"Said"

I recently downloaded a free Audible audiobook written by a well-known science fiction author (who is younger than I am).  The "cover" of the audiobook states "The New York Times Bestseller" and "Winner of the Hugo Award", so we're not dealing with some run-of-the-mill wannabe writer here.

Thus I am flummoxed by what I consider a serious writing flaw--a flaw that's amplified by the audiobook format.  Darned near every sentence in which a character speaks ends in the word "said".

"Blah blah blah," he said.  "Blee blee blee," she said.  "Neener neener neener," he said.  It's extremely grating, especially in short, staccato sentences like those above.  Said said said.  Sure, every once in awhile a character might have "asked" something, but is "said" the only such verb in the writer's repertoire?  Might not a character have "replied", or "responded", or "retorted", or "interjected", or "answered" once in awhile?  Breaking out my thesaurus I find "speak", "tell", "state", "affirm", "mention", "allege", and "recite" as synonyms for "say".  I've created quite the list to choose from without any effort to speak of.

I'm enjoying the story, but I'd enjoy it much more if every other sentence didn't end in "said".