0:09UU
Take a look.
00:24S1
Hello and welcome to Hear This. I'm Frances Keyland and this is the Vision Australia Library show, talking about books in the Vision Australia collection and talking about authors and narrators as well. And today we have a special guest, Robert DeGraauw, with us talking about the Vision Australia produced books and some of the wonderful narrators behind those books. And I'm very happy to be in the studio today with Robert de Graauw. Robert is the senior audio producer here at Vision Australia. And he brings some wonderful books to life or starts the process of getting the books recorded for people. Hi, Robert.
01:08S2
Hi, Frances. How are you?
01:09S1
I'm really well, thanks. So can you tell me about your role at VA as senior audio producer?
01:16S2
Yeah. Basically, I oversee the recording of the audio books for Vision Australia's library. So I train up new narrators. I try to match them with appropriate books. I schedule them to come in to record. I troubleshoot any problems they might have in the studios. So, they might have technical issues with the equipment or the software. So I'll sort of help resolve those for them. Or they might have, pronunciation issues that they want to check with me about. And when the book is being finished, I tend to proof and edit the material. I will help, uh, volunteers that come in to do the same sort of work proofing and editing.
01:50S1
How many narrators does Vision Australia have?
01:54S2
We have about 50 narrators, and that's split between the ones that come in for the library books and the ones that do magazines, and what we call personal support, which is material that's recorded specifically for individual clients.
02:06S1
How are the books chosen to be produced?
02:09S2
I think it's largely through borrow, borrow requests. But also I think that the library select books that they know are full within genres that are particularly popular with our borrowers, like outback romances and, you know, things like that.
02:23S1
So they're still heavily requested outback romances, I believe.
02:26S2
So, yep, yep.
02:26S1
And, a crime is still a good crime.
02:30S2
It's fairly popular. And biographies.
02:32S1
Some of the books that come through the collection are ones that you may not see, particularly on other library shelves in the in the print world. And they're often people put through suggestions, um, based on maybe family memoirs and things.
02:48S2
Yeah, yeah, occasionally we'll do books from very small or niche publishers, ones that may not necessarily get much of a profile in regular bookshops. If a book has been like self-published, it's more likely the case that that will be one that's recorded as a personal support job, because it might be that someone who knows that author that has self-published this book wants to be able to listen to it, and then it gets put through as a request to be recorded for that specific person.
03:13S1
Yeah. So there's all different departments of Visual Australia involved. S o that would be personal support where a library member can get up to how many pages a year.
03:21S2
It's 350 pages for free. Yeah. They request all sorts of things. It might bea novel or it might be some academic textbook. It might be... a microwave manual. I know that there are some clients that request bank statements to be recorded on a regular basis, but yeah, certainly a lot of, like, self-published material, things like that. So come through. Yes.
03:43S1
A really good department, weaves in and out of people's lives in all sorts of ways. From the time Vision Australia are given the book to produce. What is your part in that first process of getting it ready?
03:56S2
I will read some of the book to get a sense of what sort of voice is required to do the book well, and so try and find a narrator that is appropriate. So in terms of age and gender and the sort of voice that they have, you find some people are particularly suited to non-fiction and are not very good when it comes to dialogue. And so you would yeah, tend to avoid giving them novels and so on. Um, and some people have a facility with, with foreign languages. That means that if it's a book set in France, you know, they'll be more suited to doing lots of French phrases and so on, um, sort of convincingly. So, yeah, you just keep those things in mind when you're trying to find the appropriate... narrator. Then once you have contacted them and asked if they're available to do this, you'll schedule them in to do however many sessions it's going to take to get the book done.
And then I have to prepare the book for being recorded on our computers. We have specialised software for doing book recording format, the book for recording in that way, and also make up the announcements that need to be recorded at the beginning and end of the book. And, yeah, when the narrator comes in, they provide the assistance, as I mentioned earlier, occasionally I will actually work directly with the narrator as a producer. There are some circumstances in which it just makes sense to actually have a one on one recording session where, um, they're not worrying about the technical side of things. That's that. That will be my job when it's finished. As I said, it gets proofed. And, then I will sort of do whatever edits are required, or else sometimes we will get the narrator back in. To fix up sentences that need to be, you know, corrected. And and yeah, then it goes off to be mastered and then upload it to the servers of the library so that people can download it to their device.
05:34S1
Well, it's quite a, quite a process, quite a lot involved. And also you are a narrator yourself. How long have you been narrating and roughly how many books have you narrated? Robert?
