According to today’s USA Today article, fiction is the go-to dominator!
Fist pump (no, not “bump“)! Into the air!
Some people get down on fiction–it’s not real, what’s it purpose?–but it has it’s place.
Non-fiction, the article says, is being beat out by escapist reads and the Internet. Many are trying to forget about the daily minutiae and uglies (even if reading about nasty stuff, like the Dragon Tattoo series…) around them and are using the Internet to find out about “real stuff.” Apparently, and according to USA Today’s weekly top 150 numbers, fiction went up from 67% in 2007 to 78% in 2011. Wow. That’s just cool!
You can read the short article, so I won’t regurgitate it, but I love that fiction is making a comeback. I write fiction, and think it’s important to read fiction. We all need to escape…to dream…to divert our attention for relaxation. Fiction can help us see “around” events…maybe open our perspectives to other thoughts and considerations we’re not able to in our daily grind, our workplaces. Places where others are constantly pushing deadlines and white noise at us so fast and furiously we just don’t have time to think on our own. In reading fiction, we do have time to ourselves…because in reading, you are thinking. You are by yourself and can even be considered to be doing what I call “active meditation.” Yes, you may be “doing something,” like reading or walking or working out, but while you’re doing these things your mind is freewheeling and chillin, and it’s in these moments we might find our “ah-ha!” moments, not to mention just allowing our minds free range and the ability to unwind instead of always reacting and being inundated by other peoples’ opinions.
Reading gets us away from all the clutter in our lives. Though you can now read on many electronic devices, reading can keep you from all that constant and unrelenting e-everything. Now you just focus on this story in front of you and get engrossed in it!
Fiction also inspires, and in today’s world of “Haveta do this and that,” there may seem to be little room for inspiration of any kind. We’re always marching to someone else’s drummer.
I’m sure I might be missing one or two other reasons for why reading fiction is important, so feel free to drop a comment or two. But if we don’t relax, don’t escape from the stressful, we don’t unwind…we don’t become “better” in any sense of the word. It’s like anything else. Things break after unrelenting stress is applied, they never get better.
So go on, pick up a good–fictional–read…and get lost!
It’s funny–I prefer to read fiction in ebook form but non-fiction in paper form. I wonder if other people are like that too? I wonder if the popularity of ereaders means more people will be reading fiction now?
I prefer the tactile feel of an actual book, either way. Even when working on my fiction mss, I prefer printouts–sorry Margaret! :-]
Yes! I’m the same way! I have all novels on my Kindle (except for Elements of Style, but I also have that in paper – including a 1st edition my grandmother gave me from her personal library).
Do you prefer to edit on-screen, or on paper, Claire?
Thanks for stopping by!
Worked with a guy once on a major project that required a lot of creative solutions. He would never “waste time reading about something that never happened.”
Total creative solutions provided by this guy. ZERO, ZIP, ZILCH
If I’m going to have fiction for breakfast, however, I prefer paper. E-readers are too hard on the teeth.
Yeah, people need more fiber, not plastic, but to each their own…. ;-]
Because fiction tells the truth like no Nonfiction can. It’s got the truth of the heart.
Ah, no truer words more well spoken, my fine, fictioned, friend! :-]
Fiction rules!
It’s good to hear there are still so many readers out there.
Thanks for linking, Frank.
You’re welcome–and thanks for stopping by, Chris!