Fighting Through: Reflecting on Catching Laryngitis and Narrating “Three Summers” by Amra Sabić-El-Rayess
Cover for Three Summers
It’s been so long since my last blog post! I have to apologize for that, as I’ve had a very hectic and busy past 6 months. However, I finally feel my life clicking back into place, so hopefully I’ll be posting blogs more often going forward.
Anyway, this brings me to the topic of this blog: narrating Three Summers: A Memoir of Sisterhood, Summer Crushes, and Growing Up on the Eve of War by Amra Sabić-El-Rayess and Laura L. Sullivan.
This project was once again with Penguin Random House Audio. Getting contacted by them again was a wonderful surprise because, not only did it mean I did well and acted professionally during my first audiobook, but they liked me enough to invite me back to work with them. From the outset, I was very excited for this project. It was another Bosnian-centered book, but this time it was written by a Bosnian-American woman based off of her real-life experiences. I was so excited to start this project that, for the first two recording sessions, I came into the studio early in the morning before my shift at my day-job started. (Many thanks to the amazing director, Tavia Gilbert for the flexibility!) We started off really well, and I was impressed by Tavia’s commitment and empathy with the story being told.
Then, as seems to be my luck, we ran into issues. Issue being: I got laryngitis. Eep!
At first, I didn’t realize it was laryngitis. I had woken up for the third recording day - which was supposed to be all day on a Monday – with the inability to swallow, and I couldn’t talk without pain. It freaked me out! And, even worse, I had to do every young actors’ worst nightmare: call out of the session. I. Felt. HORRIBLE. My email to them was filled with so many apologetic statements but, again, Tavia and the producer Brian Ramcharan, were so kind about it.
We rescheduled the rest of the week’s sessions for the following week. Unfortunately, things didn’t get better. In fact, they got a lot worse. By the end of that week, I had completely lost my voice. I couldn’t make a sound! During this time, I was very thankful for Tavia’s mentorship throughout. I’m still a very “green” narrator and, to be completely honest, I still don’t really know how this part of the industry works. I was embarrassed and so scared that this whole thing would lead to them firing me or worse. But the situation was what it was, and they very gently and patiently waited for me to get better.
And I definitely took my recovery seriously!
I called out of my day job for the next 10 days-or-so in order to be on a complete vocal rest. (I have no idea how I did it tbh, because I’m still in the “starving” phase of the starving artist arc). I drank lots of honey/lemon tea, my diet became mostly soup or both-based dishes, and I tried most of the medicinal suggestions my actor friends gave me, including a very foul-tasting throat numbing spray. This period of time definitely made me thankful for what I have, and it taught me to slow down and take care of myself.
Finally, after many days of sounding like a pack-a-day-for-thirty-years type smoker, my voice came back enough to continue recording. And none too soon either, since the release date for the book was quickly approaching.
Getting back into the narration felt so good! I finally could use my voice again, and for such a beautiful story. Tavia directed with so much thoughtfulness and compassion, and pushed me to do better and go further. Toward the end, as we got to the really tough parts of the book, I felt myself moved to tears many times. From the bottom of my heart, I really recommend reading or listening to this story – it will certainly affect you.
At the end of it all, we were able to complete the recording and all the pick-ups before the launch of the book on April 9th. Unfortunately (and still quite embarrassingly for me) the audiobook was delayed to April 16th.
It is my hope that Penguin Random House reaches out again in the future to narrate something else. They were so kind throughout this whole process, but there is a deep part of me in my actor’s heart that wants to make up for the complications in this project with doing the next project “perfectly.” Now, before you say anything: I know! There’s no such thing as perfect! I’m being hard on myself! I know! I know! My friends have already told me this, and yet, this feeling persists. That’s the other thing I have to keep learning: Having patience with myself and not having my standards for myself so sky-high.
Overall, however, I’m incredibly proud of this project and, as always, thankful to everyone involved for bringing me on.
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xx Selma