Consideration for listeners?

[The Din]

I'm a bit of a minimalist when it comes to dialogue tags and thus some of my speakers are often only differentiated by changing paragraphs and other grammatical techniques, which make it (hopefully) obvious to the reader who is speaking. Just wondering if it's the writer's responsibility to paint it black and white so that someone listening to it (audiobook, etc.) knows exactly what's going on?

Would it ever be expected that a writer make two versions of his novel? One for readers, one for audiobook?

I can just imagine some monotone grandfather reading my writing to his kid and confusing the s**t out of him.

 

[Steerpike]

The readers who do the recording of audio books generally alter their voice to some extent to reflect different speakers.

 

[Benjamin Clayborne]

I don't think anyone would expect this. Even for long passages with no tags, it still should be easy to keep track of who's saying which dialogue. If not, then it hasn't been written very well.

For conversion to audiobooks, you might end up with a case where the narrator adds a tag here and there just to keep things a little clearer, and (as steerpike said) they'll usually use different voices for different characters so that it's more obvious who's speaking.

 

[TWErvin2]

The audio version of my first novel will be released in the next week or so (the completed audio file has been submitted, and whenever Audible.com and the other outlets post it as available), so I am speaking from my experience in that, as well as having listened to a large variety of audiobooks--and having read the print versions as well.

I have not come across a version yet where the text, including dialogue tags, has been altered from the print/electronic book version. As Steerpike indicated, often the voice artist/reader will alter the voices for the dialogue, although I've come across a few versions that were read straight, without alteration of the characters' voices in dialogue. There was a dramatization version of the Hobbit, where I don't think they had the tags, with others reading the various voices and parts, but I cannot say for sure. I saw it on the library shelf one time and read the description. There was a company called Timberwolf Press (I think) that did dramatization type readings, with plenty of sound effects, but I don't know if they altered the text from a print/electronic version. I looked at submitting a story to them quite a few years back before they folded up shop.

For someone reading to a child or someone else (as indicated in the OP), the dialogue tags would be handy (as well as the context/action) for the listener to keep track of who is doing the talking, just as in an audio book version.

Some folks really enjoy audiobooks, while others don't care for them, or some of them, based on the voice/tone/pacing--just like in some books translated to a movie, the reader doesn't think the actor(s) selected match up with what their mind's eye had imagined.

As far as who does the reading, it depends on the publisher--even if an audiobook is created. I was fortunate in that my publisher allowed me to listen to the reader's audition for reading the novel and okay it before the process moved forward.

I can say that it's pretty neat listening to someone else read my work.