Interview with My Narrator Vivienne Leheny (Death Before Dragons, Emperor’s Edge, Agents of the Crown)

I’ve had a number of different narrators for my audiobooks (Podium Publishing usually picks someone new for each series), but for the ones I’ve paid to produce myself, almost all of them have been narrated by Vivienne Leheny. I’ve gotten to know her over the years, and she’s super fun. I decided to record an interview with her that you might enjoy. It’s up on YouTube if you want to take a listen (and even see what Vivienne’s dragon lair, er, recording booth looks like):

What we discussed:

• 1:00​ Vivienne’s home recording booth and how she set it up.
• 4:58​ How she got started in audiobook narration and what her favorite part of the work is.
• 8:10​ Can you get gigs as a new narrator by auditioning on ACX/Audible?
• 11:58​ Advice for people getting started in audiobook narration.
• 13:19​ What it takes to become a full-time audiobook narrator.
• 16:38​ What kind of recording equipment/software she uses and if it’s good enough to eliminate outside noises.
• 20:05​ How she prepares to narrate a book — reading the manuscript first or just jumping in?
• 24:55​ If she makes notes in the manuscript to help when she goes to record.
• 27:13​ Her favorite characters of Lindsay’s from the Death Before Dragons, Agents of the Crown, and Emperor’s Edge books (all of which she recorded!).
• 29:18​ How much preparation/editing/etc. time it takes to get one finished hour of an audiobook.
• 34:13​ What she does with her voice/body to get the deeper male voices or sounds.
• 40:20​ How she comes up with the voices for each character.
• 42:08​ How many times she had to practice saying Lindsay’s dragon names.
• 44:38​ How she avoids laughing in the middle of narrating some of the funny scenes.
• 47:00​ Some of her other projects and where people can find Vivienne online.

Bonus:

Vivienne has saved some of our email exchanges (so she can blackmail me I ever run for office), and we thought it might be amusing to share some of our back-and-forths on how to pronounce names:

Pronunciation questions and responses from our first gig together:

 VL:    meselkua:  Let me know if you’ve got a pronunciation preference – I’m thinking either MESS-IL-qua or misELLEqua? Or something else?

LB:  Whatever you can get your lips around works for me. 😀

VL:    YESATHRA : yeSAH-THRA?  YESaTHRUH? something else?

LB:  Looks like it pops up a few times in the story. So, do whatever you can remember? 😀 Maybe something like Yeh SAH thra

VL:    Meselkshomaleshialae:    LOL!  Uhmmm . . . any suggestions, or should I just go for it?

LB:  Oh, that was evil of the author. My buddy said to tell you to make it, “Steve” but since Delia makes a joke about it in the next line, we better make an attempt at it. (By we, I mean you.) How about: Meh selk sho mal es he ah lay

F​or Blood Ties / Agents of the Crown:

I sent a list of 44 mystifying words and names. Lindsay’s reply?

LB:  I was totally on drugs when I wrote this. Or wine. Or puppy treats. Something like that. There was influence!

​(Then she basically said, whatever you can make work is fine by me.)

Some other gems from Agents of the Crown:

1. 78  Tildar Braksnoth
2. 82  Kolinsnor Stellash
3. 96  Bondokk Makrus