Audio books generally come with a CD or cassette that reads the books out loud. Sometimes the audio is of the author but in most cases the readings are done by actors or voice specialists. In fact the first audio book was made in 1933 by an anthropologist who drove all around North America to make a recorded history of oral stories of the native tribes. These days audio books are available in many different formats. A fast growing format is mp3 audio books which allow you to listen to books on your iPod or other MP3 player.

Audio books can often be hard to find in bookshops and are usually quite expensive. In Australia over the last few years some very good online bookstores selling audio books have emerged.

An Australia based online bookstore with quite a large range of audio books is SeekBooks.

Bookworm is another online bookstore with audio books.

There are also some online bookstores such as Audio Books Direct that solely sell audio books.