How an Audiobook Gets Made (with Julia Whelan!)

Culture Study Podcast

Arts, Society & Culture

4.5 • 789 Ratings

🗓️ 28 January 2026

⏱️ 65 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

How does an audiobook narrator know how to pronounce everything? Do they have editors? How many books can they do a year? What differentiates the live voice from AI — and how do they get paid (vs. how should they get paid)? And why are so many beloved books read by Julia Whelan? WELP, FRIENDS, GOOD NEWS, WE GOT JULIA WHELAN TO COME ANSWER ALL THESE QUESTIONS. This is a conversation about mechanics and production flows and vocal health... but it's also a conversation about how we conceive of and compensate artistic labor. This one's gonna stick with you — it's certainly stuck with me. AND GREAT NEWS: WE HAVE VERY GOOD EPISODE TRANSCRIPTS NOW! They come out within 24 hours of the pod, so you just have to be a little patient and then come back and click here. We pay an actual human for help with these, so thank you for either being a paid subscriber or listening to the ads that make this model possible!If you're a paid subscriber and haven't yet set up your subscriber RSS feed in your podcast player, here's the EXTREMELY easy how-to .And if you're having any other issues with your Patreon subscription — please get in touch! Email me at annehelenpetersen @ gmail OR submit a request to Patreon Support. Thank you for making the switch with us — the podcast in particular is much more at home here!Thanks to the Sponsors of Today's Episode!Head to moshlife.com/CULTURE to save 20% off plus FREE shipping on the Best sellers Trial Pack or the NEW plant-based trial packCozy up with your pup this season! Go to ollie.com/culture and use code culture to get 60% off your first boxTake your food to the next level with Graza Olive Oil. Visit https://graza.co/CULTURESTUDY and use promo code CULTURESTUDY today for 10% off your first orderOneSkin is making it even easier to stay consistent with your skincare routine with 15% off when you use code CULTURE at oneskin.co/CULTUREShow Notes:Follow Julia Whelan on Instagram here and find out more about Audiobrary hereAn interview with Julia about the Audiobrary modelThe episode of romance podcast Fated Mates featuring Julia Julia Whelan named Spotify's Top Audiobook Narrator for 2026To give you a sense of how many books Julia has narrated, you can see 432 of them listed over at Audible (she's narrated more than 500) We're currently looking for your questions for future episodes about:New trends you've noticed in the world of MOMFLUENCERS Dark academia-- the trends, the themes, the popularity, whatever you wantHow to process all the STUFF accumulated from relatives (we have a really helpful organizer with a bunch of mental health training for this one!)What would LIFE AFTER CARS look like?? (With the hosts of the War on Cars pod!) Anything you need advice or want musings on for the AAA segment. You can ask about anything, it’s literally the name of the segmentAs always, you can submit your questions (and ideas for future eps) hereFor this week’s discussion: What did you learn about audiobook production from this ep — and how are you going to think differently about audiobooks moving forward?

Transcript

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0:00.0	Hi, everyone. This is the Culture Study podcast, and I'm Anne Helen Peterson.
0:12.2	And I'm Julia Waylon. I am an audiobook narrator, an author, and the founder of AudioBerry.
0:17.6	Okay, so we are recording this on the day after Spotify users got like their year-end reports thing.
0:24.4	Yeah.
0:24.6	And there's this new metric.
0:27.0	It's audiobook listening hours and you were the most listened to author.
0:31.6	Narrator, yes.
0:32.6	Narrator, sorry, yes.
0:33.7	You were the most listened to narrate.
0:35.4	I think I probably got some of those hours are yes from books that I also wrote.
0:39.1	But mostly, mostly it's Taylor Jenkins read and Emily Henry.
0:43.7	When you find out about stuff like that, what's your reaction?
0:47.4	Were you like, yeah?
0:49.5	No, it never is because, first of all, because there's a lot of like massive, massive books or even in genres that I don't do. And I kind of assumed, you know, I thought that like some of the romance dudes would probably take that prize. First of all, because of volume. These guys do like 70 books a year. And those listeners are rabid. And so I was, I didn't think that this was, first of all, I didn't
1:12.3	even know it was a metric because it wasn't until this year. Totally. And so, you know, it's, it's,
1:18.5	I think it's gratifying and surprising because I have cut so much back on the number of books that I do.
1:27.5	But those books are huge.
1:30.2	And I still think the scales were tipped a little bit by the women, which was such a
1:36.2	juggernaut from last year, but people are still listening to it this year.
1:40.0	So it was just a, I think it's a collection of Emily's backlist, Taylor's backlist, Kristen's
1:46.3	backlist, the new V.E. Schwab, like it, you know, just been a busy few years.
1:52.0	Yeah, totally. And I love that even, like, even when you are trying to do slightly less,
	...

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