Get to Know Audible Editor Melissa Bendixen

Audible Editor Melissa Bendixen has a book-lover’s dream job: as manager of our editorial interviews program, she coordinates the audio Q&A’s with authors and creators for Audible’s blog and social media. And as our resident YA expert, she also works on our quarterly YA newsletter, Minor Characters, for customers who subscribe. Working with her cat Chihiro close by, she’s part of a tight-knit team focused on bringing their vast, deep knowledge of Audible’s catalog to customers looking for their next great listen.

Melissa’s main duty is to schedule interviews with creators, edit them, and publish them on the blog—all while ensuring the conversations are super high-quality for fans. “I work with each interviewer on their questions, then record and produce the interview,” she explains. Each interview requires plenty of research beforehand, as well as a quickly built rapport with the subject that comes from the interviewer being authentically themselves. “In order for the subject to share something that feels vulnerable, they have to feel that they know you a little bit. Some of our best moments came when an interviewer shared their personal connection with the subject and their story.”

Her team publishes one or two interviews per week; about 60-70 per year. Among her highlights: interviewing Travis Beacham about the first season of Audible’s Impact Winter; her teammate’s interview with Queen Latifah for Unity in the Community; and Felicia Day about Third Eye, about which she says, “I was so inspired afterward that I went and got her other book, Embrace Your Weird. One of the things I love about working on interviews is that I’m constantly inspired by them to achieve more in my own life.” 

After finishing an English degree at UNC Chapel Hill with minors in both Creative Writing and Journalism, Melissa moved to New York City to work in publishing. In September 2017, she joined Audible on the Content team, helping to run the editorial experience for a romance-listening package we offered at the time. Then she joined the Editorial team, at first helping to run the interviews program, and now leading it. “I love that change is a constant at Audible,” says Melissa, “and that I’ve been able to grow and learn in so many ways through my journey here."

The Editorial team is deeply interconnected, and many of them work together on newsletters and other projects, like the Weekly Sound Off, our newsletter that covers listening in pop culture and the news, as well as what’s happening at Audible, and Editors Select, which highlights books the team expects to be buzzed about. The editorial team also chooses Audible's Best of the Year, a campaign which requires all hands on deck and many meetings where team members heatedly debate about who deserves the honors.

After the day is done, Melissa might go climbing in the gym, attend pottery class, practice her flameworking (“I just started this”) or go for a run. But the hobby she loves most right now is riding horses, which she’s been doing for about two years. She currently takes lessons at a stable, where afterward, “you have to groom the horse, and they do get sweaty after a ride, plus they get long hair in the colder months, so that means you have to blow-dry them. It takes about 30 mins to blow dry a long-haired horse, but it’s pretty zen, especially when you’re listening to something.” Which, fortunately for Melissa, is almost always. 

Check out this video for more on Melissa’s role as an Editor at Audible.

Favorite listens (just some of them!): Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley (“for the characters I wanted to be friends with and can’t-stop-listening plot”), Iron Widow by Xiran Jay Zhao (“for the badass-ness of the heroine”), and Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik (“for the depth of feeling in the world”). Also Piranesi by Susanna Clarke and Song of Achilles by Madeline Miller—"I would venture to say those two reach the level of transcendence that makes you a lifelong listener.”