TripTales 0x101: Audiobooks

When I started off on this road trip covering the 48 contiguous US states, I knew that music playlists wouldn’t cut it for the 3 months or so I planned to be on the road. Audiobooks seemed like a good idea and I asked my friends for ideas to start off with. I had never listened to audiobooks, and I had thought that I wouldn't really enjoy the experience. As a way to break into it, a friend suggested that I start with a book that I’m familiar with and like with a good narrator – thereby getting a positive first impression. That trick worked!

My first audiobook was the cult classic “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” by Douglas Adams and narrated by Stephen Fry. I must say that the combination of the familiar text and the narrative style was amazing. It kept me going for about a week and I found that I was actually actively looking forward to getting into the car and starting to listen to the book. From that perspective, mission accomplished. I'm not going to really review this book since it’s super well known and there are innumerable reviews, summaries, references and essays on this. Probably the two most well-known references from this book are: (a) never go anywhere without your towel, and (b) the answer to the question of life and everything is 42.

My second audiobook was “A Short History of Nearly Everything” by Bill Bryson, narrated by Richard Mathews. I had started reading this in print some years ago but I never completed it and I thought this was a great opportunity for me to continue with it. As I was reading through this I found that there were references to places that would potentially be on my route. As an example, I was driving throughNew Jersey and he mentioned how at least one large dinosaur fossil was found in a region in New Jersey. Haddonfield, NJ turned out to be a 15 minute detour on my trip. He ties together different factoids and events in scientific history through the medium of human interactions and relationships. He uses feelings, relationships and sometimes just gossip and opinions as a backdrop for scientific discoveries and inventions. One thing I did notice was the lack of women in the characters that he talks about. The Curies were remarkably absent. It doesn’t take away the attractiveness and value of what he says but it does stand out as one listens to it.

It was now time to switch genres and move to looking inside myself. I started with “Surrounded by Idiots: The Four Types of Human Behavior and How to Effectively Communicate with Each in Business (and in Life)” by Thomas Erickson and narrated by David John. This book talks about the different patterns of interactions that people engage in. The title of the book stems from the commonly uttered phrase at work or at the organizations where we exclaim our frustration with our colleagues and with people around us. This book provides a context for you to understand where that frustration comes from and how to deal with it.The author classifies the personality/interaction profiles into colors along with the characteristics of each and an introduction to the techniques to identify them. By no means is it comprehensive or detailed and there are a lot of subjective statements in the course of the book. But I think this book went a long way in helping me think a little more inclusively about interactions with people.

The trend of switching genres continued and this time it was a recommendation from a friend I stayed with on this trip. “Masala Lab” by Krish Ashok and narrated by Ashish Bhandari was the next one on the list. This book is really cool and I am going to get this in print for the kitchen. But the audiobook helped me identify the characteristics of a good narrator by highlighting the flaws of a bad one. Simply put, a good narrator is like a good actor – the audience should hear and see the character first. Otherwise you are just a nuisance to be tolerated. Krish Ashok is a techie and food blogger. In this book he talks about the science of Indian cooking. I am several weeks away from getting anywhere near a kitchen but I can’t wait to get home and try some of the methods and ideas from this book. Examples of topics covered here are how pressure cooking works, what happens when you fry spices, how do you marinate meat or vegetables, the chemical reactions that happen in something as simple as boiling rice. The theme is around Indian cooking but the techniques and science are obviously not exclusive. This is definitely a book that you need to keep in the kitchen for reference and is ill-suited for an audiobook.

I felt that I enjoyed knowing more about personalities and behaviors and as I searched through the library “The Intelligence Trap: Why Smart People Make Dumb Mistakes” caught my eye. Written by David Robson and narrated by Simon Slater, this book talks about cognitive biases and how even presumably smart people get taken in by those. From there it goes to breakdown how biases happen and introduces the concept of evidence based wisdom. As an example, there are anecdotes about how Arthur Conan Doyle was completely taken in by the occult and believed in seances and spirits. He was once fooled by a picture of fairies on the planet. What I liked about the book is that it’s more than just an academic discussion of cognitive biases – the author talks about how to enhance your self-awareness to reduce the chances of your own susceptibility to the biases. I liked how the author explained how self-awareness can be cultivated and developed and it’s not just “something you are born with”.

I am currently in the first chapter of “This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession” which is written and narrated by Daniel J. Levitin. I am hoping that an audiobook format for a topic like music is just perfect and that I would learn something about how to break down music and understand more about how it impacts.