Some authors use a read-aloud method to help them edit and revise. Sometimes hearing the words and sentences helps you spot problems or areas that need a little touchup that your eyes aren’t as likely to find. The only trick, of course, is that you either have to sit there and read the text yourself, or have someone else read it to you. In either case, it can be pretty daunting and take quite a bit of time.

But I got to thinking: what if I uploaded a copy of the draft of my book (in this case, In Her Name: First Contact) and used the Kindle 2’s text-to-speech feature to read it to me? Then I could take notes or make revisions on the fly and not lose my voice in the process, or drive my wife nuts by droning on.

I also thought this was something useful that I could do while driving to and from work every day: that would give me about an hour of editing time! The only problem with that, of course, is that I can’t type on my laptop while driving. But I could make voice memos with my iPhone and it’s new voice memo app: that’s basically just a click of a button to turn on the recorder, then another click to turn it off.

I gave it a try this morning, and I think it has potential. Unfortunately, this morning’s test wasn’t really fair: I drive a convertible, and I couldn’t get the volume up high enough to hear over the wind noise (I know, I know, but I really like driving with the top open!). So I’ll try it again, maybe tonight or while driving up to Hershey Park tomorrow and let you know how it goes!

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