The Magic of Digital Storytelling: Children’s Publishers and New Media

When I was in elementary school, I experienced the advent of a life-changing new media as it became widely used by the public for the first time. That phenomenon was the Internet, and at twelve years old I was at an ideal age to become absorbed in this novel method of connecting with the world around me. I was impressed, but believed that this was merely a doorway to the virtual reality full-body immersive video game technology that they swore was just around the corner.

Needless to say, on this front I remain disappointed.

As a fervent book-reader, much of my time spent browsing was on the website of publishers and booksellers, authors and fansites as they sprang up all around me. For the first time there were easily accessible forums to learn about books and authors and connect with other fans. And I loved it.

(A few short anecdotes in no particular order: (a) I was an enthusiastic member of an extremely active website/e-mail fan club for YA author Christopher Pike based on his book The Midnight Club; (b) I played the Animorphs video game on my old-school PC; (c) I browsed the PBS website in search of trivia on my childhood television/book series, like Arthur and The Magic School Bus.)

Digital interconnectedness for today’s twelve-year-olds is as commonplace as any other marvel of the modern world, and today publishers and authors are scrambling to entice the ever-more technologically savvy youth to read an ordinary, paper book.  Especially with the advent of electronic book-reading devices, including the Kindle and Sony E-reader, and the increasing popularity of video and computer games, kids and teens today are coming to expect their entertainment on a digital platform.

Rachel Deahl of Publisher’s Weekly discusses the publishing industry’s response to this trend in her article “The New Storytelling: Multimedia Children's Publishing,”  which examines the multimedia platforms being developed to add multidimensional layers to the book reading experience. In short, books are developed that have several interlinking elements outside of the paper copy, including websites, forums, media content, cards, and even handheld games. Fourth Story Media’s The Amanda Project is one such example. The company, which focuses on new media content, describes The Amanda Project as an “interactive, collaborative mystery series” targeting teen girls. The intrigue of title alone would certainly have grabbed my attention when I was twelve.

But the challenge of any book that seeks to extend itself beyond its traditional form is in maintaining the integrity of the storytelling. Scholastic’s The 39 Clues, a collaborative book project utilizing a card set and website tie-in, marketed itself as a “built-in bestseller” meant to follow the success of Scholastic’s flagship title, the Harry Potter series, but has so far seen little of the media and public attention that its traditional predecessor received. Reviews of the series have been generally positive, though not enthusiastic, and make frequent reference to the “gimmick” behind the books. Such is my personal fear and trepidation about many of these projects—that story will play a secondary role to technological entertainment.

Rick Joyce of Perseus Book Group, which in 2006 published the highly unique Cathy’s Book, a predecessor of young adult interactive fiction, acknowledges the difficulty of keeping a story focused and characters interesting by asking the essential question: “Do I want to spend time with these characters?”

But publishers and authors alike seem to realize that whether or not they choose to embrace it, the future is already here. While multimedia and multiplatform young adult (and perhaps even adult) fiction are still at an experimental level and do not seem poised to replace the book-reading experience as we know it now, it certainly offers this newest generation a chance to shape for themselves how they choose to consume a story.

Tell us your thoughts on digital content and multimedia in young adult fiction. Intriguing new element to books or publicity stunt that detracts from them?