What I Am Listening To: Books

I guess I am an aural learner because I do listen to a lot of podcasts and listen rather than read books. It is also part of my multi-tasking life – perhaps not always a good thing – as I often listen while doing something else. That’s particularly true on my walks, in the car, and while working in the garden.

There are many podcast apps for your phone, but you can listen to them on a tablet or computer too. Apple Podcasts lost the top spot in 2020 in the United States to Spotify, which has 25 percent of podcast listeners aged 18 or above. I still use Stitcher which I have been using for years.

I have listened to audiobooks for a very long time and listened to them on audiocassettes, then CDs and used Audible for a year. Those cassettes and CDs were borrowed from the library but Audible was a subscription and it got pricey. Then I discovered that my town library participates in Hoopla, Overdrive and Libby which allows me to borrow things for free as I had done physically from my library earlier. I use Hoopla the most and from it, I can borrow books as audiobooks and as print for my screen and also movies and music. It is a great service. Like my library, those free library services allow you to borrow/download items for a period (typically 2 weeks) after which they are returned and disappear from your device.

You can search for all these apps in your app store or online. And once you’re using the app, you can search for podcast programs related to books.

Here are a few on my devices:

By the Book – Kristen Meinzer and Jolenta Greenberg follow the rules of a self-help book and review their success or failure.

The Book Review – Pamela Paul and the editors at The New York Times Book Review talk about the top books of the time and things literary.

I also listen to a lot of author interviews. You can find them by searching for the author’s name. They often appear on shows that interview a range of people including actors, directors, experts, and authors. I’ll be posting a rather long list of the interview programs I listen to in a future post.