Stop Trying to Make Books Feel Like the Internet

In reviewing a cohort of recent novels on modern men’s experiences, Robert Lubusam hits the idea that writers know they have to compete with the internet and video games for men’s attention, and points out that many writers try to do this by mimicking other forms of dopamine-inducing media.

Aspire to drive readers away from their mobile phones, these writers develop online language and screen-friendly forms. In the process, they have a book with all the written books. This has a book that shows that novels may grow more and more in a world of increasingly surprising attention. There, literacy rates are declining, screen time is surged, and even self-consciously “literary” writers are not even people who are increasingly inexplicable from the demands of the internet and the digital world.

Rubsam clearly reflects the conversations Jeff and I had over the last year or so. RoioRiotPodcast: More and more, literary writers feel that they don’t trust their readers to get big ideas for books without having to work with ambiguity or getting big ideas for books. Some authors told me they received instructions from editors and publishers who encouraged the connection of all dots for their readers and encouraged them to make their books easier to understand.

I understand the source of concern, but I’m really, but there’s a wrong strategy when trying to make a book feel like social media or video games where you compete for books. Books can do things that social media and video games can’t do. They can provide our brains with a truly immersive, rich experience that is actually pleasant and feels good. Rubsam says in an unsettling scramble to capture and maintain readers’ attention, many writers say that “prioritize text readability and narrative immediacy.”

Books need to continue to compete with the internet to survive. Only 16% of Americans read for pleasure, and only half of young people who want social media to be uninvented, have a high ceiling. You should do everything you can to distinguish your reading experience from your online experience. Turn your book into a book. Make them strange, hard and confused. Let them request our attention, not spoon feed. Let me remind you how satisfying it is to work with what Megan Mayhew-Bergman calls “analog mind.” Make them a true alternative, not a poor imitation.

Literary pet names get a boost on booktok

In one of the more creatively targeted press releases I received during my 17 years of publication, I learned that many Americans name their pets after Booktok favorites. A TrustedhouseSitters survey on nearly 100,000 PET names shows that pets named Violet (screams to Rebecca Yarros) and 320% jumps are up 318% on Onyx. Feyre, Azriel and Rowen from Acotar-verse are also climbing the charts. But it leads Twilight’s Bella Swan as a #1 book-inspired pet name and #2 general pick, followed by Jasper (a nod from Twilight, perhaps from author Jasper Hale), Winnie, Harry and Tigger. Calvin and Hobbes both made a list, as did Atticus, Gatsby, Gandalf and Frodo. Have you ever given your pet a book-inspired name?