Wednesday, September 26, 2007

Audible Launches Crime Serial in Audio Only

Audible announced the launch of a serialized crime novel, The Chopin Manuscript which will be available exclusively in audio format and via audible.com. Not only is the novel a serial but it is also written by 15 different authors who have each written one or more chapters of the book. The collaboration began when Jeffery Deaver wrote the opening chapter of the work and handed it off to fellow best-selling writer, David Hewson, who wrote chapter two. Other successive authors include Lee Child, Joseph Finder, and Lisa Scottoline. The novel returned to Deaver for the final two chapters and is narated by Alfred Molina.

From the press release:

“I think The Chopin Manuscript is an important literary innovation in three ways,” observed Donald Katz, Chairman and CEO, Audible, Inc. “First, 15 of the most gifted practitioners of a very demanding and technical form of modern fiction – the thriller – came together to create a chapter of a single novel before handing the plot development to the next master. Second, the fact that the novel was written to be produced and published as an audiobook is a step forward for the literate listening category Audible was founded to develop. And finally, the work is being delivered as an episodic, high-tech-Dickensian publishing cycle, using Audible’s technology to automatically deliver a chapter at a time. In a variety of ways this grand experiment deploys technology and new techniques to open up digital media possibilities that can expand the digital audio sector and the literary form in general.”

The title is available only in audio format and available now via the audible.com website.

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