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Don't. The choose-your-own adventure story is dead. The market was limited to begin with, and it appealed only to a very small range of readers. The stories suffered from a lock of any writing cohesiveness, the plots of any story-line were too short to be satisfying, and there was very little reward to re-reading the story, choosing a different sequence of events, since only one had a resolution beyond, "You're dead, start over."

If you insist on trying this kind of story, the only way to make it work is to start with a single story line, divide it into readable sections that end with a choice. Then, if you are using Microsoft Word, use the link feature on the tool bar to link to other pages where you can trace alternate choices. You can then follow as many alternate story lines as you wish.

Publishing a book along these lines is almost impossible now because no publishers are currently seeking such stories. The second person style you are forced into is the kiss of death for style. It freezes you out of any interesting inner-monologue. It makes any kind of irony nearly impossible. It cancels out characterization, and the only kind of empathy the reader feels is cheated whn the story doesn't end correctly.

The best advice for anyone seeking to write a choose-your-own-adventure is Just Say No.

Learn more about this author, John Devera.
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