on Writing Forward:

One of the greatest skills that a writer can possess is the ability to make readers feel something. If you can engage readers on an emotional level, you’ll have them hooked. This effect is called emotional resonance.

Think about it: Most of the books, poems, movies, and TV shows that you love best are the ones with which you forged an emotional connection. You felt like the characters were your friends, so you felt for them. You felt with them.

In performances, actors, writers, and directors collaborate to create emotional resonance. But in written works, it falls to the writer to evoke an emotional response from the readers, and it’s usually a complex and difficult endeavor.