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Monday, April 30, 2012

Worst Case Scenario Reading is the Ultimate Adventure Blog Tour

My good friends at Chronicle Books have another fabulous blog tour going. As is usual with the innovative Chronicle, they have a grand idea: a very nifty concept for reluctant readers, The Worst-Case Scenario Ultimate Adventure Novels.


The idea is this:
  1. Produce a rip-roaring adventure in some far-flung place (e.g. Everest, Mars, or The Amazon)
  2. Pepper the pages with some really good graphics and drawings
  3. Give a reader TWENTY-FOUR (yes, 24!!) possible endings, with just ONE path to survival
  4. Make your protagonists a 14-year-old boy from Montana, and a 14-year-old girl from Thailand--i.e. a great multicultural feel that will appeal to both boys and girls
  5. And Bob's your Italian Uncle--the reluctant readers will snap it up and beg for more... at least that the hope.
I couldn't wait to put this to the test and enlisted my very own reluctant reader, my 9-year-old son K.R.


(Snuck up and captured this rare shot of Readerensis Reluctibus. Note the ripped jeans. Would much rather be tree-climbing than reading. However, AMAZON caused him to take a moment from his busy day to book-snuggle.)


Here's what he had to say about it:

"I really liked how it had you choose how to survive. And my favorite part was the part about the bees. There were some really great drawings. I could really relate with the characters.

Being in the Amazon was dangerous, which I liked. It's one of the best books I've read. And I'd really like to read the books about Everest and Mars."

THUMBS UP, FOLKS!! You can get a flavor of the books from this excerpt from Scribd and view the concept in this video (from MARS, another of the books in the series.)



I've got a copy of AMAZON to send your way, whether you have a reluctant reader or not. Just leave a comment, extra Brownie points for Tweeting.

(May is Middle Grade Mafioso's first anniversary. I'm twirling my fedora trying to come up with a fitting commemoration, so stay tuned. There's bound to be eggplants, accordions, and plenty of prosciutto. Have a great week. Ciao!!)
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9 comments:

  1. Ms. YinglingApril 30, 2012 at 3:28 AM

    This is always on my Happy Haul-idays list, but I have not gotten to see a copy. Choose Your Own Adventure books make me slightly crazy, since I want to work out ALL the possibilities, but my students certainly enjoy them. And will there be cake for your anniversary? You've accomplished a lot in a year!

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  2. The Busy AuthorApril 30, 2012 at 9:48 AM

    I'd love to try this on my daughter. I think she'd love it!

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  3. Shannon O'DonnellApril 30, 2012 at 10:39 AM

    I bet my 10 y.o. would love these! What a perfect spotlight for MMGM. And because I like brownies so much, I tweeted and +1'd. :)

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  4. Natalie AguirreApril 30, 2012 at 12:23 PM

    Sounds like a great idea for relunctant readers or grade schoolers in general. My daughter probably would have liked them at that age.

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  5. Books4LearningApril 30, 2012 at 3:04 PM

    I have an 11 year old male reluctant reader. Maybe mine will snuggle up with this one. I can only hope :)

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  6. Books4LearningApril 30, 2012 at 3:07 PM

    I also tweeted this giveaway.
    https://twitter.com/#!/Books4Learning

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  7. Barbara WatsonApril 30, 2012 at 3:23 PM

    Sounds like another great one! Thanks for the chance to win it.

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  8. Joanne R. FritzApril 30, 2012 at 6:41 PM

    Readerensis Reluctibus! Love it!

    Ah, 24 possible endings, eh? Gosh, working out all the possibilities as Ms. Yingling wants to do could potentially take you until the end of the universe as we know it.

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  9. danika dinsmoreApril 30, 2012 at 9:28 PM

    Readerensis Reluctibus - lol. (does he know you used the words book-snuggle to describe the photo?)

    This sounds like a whole lot of fun, a definite maturing of the Choose Your Own Adventure books from my childhood.

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