Turning Attention Drift Into Nuanced Critique

Most people in the writing community know what a breezy reading experience feels like. It’s a swift activity, chock full of content that’s easy to follow. This kind of pleasurable, effortless reading is a telltale sign that the narrative is on the right track. But what about when you’re given a work-in-progress that takes extra time and a more concerted effort to get through?

Anyone who assesses material regularly knows this experience well. You sit down with a draft that is not obviously misshapen. The formatting is fine. The general premise makes sense. And yet, as you read, something starts to slip. Your thoughts start to drift elsewhere, away from the pages in front of you. When you bring your attention back to the work, you cast an eye on the same passage for the third time and still only vaguely retain what it said. You then skim forward, checking how many pages are left in the submission. Nothing in the writing is blatantly askew, but staying engaged feels harder than it should.

Being a story analyst means that we keep track of a lot of different moving parts in the text. But it also means that we need to pay attention to where our own thoughts are moving during the read. So the next time your headspace feels a bit distracted, hazy, or stuck during an assignment, try not to immediately label the disconnect as a problem in and of itself. Instead, let yourself pause and get curious.

Boredom, constant distractions, and mental fog are often symptoms of specific issues within the text. They are signals to be acknowledged and processed. If a reader can practice noticing these moments, as well as naming exactly where in the story they occur, it will then allow the reader to translate that experience into more specific, craft-based feedback.

Let’s go over the most common issues in the writing that lie behind the mental disconnect.

(Firstly, it’s important to flag upfront that fragmented concentration on the work at hand is not always a sign of trouble spots on the page. It could be that your workplace is too disruptive. Or you have other assignments that feel like a greater priority. Maybe you need more sleep, a snack, etc. But for the purposes of this article, we’re focusing on how to dissect the mental slog when those other interruptions from the environment and the body are not at play.)

The next time you find yourself losing focus, think of it as an indication that something is missing. If that something was included in the writing sample, then your attention would have a more concrete anchor to lock onto. As it happens, there’s not just one root cause behind the disconnect. There are several possible causes to choose from, which is why it’s important to track when thoughts begin to drift. The timing of the drift will help point to one (or more) of the following issues…

But where exactly in the writing does the slow down happen? It could be that characters are speaking in extended monologues when they don’t need to. Or whole conversations have ceased to move the story forward by not revealing new information or shifting dynamics between the characters. Perhaps the protagonist is entering scenes too early or leaving them too late. In these cases, the draft is asking the reader to linger without offering enough substance or emotional reward to justify the time.

But what particular moments on the page dredge up this feeling? Is it when the arch enemies use unoriginal, cliché dialogue? Or does the plot feel too familiar, relying on a well-worn path that’s found in other other story comps, without variation? Maybe a character comes across as a bit bland, so thoughts feel unmoored without something specific to grab hold of. This lack of a fresh angle or a reordering of events can make even the cleanest text harder to stick with.

If that’s the case, take a minute to check out this article: Giving Fair Notes on a Draft When the Genre Really Isn’t Your Jam.

But which aspect of the piece bubbles up too often? Do the scenes explain information the reader already understands? Or are emotional beats reiterated without any further escalation? When this happens, the reading experience begins to blur. Skimming often occurs not because the reader is careless, but because the piece isn’t offering enough distinction in subsequent pages.

This issue comes with a bit of a disclaimer. It’s true that every story needs solid tension in order to keep an audience’s attention (think of the word as “at-tension”). But this rule does not mean every script or novel needs explosions and life-or-death consequences. Many children’s stories operate with what appears to be, at least at face value, low-level conflict and minor stakes. Consider, for example, the classic tales of Winnie-the-Pooh. In one of the bear’s misadventures, Pooh eats so much honey that he gets stuck in Rabbit’s front door. The problem is small and even silly. Yet tales like these have endured over the years in children’s literature.

Cases where low-level conflict does not work is when the situation doesn’t matter enough to the characters. If the central character feels apathetic, then the reader won’t feel motivated to stay engaged either. In contrast, Pooh being stuck works because he minds very much that he has to wait forever to get thinner. His discomfort (and Rabbit’s) gives the narrative somewhere to go. Again, stories don’t have to be about rocket science in order to be interesting.

Which brings us to our next point… What if a submission avoids all the mistakes stated above–it moves swiftly, the premise and setting are thoroughly original, the genre is right up your alley, every beat feels like a natural escalation, and the conflict is considerable–yet it still struggles to keep the reader’s attention? What then?

Since a lack of clarity can take many forms on the page, the reader will once again need to foster a sense of inner curiosity. What specific moment during the reading experience is getting clouded with confusion? Is it the worldbuilding that’s too dense or front-loaded? Does the dialogue rely on unfamiliar terms without enough context to give them fuller meaning? Perhaps various points of view may shift in such a way that the reader sees no continuous throughline to latch onto and follow, etc., etc.…

Of course complexity is not inherently bad. The point is that if the draft does not provide clear anchors for attention, the reader’s mind works harder than it should just to stay oriented. And when weeding through overwrought, verbose language gets difficult, a common mental response is to check out and seek something easier to focus on instead.

Think of this article as your permission slip to not get annoyed with yourself if/when you lose concentration during a read. By treating attention drift as information rather than an inconvenience, creative notes become sharper. Gone will be the days of responding to clients with vague reactions to their work. Now a bit wiser, you can help writers locate and revise the problem that is actually on the page, not the one that merely feels easiest to say.