Choose your own adventure
I absolutely loved Choose Your Own Adventure books as a child! Give me an exciting story and control over the ending? The budding control-freak in me was very happy. I bet I owned close to 100 of them and I would devour each and every path.
Read the intro… turn to page 14 if you want to go in the hot air balloon, turn to page 43 if you want to go in the submarine.
Read page 43… turn to page 22 if you choose to follow the map, turn to page 99 if you follow the strange creature.
Read page 99… Suffer an agonizing death as strange creature rips open submarine and eats me.
Go back to page 43 and pick the different path…
And so on and so on.
Over the years I have tried to get the kids interested in these stories. K liked them for a little while. E never really got into them. And now J is ready for that level. So far, he seems to like them quite a bit (and as a side note, any time I find something he *likes* to read it’s an accomplishment). Last night he asked if I would listen to him read one out loud for a while. I did, of course.
Read the intro… turn to page 21 if you want to go solo, turn to page 45 if you want to pair up.
Read page 45… turn to page 5 if you want to enter tonight’s competition, turn to page 60 if you want to wait.
Read page 60… and insert bookmark at the choice because he was tired of reading.
Turns out, he had read through to the same choice the night before and had picked page 5 which caused him to lose the competition. Last night he wanted to see what would happen if he waited so he made sure he read the “same path but picked a different way on competition night.” Yes, instead of going directly to page 45, he started over completely.
Oh literal child of mine… I’m either going to have to teach you how to read these books more efficiently or you’re going to get really good at reading the first three pages over and over and over.
How have I never heard of these? Sounds like a great series.
Travesty! They are so fun: http://www.amazon.com/Abominable-Snowman-Journey-Nabooti-Adventure/dp/1933390948/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1360688548&sr=8-1&keywords=choose+your+own+adventure
This is hilarious. I loved those books and cheated like crazy at them. Die as a Mayan sacrifice? I DON’T THINK SO.
LOVED those books.Definitely have to check out all of the possible outcomes.
okay, I found your blog post by googling something cyoa for myself, and I’ll shill myself and say I write cyoa for adults (The Take Control Ladies) but now that I’ve read your post I’ll share that the same company has come out with cyoa for younger children, stupidly called Dragonlark. They’re easier, shorter, and full color. Your kid might like them~ http://www.amazon.com/Haunted-House-Choose-Your-Adventure/dp/1933390514