Now I don't want to kick things off on a b*tchy, moany tone - that's genuinely not 'how i roll' - but I've just read an article about a new digital novel that will let readers choose how the story they're reading ends. And I think about this.
And I think about it.
And I'm not sure I like it.
Take Hunter S. Thompson's 'The Rum Diary' - wouldn't we all have liked it more if Paul (Kemp) had ended up sailing off into the sunset with the icon of his lust, Chenault?
And in Kerouac's 'On The Road' - wouldn't we all have liked it more if Sal (Paradise) and the 'mad, bad and dangerous to know' (actually an enviable description of the famed poet, Lord Byron) Dean (Moriarty) had managed to find Dean's father in the streets of Denver or rolling in the alleys of Frisco??
Maybe. But these tales aren't meant to be cannon fodder for a Disney adaptation - these tales are about the real world. Do we all expect everything to end in a sea of candyfloss and sherbet flavoured rain? Well that would actually be AWESOME but ultimately, no - we all have at least a degree of realism and appreciate that there are gonna be times when things don't end up in Awesome Ville. And you know what? That's OK. As long as you (and everyone else involved) walk away upright and breathing afterwards, that's OK. It means that when we do hit a slam dunk out of the park at the Super Bowl, that we'll be even more smug about it!
And that's sort of the point to this (now quite convoluted) rant - if people are given the power to choose to hear nothing but happy endings, then how low are they gonna feel when things don't work out that way for them? But then again, maybe I'm just in a ranty mood today!
Just a thought...
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