'How hard is it, how does it feel, what’s surprising about it, what are the motivations behind it?'
Producing an audio book - from story to publishing onto a platform/YouTube - takes as much time as it does to write it. For example, The Rocket took me about 40 hours to write, re-write ... it took me another 40 hours to produce into an audio book, not counting whatever time Jeremiah spent on audio work.
How does it feel - It feels great, even if it's tiring, to make something cool. I want to focus on how the book will make readers feel, so I try to keep thinking about them as much as possible.
What's surprising about it - I think the thing I'm most surprised about is how anti-climactic the end state is. You make something, poured your blood, sweat and tears into it, and then ... yeah. That's it. People listen to it, some respond. Then it's onto the next thing. I won't think too much about the project after I'm done with it, but then I'll go back and listen to it again. Gives me a sense of pride and joy to be able to see something I still believe in, months or years down the road.
what are the motivations behind it? - My original motivation to tell stories is something I've talked about on the blog, so I'll assume you're asking about 'motivation to make audio books.' TL;DR - I like to make movies, too. Turning audio books into mini radio dramas with pictures is something that scratches a fun little itch for me. It's this close to making movies, and so it brings me a lot of joy to cut video/audio/SFX together in Premiere.