05:45S2
I've been writing for about 11 or 12 years now, and I think I've narrated about 60 books because I lack a certain resonance in my voice. Probably not good for gritty crime thrillers and things like that, but I still feel like I can do justice to a lot of young adult sort of material. So yes, I've done a fair bit of that, as well as, occasional non-fiction books like I did go to the history of Australia from a humorous perspective, which I really enjoyed. So a variety of things.
06:13S1
I understand you've got some samples or you have some samples to play of recent books from the Vision Australia studios.
06:18S2
Yeah, yeah. These ones, uh, that we've produced in the last or say six months that I think have turned out quite well and, and would be a lot of interest to our borrowers. I think I'll start with, uh, our new book by Paul Jennings, who's been a popular children's book author for many years. And although people remember the, um, the unreal series of short stories that, he'd produced, he's written a book called A Different Boy. It's a book about a boy called Anton who escapes from an orphanage where he's being treated horribly and hides on an ocean liner. Very scared boy, while he's on this, on this ship. But he meets some other passengers who have their own sort of secrets, and, it's... yeah, I won't say any more, but, it's... a nicely written book, and this one's been narrated by Paul Whitford.
07:02S1
Paul Whitford. Okay. So he's one of the, stable of he is in the stable yet is it for young adults or children or...
07:09S2
So it's the children. Maybe. Oh, if I had to guess, maybe 8 to 12. And it's apparently been longlisted for the 2019 Carnegie Medal.
07:18S1
Oh, great. Yeah. Oh, well, a good author in there. And so Paul Whitford is the narrator. Let's have a sample then, of A Different Boy by Paul Jennings, narrated by Paul Whitford.
07:28S3
Anton stared at the choppy grey sea. Now that the wintery sun had dipped below the horizon, he was cold. He shivered and leaned over the solid rail that ran around the ship far below. The waves reached up as the bow dug into a trough. He looked around at the deserted deck. He had to find somewhere to hide. Somewhere warm. The realization began to sink in. He was a stowaway. If he was discovered, he would be sent back to the orphanage. Maybe not right away, but at the first port there would be other migrant ships returning from the land of his dreams. They could put him on one of them. He would never get to the top of the waiting list. There was no waiting list.
08:21S1
That was A Different Boy by Paul Jennings. And the narrator was Paul Whitford. What other books do you have for us, Robert?
08:28S2
I have a book for young adults called How to Grow a Family Tree by Eliza Henry Jones. And this one. There's a girl called Stella who, her family find that they have to move to a caravan park because of their father's gambling addiction. And she tries to hide this from her friends. She also has to deal with another dramatic event in her life, which is, her actual birth mother sends her a letter. And the consequences of that basically form the basis of the, you know, the narrative in the novel. It's well written, but also it's been beautifully narrated by a new narrator of ours, who is probably one of the youngest people we've actually had in our stable of narrators.
Her name is Madeline Davis. She's a high school student who I had found performing at my son's school in a in a high school production of Chicago. She did such an amazing job on the stage that I asked the school if she might be willing to consider doing some audiobook production, and so this is her first book, and she did an amazing job. She's just a natural for this. So I yeah, thoroughly recommend, you know, if anyone wants to listen to this, they'll be as impressed as I was by her amazing narration.
09:33S1
Oh, let's have a listen then. What was the title again?
09:36S2
It's called How to Grow a Family Tree by Eliza Henry Jones, and the narrator is Madeline Davis.
09:42S4
It'll be like a holiday, my mom says, beaming at us with her head vein throbbing. Fairyland caravan park. My sister Taylor looks across the table with such disgust that I almost feel sorry for mum. It's the termites, mum says, although we know it's got nothing to do with termites, having to sell our home has everything to do with dad getting laid off and developing a strong attachment to the pokies down at the pub, which is why mum's telling us the bad news and dad's outside hiding somewhere. If he'd been in here, I'm pretty sure Taylor would have reached across the kitchen table and ripped out his eyeballs. I'm not going, Taylor says. I've never met anyone else like Taylor. She's short, like dad, and wears her powdery blonde hair very short, although she's got this very sweet, gentle voice. She's extremely brutal. I spend most of my life walking into things and falling over, and yet Taylor's still responsible for more of the scars and marks on my body than I am.
10:46S1
That's a lovely story, you know, sort of discovering a narrating star. Good on you. And what's next?
10:54S2
I have a book, a non-fiction book called Tonga. The subtitle is First Nations Leader and Tasmanian War Hero by Henry Reynolds and Nicholas Clements. And this book is being narrated by Anthony Campbell. I don't know if many people are familiar with tongue. He was a leader of the oyster Bay nation of south east Tasmania in the 1820s and 30s. Apparently, he, he and his allies prosecuted the most effective frontier resistance ever mounted on Australian soil, inflicting some 354 casualties on just reading of the synopsis here.
