3 ms·

I have to agree with "a lot of filler" part of your comment. This must be a result of the expectation that publishers set for authors regarding the minimum expe

I have to agree with "a lot of filler" part of your comment. This must be a result of the expectation that publishers set for authors regarding the minimum expected length of the book. I found that I would stop reading many books past the first few chapters because then the repetition sets in. The first few chapters deliver the core message and then the author is forced to extend the narrative to deliver the expected word count. In any case, I find reading a physical book to be more enjoyable and effective (in terms of retention and recall) than reading on a digital screen.

ghaff 8y ago
Publishers are part of it but basically there's a whole economic and distribution system built around books being 200+ pages. Arguably consumers "should" be willing to pay as much for a 75 page book as a 400 page one for a given level of quality (whatever that means) but they're not. So you end up with a large class of non-fiction that pads out ideas which probably deserve something more than a 3,000 word magazine article into a 75,000-100,000 word book because that's what's required for everyone to get paid (however little). And ebooks don't really change that because very little of the cost is in physical distribution.