Interesting. My writing has always triggered emotion in people. Yet, not once, in 60 years of publication, have I ever considered emotionally connecting with my reader.

The major reason I detest literary fiction is the effort to make the reader feel emotion. So much of it is pretentious.

We all feel emotion. Emotion is the chemical outcome of thought. If one has an emotion, it can be traced back to a thought.

For instance, the world as been outraged by the Hamas excursion into Israel. No vivid description was required. We all have an imagination. When we have an idea of the facts, the story, it is our imagination that triggers our emotion.

In my opinion, the best thing to do is provide as much data - compact, or tight writing, as we used to call it - as possible. That is what triggers reader response and it doesn't have to be emotional.

I am a prolific reader. I have no interest in reading things because they trigger emotion. I am interested in top quality data. Any emotion that comes with it is a side effect. I observe the emotion, note it, and move on.