Audiobook Builder: it just works

I recently subscribed to Simply Audiobooks, which is a Netflix-like service that rents books-on-CD through the mail. I listen to them unabridged so each book spans several CDs - 12 CDs for a single book is typical.

Unfortunately, iTunes doesn't handle Audiobooks-from-CD nearly as well as it handles music or audible content. Each book is composed of hundreds of tracks. For example, The Last Coyote is over 1000 tracks, each about 20 seconds long. This causes big problems:

It muddies up my iTunes library. It takes a long time to scroll through a single book!

The track names are garbage, such as "4dddd" or "1f", so finding them on my iPod isn't fun

My iPod thinks each track is a song, so I get parts of the audiobook mixed-in when I shuffle songs.

To resolve these problem, I went out looking online for an "MP3 Joiner for Mac". I didn't find one, but what I did find was much better. Audiobook Builder is a ridiculously good Mac app that fixes these problems. It will import books from an audio CD, an MP3 CD, or even a book imported into iTunes. It inserts chapter markers where they're due. It even adds cover art! The app is quite attractive, possibly sexier than iTunes itself - it's the Delicious Library of audiobook apps.

If you're using Audiobooks from CD with a Mac, buy Audiobook Builder.

# posted by Jesse Wilson on Tuesday, May 01, 2007