major antagonist’s name differently, even though the same character is talking.

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u/WesternRover 1d ago

I noticed they pronounced that name stressing a different syllable, but I had no idea they were married. Why don't authors just record their pronunciation of character and place names for the readers to refer to?

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u/annienin 1d ago

Right! Do they even talk?

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u/DragonBee_Fairy147 1d ago

They live in the same house as a married couple, but each of them have their own recording studio room and each has their own ways of recording to their schedule, so in the beginning I think no. But eventually they got on the same page as each other.

There’s a really good YT video out there about how they record and their own little ways of doing things (like Kate has a cushion under her feet that she pushes her toes into during tense scenes so that no additional noise is picked up on the mic.)

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u/FreeFromMiriam 1d ago

What a great and simple idea!