His brilliant campaign inspired terror throughout the colony, forcing Governor George Arthur to counter with a massive military operation in 1832. The longer they escaped, but the cumulative losses had taken their toll. On New Year's Eve 1831, having lost his arm, his country, and all but 25 of his people, the chief agreed to an armistice in exile on Flinders Island, tongue, along with our united remnant tribes, and became the settlements king, a beacon of hope in a hopeless situation. And this book has received a lot of acclaim from various historians and academics and so on, and, uh, and yeah, who feel that it's, um, a fairly unknown part of Australian history that a lot of people should be more aware of. Yeah, it sounds like a fairly important book.
12:05S1
Well, let's hear a sample of Tonga Longitude by Henry Reynolds and Nicholas Clements, narrated by Anthony Campbell.
12:12S5
Tonga, Longitude and Montpelier were well aware of the fear they inspired in their enemies. Under their leadership, oyster Bay and big River war parties relentlessly terrorised the intruders. Chiefs who wore distinguishing warpaint appeared doubly menacing when Tonga longed to and his warriors besieged their victims, they taunted them and shook their spears. When they fell upon them, they hurt them in ways that sent a chill up the spines of every colonist. The fear they produced in the minds of exposed settlers and convicts was often paralyzing. In a shaky hand, one servant wrote to his master, you have often been warning us a. Against the natives. We always said they would never come here, but alas, they have made their appearance. Poor Crowhurst and York are dreadfully speared. We don't expect Crowhurst to live, but one of the men that came galloped off as fast as ever he could to Doctor Peyton. Now, what is to be done? I am frightened out of my life.
13:15S1
That was Tonga Longitude by Henry Reynolds and Nicholas Clements, narrated by Anthony Campbell, produced in Vision Australia studios. And there's another book that you've got for us.
13:26S2
I actually have a book of poetry here called The Flaw in the Pattern by Rachael Meade, narrated by Marilyn Barclay. This book of poetry traverses across a lot of nature based poems, poems about nature and humanity's place within the landscape, and so on. I mean, it opens with poems about the poet's walk on the Tasmanian Overland Track, and then it closes with poems about camping in the wilds of Antarctica and facing a bushfire in Baskett Range in the Adelaide Hills. And they're just beautifully written poems. And I'm not someone who generally is into poetry, but even I can recognise how how creative and beautifully written these are. So yeah, actually I've got a sample from, from this book that I thought people might like to have listened to, which hopefully you can play for us.
14:10S1
So let's hear a sample now of that, of that poetry book. What is the title again?
14:16S2
The poetry book is called The Flaw in the Pattern by Rachel Mead, the...
14:20S7
The Wild Grammar of Leach's Kia ora Creek de five. I shed my clothes like an awful first draft, splashing river on my face and into places used to their own company. In the sibilant rush. After so many days on the trail unwashed. My mouth makes loud vowels of shock and appreciation. And my soul slip across the rock skin like speed readers fingers. I looked down to find my body being edited, its pages harshly corrected with black punctuation. My hands slap at apostrophes and commas, these possessives and contractions claiming my blood. They engorged into dashes Emily Dickinson would covet and full of stolen content, they race end for end across my skin, challenging my sensitive narrative with their bold third person revisions, opening and closing quotes with anarchic abandon.
15:21S1
And that was narrated by Marilyn Barclay's. Never. But there's one more.
15:26S2
Yeah, there's a collection of short stories that we recorded recently called Here Be Leviathans by Chris Flynn. It's, a pretty amazing collection of stories that really kind of pushed the boundaries of what you would expect in a short story, in the sense of who was telling these narratives because he has a grizzly bear telling his own tale after he goes on the run after eating a teenager. He has a hotel room talking about his involvement in the conception of a child between a couple. Oh, wow. There's a genetically altered platypus colony that puts on an art show a sabre-toothed tiger that falls for the new addition to its theme park. There's a Shakespearean monkey test pilot that gets launched into space.
Wow. So these are all characters or creatures that are telling their own tale. So it's all first person narration. So it's very unusual for that perspective, but they're all very well told. And, and it takes place in a variety of regions around the world. And, the storm drains into Las Vegas, the Alaskan wilderness rainforest of Queensland, Chile and coastline. Yeah, it's it's a really interesting way that he sort of pushed the boundaries of a short story. Yeah. By examining human behavior from the perspective of the outsider, I guess is, is the way they describe it in the book. I've actually ended up being the narrator of this, this book. And I've included an excerpt from one of his stories called 22 F, which is about an airline seat that's lamenting its last useful day.
