"Screw Big, Dumb American!": If you want to investigate the basement, turn to page 37…

When I was younger, I was a voracious reader. Which was only natural, I suppose, if you looked at my family back then. My mom and dad were the same way, with my dad being a huge fan of any military and espionage author out there (I saw a W.E.B. Griffin book next to his bed last weekend) and my mom actually had a penchant for science fiction and thrillers (which unfortunately has gone towards the “Left Behind” series). My sister though, well I don’t really ever remember her reading very much. Which at that time, just added to my theory, that she was dumb and a functional illiterate. (The “shithead” theory was later proven with the help of her kitten in a completely different story altogether)

But me? I read just about anything that I could get my hands on. Sci-fi, horror, comics, military, fantasy, Playboy, etc…In fact, my parents were amazed that one kid could read as much as I did; while still putting in the quality time to watch more TV and play more video games than any adult could ever hope to. But it shut me the Hell up, and also proved I wasn’t as retarded as my sister claimed I was; so they encouraged it and enjoyed the periods of silence that accompanied my temporary, self-imposed literary exiles. My mom actually perpetuated things when she went to work at a bookstore and brought home scores of books for me to read.

But there was one type of book that I would just plow through in a single sitting; which was prolonged by reading the book again and again and again until I had made every choice and gotten every ending possible, be it stopping the Mummy’s curse or falling off the cliff onto the jagged rocks below:

Choose Your Own Adventure books.

Plain and simple, Choose Your Own Adventure books were the shit. There’s no two ways about it. I’ve read certain books several times, but there’s never been any other book that’s caused me to read it multiple times in the same sitting and then pick it up again later on for a quick run through to see if I could get the best ending the first time through. Not even “Where’s Waldo?”

Granted the books themselves weren’t that long, and God knows they weren’t literary masterpieces; but it was the novelty that you could read them over again and experience the different results of your actions/choices that kept kids reading them. And read them they did, to the point that it became a huge fad. Well at least in my school. I remember every kid in my class reading a CYOA book. For a while, you weren’t cool unless you were reading (take THAT, Pokemon!). For me, it was as big a part of the 80’s as slap bracelets, Transformers, Garbage Pail Kids, “Where’s the beef?”, and Saturday Night's Main Event.

But as with all fads, they faded away into pop culture obscurity. Sure, one would pop up every now and then, but for the most part, CYOA books were replaced by Nintendo when it came to children’s attention. Even I succumbed to Mario’s mushroom-stompin’-tutle-kickin’ charms.

But rest assured, Choose Your Own Adventure books have a special place in the Literary Pantheon, right next to Webster’s Dictionary, The Bible, Paradise Lost, The Encyclopedia Britannica, the Dead Sea Scrolls, Batman: The Dark Knight Returns, Shakespeare, and Everybody Poops.

I actually still have a CYOA book at home. It’s actually not the “CYOA” brand, but a CYOA-style book printed by Marvel Comics starring my favorite superhero ever: Wolverine.

D