Today, I sat in a cinema all by myself and watched a film.
This is not a statement that I have no friends or that I'm a rock-star author who can command private screenings. It was just a lovely, serendipitous happening. But it made me think about what writers do for our readers.
Image: TheNextWeb.com
I didn't have special permission from the director the view the film alone. I didn't have to pay a King's ransom for the opportunity. I didn't even have to book the experience in advance. I simply turned up at my local multiplex cinema on a Saturday morning and bought a regular ticket for the first show of the day. As it happened, nobody else had the same idea and so, with my £6.20 ticket, I watched the film as the only person in the cinema. Yes, I felt like a celebrity. And yes, I grinned like a complete loon all through the film. It was one of those moments that probably won't ever happen again, but I loved every second of it.
And then, it hit me: as an author every book I write offers each reader an experience like this.
Every author who writes a story for other people to read is inviting those readers into an amazing world which feels as if it was created just for them. The audience of one. It doesn't matter if a book is read by one person or several million, the experience is the same. We offer people the chance to step into their own private cinema of their imagination and project a story into it for them to enjoy. And as each reader's ideas and expectation of the story are different, each mind-movie is different, too. We give readers an indulgent, VIP experience by welcoming them into worlds of our creation, no matter who or where in the world they are.
That's why books are magical.
I mean, where else can you receive that kind of attention for less than a price of a cinema ticket?
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