The blog The Future of The Book inspired me to write this article on the future of books. The Institute has spawned a variety of experimental publishing ideas for books that they hope will keep people reading actively into the future in an age where the visual has become king of media. Rowling's Harry Potter and run away hits like Koontz's Odd Thomas series has done a lot to inspire readers of all ages in recent years, but the battle rages on to keep people actively reading.
One of the more intriguing experiments the Institute ran this year was using a blog as a real time writing experiment, with direct interaction between the author and his readers as thw book is being written. You can visit the blog here (although Stevens has now officially taken the book into "book time" instead of "real time" to get it fully ready to be published, you can read the past year's worth of posts and see how the experiment worked for his book Without Gods.
I'm not a fan of the writing in real time idea, simply because I am a writer who needs total isolation to write fiction, but it seemed to light up the 'net like wild fire. It was much more popular than you'd think it would be. Like electronic publishing, print on demand, ebooks, the resurgence of serialized fiction online, fan-fiction's new main stream acceptance, audio books, video book readings and more, the blogging a book in real time idea was hugely popular.
Could an author make money by blogging their book in real time? I think they can. If they create a launch page for their blog so a new reader can catch up in chronological order and have a way to either pay to read, pay to comment or donate with each post, I think it's possible. Ad revenue from tie in items such as shirts and theme merchandise is also a possible way to make blogging a book profitable.
The thing that is most clear to me about the future of books is the need to find more ways to entice people to keep reading. In spite of my love of technology, I still prefer a printed book - the heft of it in my hands is essential to the reading experience to me. but the very things I love mos about books - the texture and smell of the paper, the weight of it in my hands, the tangible feel of a good read - are the very things that turn a younger generation and a busy older generation away from reading. It becomes "work" to them, when they want to be "entertained".
I see a world where the printed word eventually becomes a collector's item and electronic literature is commonplace. What future literary world do you see? Can books survive? Can literature evolve? Talk to me - send me an email with your thoughts here.
Tags: future of books