17:00S1
Okay, let's have a listen to this book. And the title again.
17:04S2
The title of this story is 22 F, and the book as a whole is called Here Be Leviathans, narrated by yourself.
17:10S1
Let's hear a sample.
17:12S2
The first day in a new workplace is always nerve wracking. So many new faces, a bewildering stream of introductions, the establishment of hierarchy. Who will I like? Who would the snipers, the gossips to avoid, which boss is friendly and which ones are sleaze who will gladly help? If you're unsure about an unfamiliar IT system, where are the bathrooms? Where they always are, of course, situated at the rear of the aircraft, in the midsection, over the wing and at the back of business class. Smoking is not permitted at any time. Detectors have been installed. Should the seatbelt sign be illuminated, please return to whichever of us you were allocated.
Personalities become apparent within the first week. There are the jokers always primed for a quip or sarcastic comment about a passenger. 19 B and 16 D are the worst. They never let up. It's a constant battle of one upmanship to see who can tell the most outrageous story. They go too far, sometimes leeching the humor out of the situation. Then there are the depressives who hate their jobs and constantly complain about matters beyond our control delays, spillages, rowdy children. At first I lent a sympathetic ear, but you can only listen to someone gripe about the same old things for so long before you start avoiding them. I wish 20 C could hear themselves. Sometimes you would think they had the worst life imaginable.
18:32S1
Oh, that was great. Thanks, Robert. What an unusual book. Um. Oh. Reminds me, there's a bit of a trend now. I know there's a book in the library that I had on the show recently, which was about blue poles. The famous painting.
18:45S2
That's right.
18:45S1
Yes, yes, yes.
18:46S2
And again, it's similar in the sense of taking a very unusual perspective of who was telling the story. Yeah.
18:53S1
Another thing about these wonderful narrators that volunteer their time for narrating the library books, they don't really get to hear much feedback.
19:02S2
Generally not. No. I mean, once upon a time when people used to get the books from us, they used to be sent the books in these boxes, which had initially cassettes and then later on CDs. And when they'd finished listening to that, that book, often a lot of people would write a bit of a note just putting down their thoughts on the book or on the narrator and include it inside the box that would then get sent back, and then we would take the note out and and save it. And, you know, if it was something that we think the narrator might like to read, then we would pass it on to them. Or if it was, you know, just compliments on the library service as a whole.
It's something that obviously people in the organisation would be quite happy to, to read and be made aware of, just to, to know that the service is being appreciated in that way. It's not something that we have received so much of lately. And so it would be nice to be able to get more of that feedback again and for the narrators to get some of that feedback, too.
19:54S1
Yeah, that's good if you. So if you do get a book that is narrated by Vision Australia, um, in the beginning of the book, there's that announcement. Just let the narrator know. That'd be lovely. I mean, you could always email or ring the library on the numbers that we supply at the end of the show. Having been one of those people that went through the notes, I must say what a useful way it was to be able to know what was getting good feedback, you know, in the library and be able to recommend it to other people. And also just some of the most heartfelt feedback you were sure.
20:28S2
I remember numerous notes from people who say that the library service kind of provided a lifeline for them after they had lost their sight, and felt that they would never be able to enjoy literature again, that they were able to continue their love of books through listening to audiobooks. That connection, that Vision Australia had provided for them, um, was a really special to them.
20:49S1
It was. And yeah, so many, so many wonderful notes and even letters. People would fold up a letter and put it in the box. And um, that was lovely to get those. And so again, if you do get one of the Vision Australia books, email or leaving the library and just mention, Marilyn Barclay comes to mind simply because I know I'm, she's narrated a lot of books in the library now or anybody, and that gets passed on to the narrators so often it feels a bit like, you're doing this work, but not getting much feedback. So narrators love that. It's a bit of a kick of a kick of, yeah, a kick in.
21:24S2
Otherwise, I sort of feel like they're doing this work that, you know, can be a lengthy project, but it just goes out into the void and they never hear anything more about it.
21:32S1
That's why putting it. Yes. And you know, you're in a studio for two hourly or.
21:36S2
Well, three hourly sessions over maybe, you know, eight weeks to record a book at the end of that, they never hear about it again. Yeah.
21:44S1
So yeah, keep that in mind. You know, Vision Australia narrators. We'd love to get some feedback. And thank you, Robert, for coming in today. Uh, that's Robert DeGraw, senior audio producer. Thank you so much. Thank you. Francis. You're listening to hear this on Vision Australia Radio. Thank you to Robert DeGraw, senior audio producer and narrator here at Vision Australia. And I went through some books and recommendations, and there is a recommendation for a book by an Australian author, Kate Mildenhall. The book is called The Mother Fault and it is narrated by Robert DeGraw. And here is the synopsis.
