Today's podcast is a newsletter about developments in books and Buddhism, particularly where the two meet.
19 Killed in Nepal Protests
Anger over economic inequality, corruption, and a ban on more than two dozen social media sites has erupted into a wave of protests against Nepal’s Prime Minister, K.P. Sharma Oli. Officials report that at least 19 people have been killed.
2 New Buddhist Books
I’m a slow book reader, especially when engaged in maintaining this blog and podcast, providing content for my website, and keeping my publishing business growing (more below), so I won’t be able to fully review these newly published books, both of which I’m exited about:
* A New Way of Seeing: From Knowledge to Insight by Dominique Side, who writes the Substack blog the softer gaze. Her 2022 book, Discovering Buddhism, provides a thorough textbook-like overview of Buddhism. The new one goes deeper into helping those of us in the West to an experiential understanding (grokking) of Buddhism that cuts through cultural and semantic obscurations.
* The Buddha: Biography of a Myth by Donald S. Lopez Jr., professor of Buddhist and Tibetan studies at the University of Michigan. On July 17, I wrote that the generally accepted details about the Buddha’s life may not have “really” happened but that the stories matter anyway. Lopez goes a big step further.
ElevenLabs
This isn’t about 11 labs, but it is about two ventures of a technology company called ElevenLabs Inc. It is a leader in the creation of synthetic voices and converting text into a variety of voices.
The even bigger news is the new venture, ElevenReader Publishing, and it’s smatphone app, ElevenReader. Users of the new app, available in iOS and Android, can listen in one of 32 languages to books, magazine articles, or podcasts converted from text to realistic and smooth synthetic voices. The user can choose the voice it prefers to listen to, and moderate usage is free.
From an author’s point of view, it’s a quick and easy way to create an audiobook, although I don’t know how the distribution will work aside from ElenReader. I had not planned to do the work required to turn out an audiobook version of Mel HP and Claude AI: A Being and a Bot Discuss Sentience and Buddha Nature, but over the weekend I fiddled a bit with the book’s organization to make it easier for a listener to follow and uploaded the manuscript. It’s awaiting approval.
If you like to listen to books and articles and be among the first to try something new, download the ElevenReader app. The app is free as is the content—which includes things like Atlantic articles—for now. Use this link and I’ll get some extra free hours.
If you’d like to be an advance reader…
…of A Buddhist Path to Joy: The New Middle Way Expanded Edition, here’s how to obtain it now at no cost. With its publication scheduled for October 17, I’m looking for volunteers to read it as an ebook or PDF over the next six weeks and post a review on Amazon.com or your favorite online bookstore. You’ll need to enter your name and email address here, which will make you a subscriber to my author newsletter, where—when the time comes—you’ll get reminders to post your review. (You can unsubscribe at any time.)
