While older generations will lament the seeming disappearance of good reading habits in modern times, saying that computers and smartphones appear to have overtaken the book can't be farther from reality. Books and reading material are still being written and published in huge quantities and made available virtually everywhere. The difference is that they are being consumed in different ways today. It would be interesting to know what are the latest literary trends to keep up with the most recent books from various authors.

The e-book is the most recent of these trends, an electronic condensation of the literary form into an easily-accessed medium that can be stored in an electronic device. Thousands of e-books can be carried around in a device no larger than a smartphone or tablet computer. The entirety of their text can be searched, anecdotes, notes and highlights can be placed all over the book, and reading progress can be stored online so that all associated accounts will have their contents and progress updated. E-books are an inevitable future that arose from the unifying and miniaturizing trends that have driven progress in personal computers and eventually smartphones. They're also cheaper to manufacture, publish and distribute than paper-based books, and may soon overtake sales of the latter.

Another trend is the novel-to-film adaptation. This trend has consisted of a spattering of adaptations over the entirety of the history of cinema, but only in the past two decades or so has it truly become a driving force in the media. So popular are these adaptations that some movies are made within a few years of their source novels. Some movie rights are already negotiated before the release of their source novel. So prevalent is the adaptation, in fact, that popular websites often publish lists of blockbuster films being released in a given year even if they are not actually novel adaptations. This practice is done to cater to audiences who are looking for original intellectual properties that offer stories that have not yet seen print. In a lot of cases, the adaptation of new novels is actually expected by novelists who prepare to write future installments of their series way ahead of time. They do it in such fast-paced fashion to make it easier for film producers to turn their works into cinema blockbusters.

A final and interesting trend is the rise of the young adult genre. Faced with a huge demographic of young people who are more and more exposed to the media every day, novelists and publishers are putting out more and more Young Adult novels to satisfy the demands of this previously untapped resource. The YA genre, in fact, is where most of the novel-to-film adaptations come from, there being a guaranteed market of young people who will flock to cinemas to watch their favorite stories come to life.

Whatever the case in literary trends these days, one thing is certain: Reading is not dying. Reading is perhaps more widespread and intense than it ever has been, with more and more literate people forming the population of the planet. People can only adapt to these trends, or adopt them as they arrive, because reading is never going to die.