avatarJF Danskin

Summary

The author is inviting writers to participate in a collaborative Choose Your Own Adventure fiction project on Medium, with guidelines to keep things running smoothly.

Abstract

The author reminisces about the Choose Your Own Adventure books they read as a child and suggests starting a collaborative fiction project on Medium. The goal is to create a series of interconnected stories that readers can navigate through based on the choices they make. The author proposes guidelines for the project, such as keeping instalments short, ending each instalment with at least two choices, and encouraging authors to add to each other's stories. The project has been successful so far, and the author invites others to join in.

Opinions

  • The author believes that collaborative fiction projects can be successful and enjoyable.
  • The author thinks that keeping instalments short and adding choices at the end of each one will help keep the story moving along.
  • The author encourages authors to add to each other's stories and to read and comment on them.
  • The author believes that having a publication to keep the stories all in one place will help keep things running smoothly.
  • The author thinks that adding multiple follow-ups to the same story is acceptable and can add variety to the story.
  • The author believes that authors should edit their own stories to link directly to follow-ups written by others.
  • The author believes that collaborative fiction can be a fun and creative way to engage with readers and other writers.

A ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’ Collaboration

Authors, come join us!

Photo by Dariusz Sankowski on Unsplash

Did you ever read ‘Choose Your Own Adventure’ stories as a kid?

I did!

They were so much fun. There’s a real pulp-thriller feel to each short instalment/chapter, with each one ending in a set of choices for what the character should do next (or, of course, with ‘The End’).

If you’re not familiar with this kind of book, here are some titles to give you a flavor of a genre that has some real Jules Verne vibes:

  • The Cave of Time
  • By Balloon Across the Sahara
  • Space and Beyond
  • Journey Under the Sea
  • Prisoner of the Ant People
Image source: canadiem.org. Marked free to reuse.

I’ve found a couple of attempts at creating collaborative fiction here on Medium, but the writers involved seem to have become inactive some months or years back.

Who would be up for giving it another shot?

Guidelines

I suggest the following guidelines to help keep things running as smoothly as possible:

  1. A publication to keep the stories all in one place.
  2. Aim to keep instalments fairly short, so that the story/stories keep moving along. No point in working on a chapter for weeks, right? If you write something longer, consider splitting it into two or more parts, with a ‘Continue’ link at the end.
  3. Otherwise, each instalment must end with at least 2 choices, or with ‘The End’.
  4. Once follow-up stories are written (by you or someone else), authors are strongly encouraged to go back and edit their own stories so that endings link directly to these. It’s also fine to loop forward to some of the starter stories! (We editors can also add links).
  5. If two people write follow-ups to the same story, that’s ok. We can add them both in as options. Roll the dice!
  6. Authors are encouraged to add to other people’s stories, but they can also add to their own.
  7. Everyone is encouraged to read and comment as well as write. Remember, reads means royalties!

Are you in? There’s nothing to lose!

UPDATE:

We created a publication and shared hundreds of CYOA chapters. This is very much still going, if you want in!

At first, these lived in a separate publication, but for ease of editing and organisation, we switched to become part of a general fiction publication, The Fiction Writer’s Den.

Therefore, if you want to write CYOA stories, just head over to The Den, check the submission guide, and get yourself added as an author.

See you there, adventurers!

Thanks for reading! And whether or not you take part in the collaborative storytelling, you can find some writing inspiration in the prompts below.

Writing
Collaborative Fiction
Choose Your Own Adventure
Fiction
Write For Us
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