To Be Or Not To Be: A Chooseable-Path Adventure (2013) - Plot & Excerpts
Very, very clever. I saw this on Kickstarter a while back and was intrigued, so I snatched it right away when I saw it sitting on my library's new books display.First off, props to Ryan North for getting me to go back and actually read Shakespeare. I started this book and quickly realized I would enjoy it loads more if the original was fresh in my mind, so I put To Be or Not To Be on the shelf and re-discovered (and enjoyed!) Hamlet first. Glad I did!I was crazy for Choose Your Own Adventure books as a kid in the 80s, but I had forgotten over the years how obnoxious the format really is. Multiple fingers holding several pages open just so you can retrace your steps and get back to the choice you really wanted to make, before you got side-tracked to see the result of other choices. This book needs a 'back' button. I can't say I made it to every ending here, but I'd guess I got to around 3/4 of them. The art for the endings is fantastic. By far though, my favorite part about this book was following the (conveniently marked) original storyline and laughing at North's poking fun at the characters and their questionable decisions. Remember that record-breaking Kickstarter where everyone was like “He’s selling what?” This was that. IT’S ACTUALLY PRETTY GOOD, or at least I had a great time. The idea of an inch-and-a-half-thick choose your own adventure book based on Shakespeare is too stupid and bizarre to possibly work, but work it does.It’s worth reading in physical form, too, because a big chunk of the fun in a printed CYOA format is paging past the more fucked-up paths on your way to something sensible and being like “Damn, how’d they end up over there?” Spoiler alert: there are two separate paths that end up with Ophelia murdering literally every character. (One’s on the cover of the hardback.)There’s also a chess game, immense scorn from the narrator every time the reader chooses the decisions from the actual play, and the mandatory “Ultima” easter egg. And the whole thing is funny as hell. A++, would choose my own adventure again.
What do You think about To Be Or Not To Be: A Chooseable-Path Adventure (2013)?
This is a book that I will, for sure, play through over and over again. It's hilarious and just fun.
—Melly0514Mel
Thoroughly entertaining and very funny :) Definitely recommended for a good laugh.
—pks
very funny book to choose your own adventure. Quick to read and enjoyable
—BeckyDear
I was way excited by this but it didn't live up
—tink
