Here’s an idea. You write a page of a story. Then maybe continue with a second page. Then a third. I read your story and become inspired. The relationship between your two romantic characters is powerful to me. I decide to continue your story from the third page. As you write a fourth page, I write a fourth page. We both write a fifth page, but separately. We take the story in two different directions. Your characters break up and move to different cities. Mine get married but lose a baby in a miscarriage. We have created two alternate universes from your original idea.

Someday I start my own story and maybe you will create your own version. I write a story about an epic battle between two alien species. You become attached to one of my side characters, a commander of an elite fighting force. I may not have much to say about her, but you tell her tale. On the next page you give her a voice. You give her a backstory and a family. You write the tragic murder of her best friend by an enemy assassin. Then, when you are finished with this spin-off, you return your focus on my original story. Our readers can reach my fourth page either by going directly to it, or following your digression. Or if you prefer, you can just continue on with that side character’s story, never having to worry about satisfying the continuity of mine.

Such a story-telling method could be used to set up choose-your-own-adventure stories or fan fiction with collaboration from several different writers. Each writer starts from the same page or few pages and adds something of their own or takes it in an alternate direction. Characters make different choices and live or die in the same place at the same time in an alternate version of their life.

What do you think? Is this something you would like to be part of?