Audiobook Production
Business readers are commuters, runners, and multitaskers. Many of them will never buy the print edition but will happily listen to the audiobook on the way to work. Quartz Press produces audiobooks that reach them.
Book a Strategy CallWhat we handle
Narrator selection
You as the author, or a professional narrator matched to your book's tone and audience. We help you make the right call for your business goals.
Script preparation
Your manuscript is adapted for audio — footnotes turned into spoken asides, diagrams described, pronunciations standardised, and everything signposted clearly.
Studio recording
Professional studio recording with a director, sound engineer, and multiple takes, so the final audio sounds like a book you would pay to listen to.
Mastering and QA
Post-production mastering, pacing review, and a full quality check before the files go to distribution.
Multi-platform distribution
Audible, Apple Books, Spotify Audiobooks, Google Play, and every other major platform — reaching every listener on every device.
Author-narrated option
For many founders, narrating your own book is the right call — it builds trust and lands the voice readers came for. We coach you through it and run the studio sessions.
Should you narrate your own audiobook?
For business books, the answer is usually yes. Readers who pick up a business audiobook want to hear the author, not a stranger pretending to be them. It is one of the few places a professional narrator can actively hurt your book.
The exception is memoirs with difficult emotional scenes, books with extended dialogue that needs acting, or authors whose speaking voice is genuinely hard to follow for long periods. In those cases we bring in a professional. We will talk you through the right call on the strategy call.
How a Quartz Press audiobook gets made
A typical business audiobook runs between five and nine finished hours, which translates to roughly two to three full days in a recording studio for an author-narrated book, or one to two days for a professional narrator who works faster. We plan the recording around your calendar and break sessions into three-to-four-hour blocks — anything longer and the voice tires, the pacing drifts, and the retakes start to add up.
Before you step into the booth, we run a voice warm-up and a coaching session with the studio director to establish the tone, pace, and pronunciation choices for the whole book. We mark up the script with breath breaks, emphasis cues, and any tricky passages — proper nouns, foreign terms, technical vocabulary, and the place names your editor keeps flagging in the print edition. The director rides with you through the whole session, catching fluffs in real time and asking for retakes when a line lands flat or a sentence reads too fast.
Post-production takes roughly two weeks. The studio cleans the audio, punches in corrections, levels the chapters to broadcast standard, and produces the final master files in the technical specs Audible and Apple Books require. We then handle distribution setup, chapter metadata, cover artwork sizing, and retailer submission. First listeners can usually buy the audiobook within four to six weeks of the last recording day.
Audiobook FAQs
What if I've never recorded audio before?
Most of our authors haven't. The studio director's job is to coach you through the first hour of recording until your voice settles into the rhythm of the book. After that it becomes surprisingly natural. You do not need broadcast experience, voice-acting training, or a "radio voice." You need to be able to read your own writing out loud with conviction, and we handle the rest.
Do I have to travel to a studio?
Not always. For UK and US authors we can book a local professional studio so you do not need to fly. Remote-directed sessions are also possible for authors who already have a treated room and a broadcast microphone — though most business authors prefer the studio option for the quality uplift and the absence of distractions.
Will my audiobook be on Audible?
Yes. We distribute through the major platforms: Audible, Apple Books, Spotify Audiobooks, Google Play Books, Kobo, and Chirp. You retain the rights to the audio and can re-upload, re-brand, or produce a second edition at any point.
Related services
Ready to produce your audiobook?
Book a strategy call and we will talk through narrator options, recording schedule, and distribution for your book.
Book a Strategy Call