The Future Of Books

While we all at some point in our life are inclined towards one self-fulfilling desire of writing a book, alternating with a nagging feeling of who will read my book? We might have sparking ideas, innumerable anecdotes to narrate, unique concepts and pulsating information that could cook up a masterpiece, a bestseller. But how do I reach there?

My clients ask me excitedly, yet dotted with apprehension, "Who will read my book? What is the readership I will attract? Are my ideas saleable?" I tell them, writing a book is just 50% of the experience, the other 50% is reaching out to your audience and connecting with them.

Recently in a book discussion with a prospect, we were brainstorming on what a book should be about when there are other hundred such books in the market in that category.

I come across books all the time, and I think beyond a physical and e-book what I have visualised is to create a never before experience. Like we were all new to an e-book and Kindle at one time. Likewise, from the writing, and presentation perspective here are some of the exceptional ways in which books can be created in the future.

1.??????When the book is a strategic one where solutions are offered you should consider a span of suggestions for the next 10 years, as it might be redundant in 10 years.

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2.??????If a book is about the subject matter, then the flavour of the author should be present in the form of innumerable anecdotes, the author's future vision, their revolutionary ideas, or approaches, and how they are or can create a change.

3.??????Sci-fi and fairy tale books can be adapted to AI-powered video displays to create an engaging experience well beyond your sensory imagination.

4.??????Audio books can take the help of background music to create the right emotion and pulse of a scene or a situation.

5.??????Financial books can have inbuilt calculators to find out relative answers where needed.

6.??????E-books can be a culmination of audio, video, and text for an enthralling experience.

7.??????Imagine you referring a Wikipedia through a book, and you can project the video reference on a wall or a screen to have all back-dated information. This would further enhance reading engagement.

AI-generated books are already in the market but more than using unique prompts and writing books, we need to engage readers through real-time, factual, self-experienced textual and visual experiences. As far as readers are concerned, they are people, and people can only be moved by people's experiences, and not what a bot has researched and presented.

Not to forget, a touch of emotion, poignancy, and storytelling.

We have progressed from long-format novels to short stories and have just about adapted to the minimal WhatsApp text, brimming with emojis. To make readers go back to reading is about creating experiences that are existent but have not used in an engaging format before.