You will not recognise me, she thinks, when I find you. Nim's husband is missing. No one knows. We've been is. But everyone wants to find him, especially the department. And they should know the all seeing government body has fitted the entire population with the universal tracking chip to keep them safe, but suddenly Ben can't be tracked and MIM is questioned, made to surrender her passport and threatened with the unthinkable her two children being taken into care at the notorious Best Life cornered meme risks everything to go on the run to find her husband and a part of herself long gone that is brave enough to tackle the journey ahead. From the stark backroads of the Australian outback to a terrifying sea voyage, Nim is forced to shuck off who she was mother, daughter, wife, sister and become the woman she needs to be able to save her family and herself. Let's hear a sample of this book. The Mother Fault.
23:27S2
Meme runs hot water in the sink, plunges her hands beneath the suds, and gasps at the scald of it. Ben is particular about knives. She has to hand washed them even with the restrictions. She runs the blue cloth up and down each blade, feeling the smooth heat of the steel. Missing. He is missing. Your husband is missing. Mum. She turns to her daughter, leaning over the kitchen bench, scowling, still in a soccer gear. She is long legged and ponytailed. It is untenable how much longer she gets each day. Essie holds at her screen the friendship project. You haven't signed the form. There is always something else. You sure? I didn't sign it already? Essie sighs. No you didn't. Everyone else got to start uploading today and I didn't because you haven't signed the form. MIM takes the screen. Apologizes, swipes her fingers in a squiggle across the flashing rectangle. Thank you. As he says, taking the screen back and muttering, wasn't that hard, was it? Careful. Meme says, trying to keep her tone light. Tell Sammi bath time, can you? Since when did 11 year olds have so much attitude? Ben will laugh when she tells him. MIM puts one hand on her sternum, thinks she will vomit. Keep it together.
24:51S1
So that was a Vision Australia production audio production there. The Mother Fault by Kate Mildenhall. Kate is Kate, that's Kate Mildenhall is [spells the name], narrated by Robert DeGraw. And again, we're looking for feedback for our and wonderful narrators here at Vision Australia. And that book goes for eight hours. It is coming up to Anzac Day, 25th of April. So I thought I'd play a sample of a book titled Larkins in Khaki by Tim Bowden, with a reputation for being frank, hard to discipline, generous to their comrades, and for sticking it up to any sign of pomposity.
Australian soldiers were a wild and irreverent lot, even in the worst of circumstances during World War II. In Larkins in Khaki, Tim Bowden has collected compelling and vivid stories of individual soldiers whose memoirs were mostly self-published and who told of their experiences with scant regard for literary pretensions and military niceties. Let's hear a sample of Larkins in Khaki by Tim Bowden. It's from WAV sound, and it's narrated by Stephen Hunter.
26:11S8
There is a possible apocryphal story told of two Aussie diggers experience in the trenches of World War one. General William Birdwood, an Englishman, commanded the Anzac Corps and by mid 1916 the Anzacs were in action on the Somme. You can imagine the trenches churned, mud, duck boards and shell hold no man's land. Two diggers are leaning against the side of a trench, smoking and holding their 303 rifles in one hand. They watch a senior British officer, followed by a gaggle of attendant junior officers, pick their way briskly along a frontline trench. The diggers don't take their eyes off the officers, but they don't shift to allow a wider passage, and they don't salute. After the senior officer is passed, a junior officer spins round and comes back. He says, don't you know who that was? The diggers. Consider the question. One answer is not you ever met him, Barney? No. Not me, junior officer. That was General Birdwood. The first digger says, well, he didn't have feathers on his ass like any other bird would.
27:23S1
And that was a sample of Larkins in Khaki. Tim is Tim Bowden is [spells it...] maybe pronounced Bowden and I apologise if I do have that wrong. And that book is a longish one. It goes for 13 hours and 20 minutes, and it's part of the really large non-fiction military history, that we have in the library collection.
Thank you all for joining us on here this today. Thanks. Robert de Graauw, Senior Audio Producer. And again, just give us some feedback about the narrators that can get passed on. You don't have to give your names as well, just simply the feedback if you want. And it will get passed on to those wonderful narrators. If you would like to join the library, if you would like to add your voice to what books you've been enjoying, you can email library@visionaustralia.org ... that's library - at Vision Australia - dot - org... or you can call 1300 654 656. That's 1300 654 656. Have a lovely week and we'll be back next week with more Hear This.
