NEW AUDIBLE RECORDING OF MARKET WIZARDS HAS REPLACED THE ORIGINAL
The original audio book for Market Wizards has been replaced by an entirely new recording. Why the change? The original audio book was not produced by Audible but rather acquired from another entity that had limited experience in audio book production. The narration and production quality of this original Market Wizards recording was distinctly inferior to the recordings of the other books in the Market Wizards series, which are all professionally produced with high quality narrators.
PERFORMANCE REVIEWS FOR ORIGINAL RECORDING
Below are samplings of Audible listener reviews regarding the performance for the original Market Wizards recording:
Utterly awful production of a very good book. First: This audio book is chock full of errors. Numerous reading mistakes by the narrator have gone unedited. It is distracting to the point of being virtually unlistenable. Second: The producer has put an obnoxious self advertisement at the end of each chapter. that advertisement is at an increased volume and tone. It sets one’s teeth on edge. Third: The book is a series of Q&A interviews however there is only one reader who attempts to present as both the interviewer and interviewee. He is unsuccessful. There is insufficient difference in the voice for the listener to easly distinguish which is supposed to be speaking. The writer/interviewer is very good so many questions are detailed. Hence the lack of a true second voice is often confusing.
Great book; poor reading. The concept and the content are excellent. The performance is irritating. I’m shocked no one caught two things in particular: First, “Keynesian” is pronounced “Cane-see-an” not “Kensianism”! Anyone with some economics would know that. Second, there are several places where the studio conversation is not edited out and you can hear things like “reading the interview answers now, go”.
Editing. Book was good, but the editing of the audio was the worst I’ve encountered in a book from audible. The narrator repeats words and sentences and there are a couple times where you hear him make a mistake, stop and then read the line over again. It was as if no one gave it a proof listen before it was released.
Excellent book, but the narrator needs to slow down. I was excited to see that Audible had released a recording of Market Wizards, however the narrator was very difficult to follow. He raced through the book like he was late for something without considering context or punctuation. I spent the first chapter trying to keep up with what he was saying, without being able to enjoy the story. I ended up listing the entire book at .5 speed, which is something I have never done before.
You get the idea.
CREATING A NEW RECORDING FOR MARKET WIZARDS
Over time, I noticed that while Market Wizards continued to be the best-selling book in the series, the audio version of The New Market Wizards—a book for which I had the audio rights and personally selected the narrator—consistently outsold the Market Wizards audio. This disparity did not surprise me. The Market Wizards recording was inferior, whereas the New Market Wizards narration by DJ Holte was probably the best in the series. My agent had obtained the audio rights for The New Market Wizards so I had full control of the audio book production. I posted a request for audio auditions based on a supplied excerpt from my book on ACX (the audio exchange production arm for Audible) and within a few days, I had received over 40 audition recordings, virtually all good and many excellent. After repeated listenings, I narrowed the choice down to four narrators. To help make a final selection, I enlisted ten contacts with relevant experience (e.g., podcasters, publicists, etc.), There was a clear winner—DJ Holte—who was the first or second pick of 9 of the 10 professionals whose opinion I had sought. DJ did not disappoint, and his recording of The New Market Wizards was superb.
So I not only knew that I wanted to replace the original recording of Market Wizards, but I also knew who I wanted the new narrator to be. To facilitate the creation of a new Market Wizards recording to replace the original, I provided the publisher who owned the audio rights with an offer to fully pay for a new recording. This new recording by DJ Holte is outstanding and an enormous improvement over the original. The recording is not only flawless, but DJ is a master of voice differentiation, which is critical for a book with so much conversation.
The new audio book also contains the text that was added in the 2012 edition of Market Wizards. Although the original chapters were not changed, the 2012 edition added a new preface and a new final chapter: What I Believe 22 Years Later.
Below is a link to the new audio book, which contains a sample excerpt:
