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This is slightly embarrassing to confess, but here goes. Several novels sit beside my bed, each only partly read. Inside my smartphone, I'm partway through 36 audio novels, which pales alongside the forty-six digital books I've left unfinished on my e-reader. This does not account for the growing pile of pre-release versions beside my side table, competing for praises, now that I have become a published author myself.

Starting with Persistent Finishing to Purposeful Abandonment

Initially, these stats might appear to support recently expressed thoughts about today's focus. An author observed a short while ago how simple it is to distract a reader's attention when it is fragmented by digital platforms and the news cycle. They suggested: “Perhaps as people's attention spans evolve the literature will have to change with them.” Yet as a person who once would persistently finish every novel I picked up, I now view it a personal freedom to set aside a novel that I'm not in the mood for.

The Short Span and the Glut of Possibilities

I wouldn't think that this tendency is due to a limited attention span – more accurately it stems from the awareness of existence moving swiftly. I've consistently been affected by the spiritual maxim: “Hold the end every day in mind.” A different idea that we each have a mere limited time on this world was as horrifying to me as to others. However at what other moment in our past have we ever had such immediate access to so many incredible works of art, whenever we want? A glut of treasures meets me in any bookstore and within every digital platform, and I strive to be purposeful about where I channel my time. Is it possible “not finishing” a book (abbreviation in the book world for Did Not Finish) be not a mark of a limited mind, but a discerning one?

Reading for Empathy and Insight

Notably at a era when publishing (consequently, commissioning) is still controlled by a particular social class and its concerns. Even though exploring about people unlike our own lives can help to strengthen the muscle for empathy, we also choose books to reflect on our own journeys and role in the society. Unless the books on the displays more fully represent the identities, realities and issues of prospective audiences, it might be very challenging to hold their focus.

Contemporary Storytelling and Audience Interest

Certainly, some novelists are effectively creating for the “modern interest”: the tweet-length writing of selected recent works, the compact fragments of additional writers, and the quick sections of various modern stories are all a impressive example for a shorter style and method. And there is plenty of author tips geared toward capturing a reader: perfect that opening line, polish that beginning section, elevate the stakes (more! higher!) and, if crafting mystery, introduce a mystery on the opening. Such guidance is completely solid – a potential representative, house or reader will spend only a several valuable moments determining whether or not to proceed. It is no benefit in being difficult, like the writer on a writing course I joined who, when challenged about the storyline of their novel, declared that “the meaning emerges about three-quarters of the way through”. No writer should put their audience through a set of challenges in order to be grasped.

Crafting to Be Accessible and Allowing Space

And I certainly write to be clear, as much as that is achievable. At times that requires holding the reader's hand, steering them through the narrative step by succinct point. At other times, I've realised, insight requires patience – and I must give me (along with other authors) the permission of meandering, of adding depth, of digressing, until I hit upon something meaningful. An influential writer contends for the story discovering innovative patterns and that, rather than the conventional dramatic arc, “alternative patterns might help us conceive innovative approaches to create our stories vital and true, persist in creating our books novel”.

Change of the Book and Contemporary Mediums

From that perspective, both viewpoints agree – the novel may have to change to fit the today's reader, as it has continually accomplished since it began in the historical period (in the form today). It could be, like earlier novelists, tomorrow's authors will revert to publishing incrementally their novels in periodicals. The next such creators may even now be publishing their content, part by part, on web-based services including those visited by millions of frequent visitors. Creative mediums evolve with the period and we should permit them.

Not Just Limited Attention Spans

Yet do not assert that any shifts are completely because of reduced focus. If that was so, short story anthologies and very short stories would be regarded considerably more {commercial|profitable|marketable