What is an MP3-CD?

You can purchase most of Brilliance Audio, Tantor, and Blackstone audiobooks on MP3-CDs instead of standard CD. Lately, we’ve been getting a lot of questions: What is an MP3-CD? Is an MP3-CD on a smaller disc? What is taken out of an MP3 file to fit so much on one disc? Here is all you need to know and more about this great format:

An MP3-CD looks, sounds and feels like a regular CD (compact disc). However, the content file(s) is more compressed. MP3 stands for both the extension on the file and the type of file-MPEG, Moving Picture Experts Group, Audio Layer 3. (Layer 3 is one of three coding schemes for the compression of audio signals.) Layer 3 uses compression to remove all redundant and irrelevant parts of a sound signal-what the human ear doesn't hear anyway. The result in real terms is that layer 3 shrinks the original sound data by a factor of 12 without sacrificing sound quality. A regular CD holds a maximum of 74 minutes of audio, compared to the MP3-CD's storage capability of up-to 16 hours (at 96kbps). This advantage makes MP3-CDs the logical choice for audiobooks. The MP3-CDs are also broken up by chapter, have all the important information (title, author, narrator, etc.) on the disc, and were specially designed to be transferred to a portable player. Want to know how to transfer the MP3-CD to your iPod? Check out our previous blog!

-H.B.

Audiobooks on CD

I hear many complaints of CDs being faulty, skipping, stopping or being blank. Since these audiobooks are traveling through scanners, anti-theft systems and the inevitable swipe at checkout, all of these magnetized operations can corrupt the performance of an audiobook on CD or MP3-CD.

Don’t be too discouraged about your damaged CDs that the dog chewed up, got stuck in your car CD player, or if one of your children thought it was a Frisbee and it got left out in the sun. Thank goodness for audiobook publishers like Brilliance Audio who back their product and have replacement CDs available for their titles (excludes out-of-print titles) at a low cost of $5.00 per disc (that’s including shipping!).

I often get questions about the lifespan of compact discs. Wouldn’t you like your audiobook to last forever? Your CDs should last anywhere from 25-75 years. This is obviously in ideal situations. The lifespan also depends on the color of the disc you see on the recorded side because of the dyes that were used to create the discs. Green is about 75 years, nearly 100 years in gold discs, and if you are one who downloads our titles and records your own CDs, the CD-RWs last about 25 years. An ideal situation is low humidity, limited sun exposure, and stored in a dark and cool room.

If you are looking for something new and interesting, listen to Pride and Prejudice and Zombies and Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters for a fun twist on Jane Austen’s classics. As a HUGE Jane Austen fan, these made me laugh out loud and I finished each of them in one sitting because they had me so captivated. These spoofs are in a genre all their own.

—S.K.

Good Clean Listening

If you’re looking for a good clean audiobook without a lot of explicit language to listen to, I’ve come across a couple lately. Recently I’ve been listening to the Cedar Cove series by Debbie Macomber, these books have romance, a bit of suspense, and good clean listening. I often hear that people are offended with the language used in many of the books today and so when I started this series and heard no such language I was very impressed. I’ve read the first three titles in the Cedar Cove series and have enjoyed listening to them. The characters carry over to each book with the focus of each book on a particular couple or person. This is a series that I can listen to in my car with my child and not feel guilty that he’s hearing things he shouldn’t. I also just started listening to her new Christmas title The Perfect Christmas and so far, so good. If the romance genre isn’t your thing, I also recently read two mystery titles that I also classified as “clean listening”. The titles were Where Are You Now? by Mary Higgins Clark and Prime Cut by Diane Mott Davidson. These had good story lines without all the unneeded swearing, gore, and explicit love scenes that are in so many books today. If you have any additional suggestions for good “clean listening” please let us know!

-L.M.

Great Holiday Book - Mrs. Miracle

I’ve just listened to a wonderful feel good holiday story. The title of the book is Mrs. Miracle. A valuable message is delivered in this story. A message all of us should be thinking about at this holiday season. Debbie Macomber writes of a man whose wife died and left him with two small children to raise. He was a lonely widower having trouble keeping a housekeeper for his boys. Mrs. Merkle (Miracle) arrives at their house and from the moment she arrives everything changes. Her faith and spirit helped rebuild this family after the loss of the wife and mother. I consider this a must read for anyone at Christmas who may be going through trials and who need a miracle in their life.

-K.R.

Our Top Five Holiday Audiobooks

It’s that time of year! Beat the holiday blues with a great holiday audiobook. Is the weather just as frightful where you are? Stay home and take some time to wrap some of those holiday gifts while listening to one of these great Holiday books that released on audio this year:

1. The Christmas List by Richard Paul Evans

2. All I Want for Christmas by Nora Roberts

3. A Christmas Blizzard by Garrison Keillor

4. Wishin’ and Hopin’ by Wally Lamb

5. Knit the Season by Kate Jacobs

There’s our Top Five… think you have a better list? Write and tell us your Holiday favorites.

-H.B.