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This is slightly awkward to reveal, but I'll say it. Five novels rest next to my bed, all only partly consumed. On my phone, I'm midway through thirty-six audio novels, which looks minor next to the 46 ebooks I've abandoned on my digital device. The situation doesn't account for the growing stack of early editions near my living room table, vying for praises, now that I have become a professional author in my own right.

From Persistent Reading to Deliberate Abandonment

At first glance, these stats might seem to corroborate recently expressed comments about current concentration. One novelist observed recently how easy it is to distract a reader's attention when it is scattered by digital platforms and the news cycle. The author stated: “Maybe as readers' focus periods evolve the fiction will have to adjust with them.” Yet as an individual who once would doggedly get through every title I started, I now regard it a personal freedom to put down a book that I'm not in the mood for.

Life's Short Duration and the Glut of Options

I do not think that this habit is a result of a short focus – more accurately it comes from the awareness of time passing quickly. I've always been affected by the monastic principle: “Place death each day before your eyes.” One reminder that we each have a just finite period on this Earth was as horrifying to me as to everyone. And yet at what other point in our past have we ever had such immediate availability to so many mind-blowing works of art, at any moment we choose? A glut of riches awaits me in every bookstore and within any screen, and I want to be intentional about where I focus my energy. Is it possible “DNF-ing” a novel (term in the book world for Incomplete) be not a sign of a poor focus, but a discerning one?

Selecting for Connection and Self-awareness

Notably at a period when book production (and therefore, acquisition) is still dominated by a specific demographic and its concerns. While engaging with about people distinct from our own lives can help to develop the muscle for understanding, we additionally choose books to think about our individual journeys and position in the society. Before the titles on the shelves more accurately depict the identities, stories and interests of potential readers, it might be extremely challenging to hold their focus.

Current Authorship and Audience Interest

Of course, some writers are indeed skillfully writing for the “contemporary focus”: the concise style of some modern works, the compact fragments of different authors, and the short sections of various modern stories are all a excellent showcase for a shorter form and style. Furthermore there is an abundance of writing advice designed for grabbing a reader: hone that initial phrase, polish that beginning section, increase the tension (further! further!) and, if writing thriller, introduce a mystery on the opening. Such guidance is entirely good – a possible representative, publisher or buyer will devote only a several precious minutes determining whether or not to continue. There is no point in being difficult, like the person on a workshop I joined who, when questioned about the plot of their novel, announced that “the meaning emerges about three-fourths of the through the book”. No author should put their audience through a series of difficult tasks in order to be understood.

Crafting to Be Accessible and Allowing Patience

Yet I absolutely create to be understood, as to the extent as that is possible. At times that needs guiding the audience's attention, steering them through the plot point by efficient point. Occasionally, I've realised, understanding demands patience – and I must grant my own self (and other authors) the freedom of meandering, of building, of deviating, until I discover something true. One thinker argues for the fiction developing innovative patterns and that, rather than the traditional dramatic arc, “other forms might enable us envision novel ways to craft our tales alive and true, persist in creating our works original”.

Transformation of the Story and Modern Mediums

Accordingly, the two viewpoints agree – the fiction may have to change to suit the modern reader, as it has constantly accomplished since it first emerged in the 1700s (as we know it today). It could be, like past authors, tomorrow's writers will go back to serialising their books in publications. The upcoming such creators may currently be releasing their content, part by part, on online platforms like those used by many of regular users. Creative mediums change with the era and we should let them.

More Than Limited Attention Spans

Yet do not assert that any shifts are completely because of limited concentration. If that was so, brief fiction collections and very short stories would be regarded far more {commercial|profitable|marketable