When I was eight, my parents got me the audio book of The Phantom Menace novelization (back when we were calling them "books on tape".) In the fourteen years since, I haven't even thought about buying another. There have been candidates. When Neil Gaiman announced that the American Gods recording would feature a voice actor for each character, I was ecstatic. At the time,there hadn't been much news on the miniseries, so I figured it may be the only time I'd experience a performance of the story.
Audio books are anywheree between twenty to thirty bucks, which strikes me as too pricy for something I can't (legally) check out first for free. So when Audible announced they'd be releasing a collection of R.A. Salvatore's D&D stories, read by some of my favorite celebrites, at no charge for the first month, I hit download immediately. I've had about as much experience with Dungeons and Dragons as I have with audiobooks. I've always been interested in it, but never had friends willing to learn the rules (Oh boo hoo reading hurts the brain poor thing.) Without any real game experience, I was never motivated to go out and buy any books. Really, I downloaded the thing on a whim.
The stories were recorded by a really eclectic group. Nerd icons like Wil Wheaton and Felicia Day, celebrity nerd Al Yankovic, and Ice T, who admitted he was as confused by D&D lore as you would expect him to be, "Ya'know this guy got a talking sword. It's interesting." Greg Grunberg, David Duchovney, Sean Astin , Melissa Rauch, Dan Harmon, Michael Chiklis, Tom Felton and Danny Pudi also lent their voices to the project. I strongly suggest you check the stories out, especially if, like me, you've never really experienced the audiobook medium. You can downloaded the stories here, either individually or in two parts, each running a few hours long.
