Fourth Story Media

Publishers Weekly asked a number of children’s publishers, scouts, and editors (including FSM’s Lisa Holton) what they’re expecting at this year’s Bologna Children’s Book Fair (March 23-26). Some soundbytes:

Natasha Ferrant, Literary Scout: “There’s a real buzz about YA literature, which is tremendously exciting. I’m hoping to see less of the paranormal stuff and more good, original writing. Much as I love them—I do, I do—I don’t want to read any more vampire books, probably EVER AGAIN. What I really want to find is simple and oh so elusive: a strong middle-grade series with great writing and an even better story.”

Rob McMenemy, Senior VP Egmont English Language & Central Europe: “The digital agenda will loom even larger this year, taking more airtime and even more space, but we are fast approaching the point where it won’t be a separate agenda at all nor just an interesting sideshow, but rather an integral part of the business of publishing and rights.”

Lisa Holton, CEO Fourth Story: “I am going mainly to hear what my international colleagues are thinking about their business—how they publish, who they are publishing, and how they think the landscape—digital and print—is changing.”

Klaus Humann, Publisher Carlsen Verlag, Germany: “Our job as publishers had always been and will always be to take risks, invest into new authors, encourage them to write their first books and get them published. We are not paid to follow trends. We are paid to create them.”

Read the full piece in PW.

Shelli (@srjohannes) from Market My Words has a two-part interview (part one, part two) with FSM’s Creative Development & Marketing Director Ariel Aberg-Riger about marketing The Amanda Project. It’s quite long (but chock full)! A small taste:

What are the top 3 reasons The Amanda Project interactive model works for readers?

1. Most importantly, it’s an amazing, well-written story. We have fantastic, bestselling YA authors like Melissa Kantor and Laurie Stolarz working collaboratively to create a rich narrative core and to build Amanda’s world. It’s only with such a strong base that we are able to extend the story and invite our readers in to collaborate and interact as well. If they weren’t hooked in the first place, they wouldn’t care!
2. It’s a structured creative environment. We find that although the sky really is the limit in terms of what you can invent and who you can be on The Amanda Project, our readers and writers create most readily when we actually impose certain constraints. For example, every Friday we publish a new story on the site, and each week’s story ends with a call to action that asks a very specific question (e.g. Have you ever lied to make people like you? Is this Amanda’s purple ink?) which we find both lowers the barrier to entry for participation (aka the blank page effect), as well as creates a much more cohesive direction for the continuation of the story.
3. It’s universal. The Amanda Project deals with issues all teen girls (and anyone, really) can relate to – identity, friendship, difficult decisions, loyalties, secrets, the drama of high school life – so it’s easy to lose yourself in the character you create, and really immerse yourself in Amanda’s world.

Daily Grommet gives a great endorsement of The Amanda Project as a “treat” for those “tough-to-shop-for teen girls in your life” (and for grown-ups with a fondness for YA)!

Remember how nutty everyone got over the Da Vinci Code? Staring at The Last Supper, looking for clues… well, Invisible I, the first novel in a new series called The Amanda Project, is a little bit like that, but its target audience is teen girls. It is a story of a mysterious “new girl” at Endeavor High who touches the lives of the main characters, and just as quickly disappears, leaving everyone — including the reader — compelled to figure it all out. Even more importantly, it’s a totally interactive experience. Beyond reading the book, your teen can use a cell phone camera to crack a code in the book, visit the website, and contribute her own stories and ideas to the online community.

Author Melissa Kantor creates a vivid and authentic reality, with text messages and passed notes baked right into the story, as well as moments of gritty realism (an alcoholic parent) all tastefully and carefully handled.

The next book in the series, Signal from Afar, is due out in June, which makes it a great time to join in the fun.

Read the full post here!

Lisa Holton discussed Fourth Story Media’s current thinking, and recent developments in The Amanda Project at Digital Book World January 26th on the panel “Synergizing the Book and Web: Books Plus in the 21st Century.” The panel – moderated by Market Partners International’s Lorraine Shanley, with Will Schwalbe (our office mate and CEO of Cookstr), and Hillel Cooperman (founder of Jackson Fish Market) among others – covered everything from the challenges of being a start-up to exploring new digital business models.

Some highlights:

• The twitterverse especially loved Lisa’s mention of The Amanda Project’s recent collaboration with Modcloth.
• ForeWord highlighted The Amanda Project as an “innovative application of reader engagement in authoring,” alongside other projects like the ever-popular book social networking site GoodReads, and HarperCollins’ new site for aspiring writers Inkpop.
• And (our favorite) Chapman/Chapman said in his DBW summary: “Fourth Story Media are doing very, very cool shit with transmedia storytelling.”

Last week, MediaBistro’s Ron Hogan stopped by our offices to chat with us about The Amanda Project and what we’re up to at Fourth Story Media in general. We had a great time – jumping into a discussion about immersive fiction – soap operas, ARGs and role-playing games, books – the works! From his post:

“The effect, we commented to Holton, was like a participatory soap opera, or a massive Dungeons & Dragons campaign with one dungeonmaster and hundreds of players; she brought up the classic text-based puzzle games Infocom created for home computer owners in the 1980s, which set us both on a nostalgia kick for their adaptation of The Hitchhikers’ Guide to the Galaxy, one of the truly great interactive fictions. (Interestingly, that was the second time this month we’d found ourselves in that conversation!)

