www.librivox.org is a volunteer organization that makes books in the public domain available as audio books for free download. The audiobooks are available from librivox.org, or you can download though iTunes for free or use some cheap apps. Personally i like Sci-fi short story collections, Sherlock Holmes, John Carter of Mars, and Mark Twain. I put some on CD's but i listen on my iPhone these days.
What makes this interesting for this group is that the FAA Handbooks are all in the public domain and can be read, proof listened and distributed by Librivox or any other group. The handbooks are outstanding. Having the books read as an audiobook won't be useful to a lot of people, but i hope for some people, that an audiobook will supplement learning while driving to work or to the airport, or maybe even pulling rivets, and eventually they may serve as an introduction to those who are borderline about getting into Aviation. The handbooks are graphics intensive, but i just plan on reading "see Figure X-Y" and either the text talks to the figure adequately or the listener should review figures before and after listening to the text. [Re: public domain. From wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipe...main_resources Title 17 USC §105, Subject matter of copyright: United States Government works, provides that "Copyright protection is not available for any work of the United States Government," defined in Title 17 USC §101, as "a work prepared by an officer or employee of the United States Government as part of that person's official duties."]
I have started reading the Aviation Instructor's Handbook (FAA-H-8083-9A) as a solo reader. I'm a couple of chapters into it and probably won't be finished until the end of the year. (it won't be generally available until it is complete. I would include a chapter here as an attachment, but i would not want to overload the capacity.) You may think i started with the wrong book, but i have my own reasons, so no criticism will be ackowledged. ;-) Many Librivox books have different people volunteer to read different chapters. Every submission must be "proof listened" by a volunteer to meet the Librivox guidelines. I have a very nice lady who volunteered to be the Designated Proof Listener, who listens to the entire book, section by section as i submit it, and I act as the Book Coordinator. She catches my errors, offers suggestions and most importantly encouragement (like saying the handbook is interesting!) It takes me about 6 hours of reading, re-reading, editing, noise filtering, uploading, etc for every hour of audio (but i edit out lots of mistakes). The completed handbook will be on the order of 12 hours, or 2 weeks listening for my daily commuting time.
As a metallurgist, i later plan to read chapter 5 "Aircraft Materials Processes and Hardware" of the Aviation Maintenance Technician Handbook FAA-H-8083-30, and i will try to release that by itself. If there are other volunteers i would consider being book coordinator for that entire handbook.
Of course, I would really love to be able to download the "Pilot's Handbook of Aeronautical Knowledge" FAA-H-8083-25A as an audiobook. From the above it will be a while before I attempt to start reading or even volunteer as book coordinator on PHAK, since i would want to stay on top of it every day (to keep hopefully many volunteers happy and encouraged). But if you would be interested in volunteering I encourage you to get to know Librivox. You can find me on the forums as "Norman" or here as "Flatboat" if i can help you learn the ropes and all the free software that is available. Maybe if we can get some of these projects completed in the future, EAA and others can provide links to help people download the audiobooks to go with the PDFs from the FAA.
Best wishes and i hope you consider volunteering, or at least try listening to some free audiobooks from Librivox.
Norman
aka flatboat