An Interview with Narrator Annette Chown

Actor and Voice Artist Annette Chown (Abi Bansal Photography)

Hi Everyone! Hope this finds you in fine fettle. :)

I recently had the great pleasure of working with actor and voice artist Annette Chown on my latest audiobook project, MY WICKED MARQUESS (Inferno Club, Book 1). I selected her from literally dozens of strong auditions for one simple reason--ok, two: She sounds fabulous, and she really gets my writing style!

When I heard her narration, I thought, That's exactly how the story sounded in my head!

So I was really excited to find her and wanted to introduce her to my readers.

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Bristol Bridge

Annette's been extremely busy lately, but yay, she managed to squeeze in a quick Q&A session with me. Here's my little interview with her. Enjoy! (And be sure to check out the audio sample from MY WICKED MARQUESS below!) 

GF: Hi Annette! Thanks for taking the time to say hi to my readers. So, where are you from, and what else do you like to do besides narrate audiobooks?

AC: I am an actor from Bristol in England (if people have heard of the city, it's usually because of the artwork of Banksy, the music of Massive Attack or because it's the birthplace of Cary Grant and 'Vicky Pollard' of Little Britain!). When I'm not acting, I'm usually designing, writing or reading something. If you put my name into Amazon you'll find I'm also listed as the illustrator for 'Dion: His Life and Mine'. That's not a mistake, I designed the cover and some of the additional content for the book.

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GF: How did you first get into narrating audiobooks?

AC: I trained at The Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama and was lucky to receive, not only a great grounding in all the disciplines but also the opportunity to meet some great industry professionals. One of those professionals was an audiobook producer who kindly offered for us students to visit her in the studio. I took her up on her offer and she recorded some material which she passed to some colleagues who booked me for my first audiobook, 'Weird', which was also my first job after Drama School!

GF: What's the most fun part about doing this?

AC: Reading books I wouldn't have discovered, playing lots of different characters and working with very talented people.

GF: What's the hardest part of being a narrator?

AC: Playing lots of different characters in the same scene. It's like driving a car and each character is a different gear, most of the time your brain changes gear with ease, but every now and again you hear that awful crunching sound as your brain doesn't quite put it in the right one! I think there was one section in MWM where you gave me a good challenge, as I had to move back and forth between several characters with numerous accents including Scottish, Welsh and Yorkshire, over just a couple of pages!

GF: Well, you were amazing at it, lol. I sometimes wonder myself where all those people in my head come from! What else can people hear you in?

AC: I'm one of the narrators of 'Weird' by Jeremy Strong, but you'll also find me playing Molly (when she's an adult) in the BBC Radio 4 dramatisation of 'Private Peaceful' by Michael Morpurgo. I can also be heard as the voices of Ben and Lucy in the animated series 'My Friend Boo'.

GF: Fun! So what are you working on next?

AC: I wish the answer to that was 'Game of Thrones', but sadly it's not! There's a play on the horizon, but I'm largely writing for my own projects at the moment. I've just finished a short play and Arran (director of MWM) has a few audio and screen projects up his sleeve, some of which we are looking co-write/collaborate on.

GF: Oh, I'm glad to hear that, because Arran and his team at Audio Factory were great to work with. Well, thank you very much, Annette, for taking the time to talk with us today! Best of luck in your future projects, and now, you guys, don't forget to take a listen to the sample here to hear for yourselves how great she is! It was so much fun hearing Max and Daphne come to life. ;)

Gaelen

Sample from the newly released MY WICKED MARQUESS audiobook, read by Annette Chown:

Audible

iTunes

Amazon

Now Available!