What Is The Reading Experience Today?

  

If books give your life a measure of meaning, knowledge, and satisfaction, do you believe the books chose you or that you chose them? Did the book give you all that you feel you received - or was it your perception and interpretation of what you gained by the reading experience?  

When you reread a book, after a long time between readings, does it make a completely different impression on you than it did when you first consumed it? The book has not changed, but you have, and so has your power to interpret, feel, think, and see. You may love it even more -- or you may decide it no longer rings as true to you as it once did.   

Are the days over where people read the classics, however, a classic is defined? Are so many people reading different books that few books can bring us together in thought, feeling, or deed? I mean, if the new generation is not reading Dickens, Poe, Plato, or Orwell, then what is binding our readers? How do we ensure we all get to read about all that life and death offers, from love and nature, to family and friendships, to ethics and the meaning of life?  

The reading experience of books today may be a fragmented and scattered one. There are simply too many choices and options available. Think about it. In one year, several million new books are put out in America. Only 35 years ago it was not even a fiftieth of that. Yes, you have 50 times the choice of books from what came out this year vs 1989’s offerings. And you have tens of millions of books that were published in just the past few decades, many of which are forever available thanks to digital books and print-on-demand technology.   

If books present ideas, truths, and experiences, and if every reader of a book is exposed to what that book offers, how do we account for so many readers choosing to read so many different books?  

There are many genres and sub-genres as well. If one reads erotica but not thrillers, or one enjoys poetry but not graphic novels, are we on the same page at all? Or, if you read business but not history, or self-help but not political books, are we on the same page? If we don’t have identical experiences (same book) or even identical genre experiences, can we even fully see life the same or understand one another? Is this even necessary?  

We do have a wide diversity of life experiences, as well as book reading choices, and that’s fine. But, we need a core of some books to be digested by everyone so that, at a minimum, we share a foundation of information that can inform the rest of what we do.   

Some might say we all need to read the Bible, or the Bill of Rights, and U.S. Constitution. This may also extend into classics, from Romeo and Juliet to 1984 to Lord of The Flies, and to others. Diversity of experience is wonderful, including one’s reading experiences, but we must find common ground and overlap in some experiences and books in order to agree upon the values we should live by and some to expect from others.   

I would be for the creation of a recommended national book reading list that all citizens and school-age children get to read. It can have flexibility of choice built into it -- and it can be altered over time - but we need to start somewhere.  

To have a less fractured nation, reading the same books and reading more books seems like a good place to start. Nothing bad will happen if we read Hamlet, A Tale of Two Cities, Frankenstein, and Invisible Man. In fact, only something good will come of this.

 

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Brian Feinblum, the founder of this award-winning blog, with over 3.9 million page views, can be reached at brianfeinblum@gmail.com  He is available to help authors like you to promote your story, sell your book, and grow your brand. He has over 30 years of experience in successfully helping thousands of authors in all genres. Let him be your advocate, teacher, and motivator!

 

About Brian Feinblum

Born and raised in Brooklyn, Brian Feinblum now resides in Westchester with his wife, two kids, and Ferris, a black lab rescue dog, and El Chapo, a pug rescue dog. His writings are often featured in The Writer and IBPA’s The Independent (https://pubspot.ibpa-online.org/article/whats-needed-to-promote-a-book-successfully).  This award-winning blog has generated over four million pageviews. With 5,000+ posts over the past dozen years, it was named one of the best book marketing blogs by BookBaby  http://blog.bookbaby.com/2013/09/the-best-book-marketing-blogs  and recognized by Feedspot in 2021 and 2018 as one of the top book marketing blogs. It was also named by www.WinningWriters.com as a "best resource.” For the past three decades, he has helped thousands of authors. He formed his own book publicity firm in 2020. Prior to that, for 21 years as the head of marketing for the nation’s largest book publicity firm, and director of publicity positions at two independent presses, Brian has worked with many first-time, self-published, authors of all genres, right along with best-selling authors and celebrities such as: Dr. Ruth, Mark Victor Hansen, Joseph Finder, Katherine Spurway, Neil Rackham, Harvey Mackay, Ken Blanchard, Stephen Covey, Warren Adler, Cindy Adams, Todd Duncan, Susan RoAne, John C. Maxwell, Jeff Foxworthy, Seth Godin, and Henry Winkler. He hosted a panel on book publicity for Book Expo America several years ago, and has spoken at ASJA, BookCAMP, Independent Book Publishers Association Sarah Lawrence College, Nonfiction Writers Association, Cape Cod Writers Association, Willamette (Portland) Writers Association, APEX, Morgan James Publishing, and Connecticut Authors and Publishers Association. His letters-to-the-editor have been published in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, New York Post, NY Daily News, Newsday, The Journal News (Westchester) and The Washington Post. His first published book was The Florida Homeowner, Condo, & Co-Op Association Handbook.  It was featured in The Sun Sentinel and Miami Herald.