I enjoy participating in LinkedIn discussions. It’s a good place to gather ideas from fellow writers. Even though it’s been several years, now, I’ve never forgotten the discussion started by an author who was considering whether the trend to add media to ebooks was a good thing.
“Is ‘media-added’ actually good for books?” The author asking the question said he feared the media trend would turn the book market into a gaming venture and destroy the market for good books that depend only on the word power of their authors.
Will Adding ‘Movies’ Devalue Your Ebook?
Anyone who loves to read knows that the movie never does justice to the book. Hollywood always has to “tweak” the story. There are three primary reasons for this—appeal, time constraints and visual restraints.
For example, the Sound of Music was based on the book The Trapp Family Singers. In the book, Maria and Captain von Trapp had just married. In reality, they’d been married 11 years.
The family had been singing together for years. They began singing professionally after the stock market crash of 1929 stripped the family of their fortune.There was no dramatic escape over the Swiss alps. Rather they boarded a train for Italy, Georg’s country of citizenship. They called their American booking agent from there.
It’s certainly a more exciting tale in the movie!
Hollywood also faces another challenge with converting books to screen. You can’t ‘show’ what’s going on in someone’s head without using some vehicle—a dream, a flashback, a montage. A movie strung together with these elements is difficult to follow, so screenplays rely upon telling the story through what we can see.
Is it any wonder that once you’ve read the book, the movie is almost always disappointing?
What if I had the rights to The Trapp Family Singers today? Would the telling of the story be far more exciting to readers if I added multi-media experiences to the ebook version? I could add:
- Pictures of the real Von Trapp family
- Pictures of legal documents
- Video clips of the family singing (if available)
- Video clips of the political events that contributed to their choice to leave Austria
Any addition that would enhance the story and set the different parts into their historical setting could turn a book that’s already a great read into one that’s fantastic.
My primary caution is this. The trend to add media to books needs to stop short of robbing readers of creating their own cinematic visions in their minds. Each element should be chosen for a specific purpose.
Choosing Media to Add to Your Book
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Why not use media to complement your writing?
When it is used appropriately, added media is a wonderful enhancement that leverages the qualities eBooks enable. There’s no reason to not harness the combined power of the written word with visual and audio experiences if you can do it in a way that brings more meaning to what you publish.
Would you like help with developing your multi-media strategy at the same time as you develop your book concept? Contact Denise Rutledge at WritingMyOwnBook.com.