“A lot of adults had a really hard time grasping this,” Holton says of the way the books and the website link together into one overarching immersive narrative, “but I would explain it to a 13-year-old girl and ” (she snaps! her fingers) “she’d get it in 30 seconds. In fact, beta users used to tell us it took them a long time to figure the website out, and it would turn out ‘a long time’ was five minutes.” Inspired by the initial success of The Amanda Project, Fourth Story is already preparing another series, a science-fiction-themed narrative aimed at young male readers. “In some ways, this is radically different than what I’d been doing for the last 20 years,” Holton reflects, “but the basics are still the same… What’s the story? And how do you think readers will be interested by it?”

Read the full piece now!

Today’s NYT mentions The Amanda Project in its front page article “Curling Up with Hybrid Books, Videos Included:”

The children’s division of HarperCollins recently released the first in a young-adult mystery series called “The Amanda Project,” and has invited readers to discuss clues and characters on a Web site. As the series continues, some of the reader comments may be incorporated into minor characters or subplots.

Susan Katz, publisher of HarperCollins Children’s Books, predicted that “there is going to be a popular kind of literature where the author is seen as the leader of a large group and will pick and choose from these suggestions” by readers.

Read the full article here.

UPDATE: Book Case (a blog by the editors of BookPage) has a great post about The Amanda Project including a summary of Invisible I, the TAP video, and commentary on the NYT piece. Check it out!

Common Sense Media, the well-respected, non-partisan, not-for-profit organization that provides media reviews for families and educators recently reviewed Invisible I and The Amanda Project and gave it 4 stars! Calling it a “compelling, quirky onion of a mystery” the review goes on to say:

The writing and the book design are both beautiful. Main characters are smart, resilient, and optimistic — Kantor’s dialogue is spot on, and the characters will resonate with readers. Callie’s life is a roller coaster, and yet her new-found friendships empower her. Amanda’s disappearance seems to lead to more secrets and more revelations at the same time, and Callie finds the strength, and the support, to make some big changes in her life. Courage leads to confrontations that help many people; but Amanda is still missing.

This is a cliffhanger that will have readers anxiously awaiting the next book, and the Web site may inspire them creatively.

Check out the full review, and learn more about Common Sense Media!

Bookselling This Week talked to FSM CEO Lisa Holton about the launch of the first book in The Amanda Project- Invisible I.

“First and foremost, the book is a great read and a fun handsell…It’s a perfect choice for Teen Book Clubs, Mother/Daughter Book Clubs, or for avid readers who love to write as well,” said Holton. “And if you look in the back of the book, you’ll find the work of Lisa Strumm — a 17-year-old girl whose writing on the website was chosen for the first book.” (For her piece, Strumm, who lives in Plano, Texas, received an honorarium of a $100 gift certificate to her local indie bookstore, Legacy Books.)

To booksellers, Holton said, “Encourage your customers to write on the site, and perhaps they will be chosen for book two!”

Read the full piece here!

YPulse Managing Editor Meredith Sires virtually sat down with a bunch of us at Fourth Story – Lisa Holton, JillEllyn Riley, Ariel Aberg-Riger, and Melissa Kantor (author of Invisible I) – to discuss The Amanda Project.

YP: Melissa, what was it like shaping a story that would be left open to interpretation by the readers? Do you have any favorite mystery stories or other sources that served as inspiration?

TAP: I was a HUGE Nancy Drew fan as a kid, then moved on to other great mysteries (Agatha Christie, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle) and more popular/contemporary writers (Mary Higgins Clark). TV has definitely played a role in inspiring me (Veronica Mars, anyone?). In terms of the reader/writer relationship that The Amanda Project has created, I find the whole reader-input idea really exciting; as a writer, I normally have to wait to hear what my readers think until after the fact, when the book’s published, and I’ve moved on to another set of characters. So to have the opportunity to be in a dialogue (of sorts) with people who are excited about the characters I’m spending so much time with is a real thrill. I love that the identity a reader invented is included in “Invisible I.” What a cool moment for her AND for me! (MK)

Read the whole interview here, and be sure to leave a comment about your favorite mystery over at YPulse for a chance to win a free copy of Invisible I!

The Austin Children’s Book Examiner has an amazing review of The Amanda Project and Invisible I, calling it “the most innovative interactive fiction project from a major publisher yet:”

The first book in this series, Invisible I, is fantastic and gets you engrossed in the mystery right from the start.  The website is well designed and packed with fun and engaging features.  With eight books planned, one can only assume that more will be added to the site as well (such a dynamic website couldn’t stay the same for that long).  There is so much potential in this project and the idea that readers get to actually help create the mystery as it is written is really innovative and exciting.  It’s a perfect interactive project for a teen audience!  The ability to actually be a part of the story is fantastic and if HarperCollins starts to incorporate more multi-media content to the website as well it would be a sure winner.  There’s so much fun content both in the engaging book and the interactive website that The Amanda Project is really something to check out and keep an eye on as it continues to unfold!

Read the entire article here!