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It's somewhat uncomfortable to reveal, but here goes. Several books sit beside my bed, each only partly finished. On my mobile device, I'm midway through thirty-six audio novels, which seems small alongside the nearly fifty Kindle titles I've abandoned on my Kindle. This fails to account for the growing stack of pre-release editions beside my coffee table, competing for blurbs, now that I am a published writer personally.

Beginning with Determined Finishing to Purposeful Setting Aside

Initially, these numbers might seem to confirm recently expressed opinions about current focus. One novelist commented not long back how easy it is to break a reader's concentration when it is scattered by digital platforms and the news cycle. They remarked: “Maybe as readers' concentration shift the literature will have to adapt with them.” Yet as someone who once would stubbornly finish any novel I picked up, I now view it a individual choice to put down a book that I'm not enjoying.

Life's Short Time and the Abundance of Options

I wouldn't feel that this habit is a result of a short attention span – instead it relates to the sense of time moving swiftly. I've consistently been affected by the monastic teaching: “Place mortality every day in mind.” A different reminder that we each have a mere finite period on this world was as horrifying to me as to others. And yet at what other time in human history have we ever had such direct entry to so many amazing creative works, anytime we desire? A glut of riches awaits me in every library and within each digital platform, and I aim to be deliberate about where I direct my energy. Could “abandoning” a novel (term in the publishing industry for Incomplete) be not a sign of a poor focus, but a discerning one?

Choosing for Empathy and Self-awareness

Particularly at a era when publishing (and therefore, commissioning) is still controlled by a certain group and its quandaries. Although reading about characters distinct from our own lives can help to develop the muscle for understanding, we furthermore choose books to consider our own experiences and place in the world. Before the titles on the shelves more fully depict the identities, realities and concerns of potential readers, it might be very difficult to hold their focus.

Current Authorship and Audience Engagement

Of course, some authors are indeed skillfully crafting for the “modern focus”: the concise style of selected modern works, the compact sections of different authors, and the quick sections of numerous modern books are all a impressive showcase for a more concise approach and technique. Furthermore there is plenty of craft advice geared toward capturing a consumer: hone that first sentence, improve that beginning section, increase the tension (more! further!) and, if crafting crime, place a mystery on the opening. That suggestions is completely sound – a potential agent, editor or buyer will devote only a a handful of limited minutes deciding whether or not to proceed. There is no point in being obstinate, like the person on a workshop I joined who, when challenged about the storyline of their manuscript, declared that “everything makes sense about 75% of the way through”. No writer should force their reader through a set of 12 labours in order to be comprehended.

Creating to Be Accessible and Granting Patience

But I certainly compose to be comprehended, as far as that is feasible. Sometimes that requires guiding the consumer's hand, directing them through the plot beat by efficient step. Sometimes, I've discovered, comprehension requires patience – and I must allow myself (as well as other authors) the grace of meandering, of building, of digressing, until I find something true. An influential thinker makes the case for the novel developing fresh structures and that, instead of the standard narrative arc, “different patterns might help us envision new ways to craft our narratives vital and real, continue producing our works original”.

Evolution of the Book and Current Platforms

In that sense, each perspectives agree – the novel may have to adapt to fit the modern consumer, as it has repeatedly done since it began in the historical period (in its current incarnation now). Maybe, like previous novelists, coming authors will revert to publishing incrementally their works in publications. The next these creators may currently be releasing their writing, section by section, on online services like those used by many of monthly users. Art forms evolve with the times and we should allow them.

Not Just Brief Concentration

However do not say that every evolutions are completely because of reduced attention spans. Were that true, short story anthologies and flash fiction would be regarded much more {commercial|profitable|marketable