Meet Zara Ramm, narrator of Jodi Taylor's books on Audible
Hello all you lovely Jodi Taylor fans out there.. My name is Zara Ramm and I am the reader of all those wonderful tales from St. Mary’s.
Jodi has asked me to say a little about how I bring her brilliant words to your eyes and ears.
So where to start?
Well…..I have been an actor for twenty seven years doing mainly theatre and television. In the last ten years I have also been recording audio books as well which I sort of fell into and found I really enjoy. Which is lucky as I do quite a lot of them.
It’s a funny old job as you sit and prep the book (i.e make tons of notes and decisions about what voices and accents you are going to give all the different characters) and then spend two or three days sitting in a tiny studio with a producer in the next room making sure you don’t talk total rubbish and letting you out for a cup of tea every few hours.
You could of course risk not reading it before you record it and just wing it in the studio. Not a great idea though as you might get to the end of the recording and find out that all the characters were French!
I love a dialect so am very happy to give characters all manner of them but sometimes a change of pitch or pace is all that is needed to distinguish one character from another.
Unless specifically requested by the author I will always narrate in my own accent and then add different voices for lesser parts as I get to them, as sustaining a voice that isn’t your natural voice for a whole book is pretty demanding. I did do that with a Geordie accent once and also Glaswegian but it was quite hard work!
Reading and recording The Chronicles of St. Mary’s is always a treat...here’s to many more! Thanks Jodie for giving me the opportunity to record them and thank you readers and lovers of audio books for continuing to read and listen to them.
CLICK HERE to discover the full range of books on Audible
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Readers Q&A's
Not that it would change anything for me as a reader — St. Mary’s books are fixtures in my reading life now — but I’m so unreasonably pleased to see from your photo that you match very nearly, in real life, the picture I have of Max in my mind. It just makes hearing your voice and picturing Max that much more fulfilling.
There are very few books I will consistently pay full price for, but I can barely ever wait for the next St. Mary’s book to be released. The only thing wrong with the books is that they don’t go on FOREVER. And a lot of what I would enjoy about that — in addition to Jodi Taylor’s absolutely brilliant writing — is hearing you read them. As far as I’m concerned, out of the hundreds of audio books I’ve listened to, there is not a single other narrator I have enjoyed listening to more, and there has been absolutely NO one else who could ever do St. Mary’s books and endear them to me so thoroughly as you have done. Thank you SO MUCH for your excellent creation of every character’s voice and for revealing their Taylor-made personalities so perfectly.. Every St. Mary’s book is a gift from you and Jodi that I am thrilled to receive — I only wish that, once finished, it didn’t leave such a painful craving for another! (The short stories help…but I love love love the novels. :)
Love your voice for the St. Mary’s books. Thanks and thanks for this page. It is nice to know a little about the talent behind the audio books.
Brilliant to listen too, some lol moments, you are definitely Max for me, long may it last
This may sound weird but you read me to sleep every night – I know the books and stories so well now that I don’t really need to listen to the content just your voice. Thank you.
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