Connected to last week’s—it’s one of the ways writing has changed. Books from a century or two ago spent huge swaths of text describing locations and character traits, but modern writing does all of this in shorthand. You might know a character is short with blond hair and blue eyes, but the author leaves the rest for you to figure out on your own. The writer might tell you the story takes place at a beachside town, but leaves the details to your imagination. Why do you suppose this is? Is it that we have shorter attention spans these days? That, bombarded with video and photos as we are, we don’t NEED every detail of an unknown scene described, because we have a stock of images already in our heads?
Now, since I didn't participate last week, I'm not sure how to connect it, but I will answer this question. And I'd actually have to say I disagree with this a bit. And the reason I disagree comes from the book that I just finished, The Dream Thieves. I feel as if that author, Maggie Stiefvater really does describe in great detail the people, the settings, etc. So while I think maybe some authors don't spend as much time on that, I think maybe it has more to do with the specific author's writing style and technique.
How about you? What do you think of today's books? Do you feel that more of the details are left out because of the reasons listed above? Or do you feel there are other reasons for it? Or do you, like me, think it all depends on the author, and maybe even the type of book?
