BY ELISA SHOKOFF

Over 15 years ago, I came to work at Simon & Schuster Audio. I'm now a producer and director, but when I started, I was a production assistant who—because of my great love for the theatre and movies—was also allowed to dabble in casting. From the beginning, I've been intrigued and perhaps a little obsessed with matching a book with the right voice.

The first book I ever cast was Thomas Harris' The Silence of the Lambs. We were on an extremely tight deadline (often the case!) and I stayed up all night reading the book, trying to imagine who might do it justice. I'd recently seen Kathy Bates in the off-Broadway play Frankie & Johnny in the Clair de Lune. I was crazy about her performance and remembered noticing in the Stagebill that she was a southerner. Perfect for Clarice Starling, the heroine in the novel. The next day, we sent the book to Kathy, who quickly accepted our offer. The result was a perfect union: a daring actress with daring prose.

PHOTO: Frank McCourt, author of Angela's Ashes, is one of the many readers who have worked with audio producer Elisa Shokoff.

It's not always that easy. But the more I produce and listen to audiobooks, the more I am sure that the time (and sometimes the agony) spent on casting is worthwhile. The reader is the key to the production. All the video rentals to check an actor's voice, all the scribbled-in-the-dark notes at plays and movies, all the late-night worry over finding time to schedule an actor between gigs seem a small price to pay when they finally lead to that harmonious match of book and reader.

The audiobook casting process is pretty straightforward. The first decision is whether or not the author will read. Almost always, authors read autobiographies and personal essays. The result, when it's good, can be audio at its most intimate and mesmerizing. Last year, I had the great fortune of working on Q: The Autobiography of Quincy Jones. Listening to Quincy tell the story of his life is a bit like having the rare opportunity to join him for a leisurely dinner party. Another author reading that stands out is Alice Sebold's unabridged recording of her harrowing memoir Lucky. Her unnervingly direct reading style intensifies the candor and heightens the eloquence of her writing. And then there's Frank McCourt. Angela's Ashes and 'Tis are as good as they get.

If the author chooses not to record the book, as is often the case with novels and some nonfiction, we begin reading early drafts of the manuscript in an attempt to define what we are looking for. Is it a first-person narrative? How varied are the secondary voices? Do we need a man or a woman? A particular geographic background? Energetic and edgy or relaxed and easygoing? And on and on. We then compile lists of actors who seem to match our ideal (or come close to it) and research their availability.

When it comes to making the actual offer, our everyday lives and interests heavily influence our decisions. For example, Sandy Moore, S&S Audio's Production VP, had followed Will Patton's early career. He'd never recorded an audiobook, but when she saw him in No Way Out, she was intent on finding something equally menacing for him to read. She cast him for Peter Straub's Houses Without Doors, then James Lee Burke's Black Cherry Blues. This began one of our most enduring relationships; S&S will publish its 16th James Lee Burke/Will Patton production, Last Car to Elysian Fields, in the fall of 2003.

Casting is work for an alchemist. Lots can go wrong on a production, but in the end, in the grip of the right storyteller all problems seem to fade away. A great book can be weighed down by a leaden reader, but a not-so-great book can be magically transformed by a good reader. In my 15 years, I have heard this transformation often enough to make me believe in some indefinable spark that happens when the casting is right.

Elisa Shokoff is an award-winning producer for Simon & Schuster Audio.