S. Marie

Didn't translate to audio well

Reviewed: 12-16-22

I read the physical book along with the audiobook version, so I was very aware of all the decisions they made. I completely understand that this is a challenging book to translate to audio, and I actually myself read some of it out loud to someone who couldn't see it, so I was very ready to empathize with how hard this is. But I just ended up being so frustrated by the decisions made here (no idea whether they were made by Wil Wheaton or someone else, but I'm assuming it's a combination).

First, they completely ignored and left out most of the illustrations. For the ones that were just illustrating the text, that makes sense. But some of them were more text-based, had jokes, and/or were even necessary/relevant to understanding the text that came after. I was so surprised by some of the ones they just completely left out. On top of that, they *did* read aloud some of them, and it just felt so arbitrary. (To add insult to injury, they also described one illustration that was definitely unnecessary and not text-based, seemingly just because Wil Wheaton especially enjoyed it.)

Leaving out so much of what makes the book entertaining (and even understandable at times) is unacceptable in my opinion. I was reading this along with someone else who couldn't see the book, and I paused the audiobook every 15-60 seconds or so to describe what the audiobook either skipped over or made unclear.

Now, again, I'm not saying this is an easy job or that there's clearly one perfect solution. With all the footnotes and illustrations, there's no way to do it without at least some remaining issues. I fully appreciate this, but it honestly feels like they didn't even try with some of this book. So much of it was left out, and so many decisions were made that I felt were completely wrong. I know that the audiobook would be a different experience from reading the print book no matter what, but this was a whole other level that was very frustrating to experience.

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Excellent on every level

Reviewed: 05-17-20

This book was weird, hilarious, heartfelt, and brilliant. I thoroughly enjoyed every bit of it, and am very glad I read/listened to it. I'm generally not much of an audiobook person to be honest, but Daniel Lavery reads it extremely well, and I don't at all regret buying it in this medium.

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1 person found this helpful