On grasping and stating the main point see Adler 1972, p. 76.
When reading a book, a good signal that you've understood it properly is to compress it to its essence and to state it clearly and briefly.
This can be applied to writing and reading fiction, though it can be a difficult exercise to extract the essence of a dense fiction book.
![[Compression brings clarity]]
![[Compression as a remembering tool]]