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Chatterbox: Crowd Sorcery
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Welcome to Crowd Sorcery!
This summer, Fred Durbin and Emily Fiegenschuh, author and illustrator of “The Star Shard” (Cricket April 2008–April 2009) will be working with ideas and characters you develop through Crowd Sorcery to create an original fantasy story for the November/December 2014 issue of Cricket.
Fred and Emily need your help inventing a hero or heroine, a sidekick, a villain, and an imaginative fantasy world. Beginning with the July/August issue, Cricket will publish in the magazine selections of what kids write on Crowd Sorcery. Sketches of some of your characters and ideas by Emily will be featured in the digital editions!
Digital editions of the magazine will be downloadable for free during the summer. They include everything in the magazine plus many extra features. Just go to the iTunes store or Google Play and search for Cricket magazine to download a free digital edition.
We hope that all of you who love to create stories on the Inkwell will enjoy collaborating in the process of creating a real Cricket story. We also hope that kids who read Cricket around the world will join the fun by linking from their digital editions to the Chatterbox.
If you’ve linked here from the digital edition, let us know! And welcome to the Chatterbox!
How does Crowd Sorcery work?
We’ve planned four threads where you can contribute ideas for a hero or heroine, sidekick, villain, and a Fantasy Dictionary. You can create as many characters and fantasy worlds as you like. Maybe your characters will live in a medieval village, or in ancient Egypt, or your fantasy ideas might lead you to imagine a futuristic world. It’s up to you! You can also change your ideas, and comment on the ideas of other Chatterboxers. (You can’t create new threads on this section of the Chatterbox. Please post your contributions as comments or replies.)
From time to time, Fred will create a Fred Thread. He may ask a question to help him, and everyone, better imagine the story’s fantasy world and characters. He may also post parts of the story as he writes, so that you can comment or make suggestions.
We would like you to begin with the threads for Hero or Heroine, Fantasy Dictionary, and Fred Thread 1. Later in May we will make live the threads for Sidekick and Villain.
How will we/Fred/you decide on the final characters?
We plan to have kids vote on the final choice of characters for the story. We’ll announce during the summer when voting will take place. Your discussions on the threads may also help you decide on your favorites.
When writing the story, Fred will probably draw upon a lot of your ideas, not just the final choices. It will be interesting to see how an author uses ideas in surprising ways to make a story his own.
So go to the threads and begin!
You don’t have to do them all at once. We hope you will return many times over the summer to add and discuss ideas.
Invite your Chatterbox or other friends to participate. We’ve never tried this before, but no one else has either because ... it’s a first-of-its-kind crowd-sourced fantasy story!
If you have any questions or comments, you can post them below.
submitted by Admin
(April 23, 2014 - 9:50 am)
(April 23, 2014 - 9:50 am)
Cool!
(July 18, 2014 - 6:24 am)
Hi, I love Cricket magazine.
(August 9, 2014 - 11:36 pm)
I like this idea.
(August 19, 2014 - 3:00 pm)
This is a great opportunity for those who have creative skills and havn't put them to good use. I love the excitement in the comments.
(September 3, 2014 - 5:24 pm)
Awesome ideas!:)
(September 5, 2014 - 8:17 pm)
Omg Hi!!!!!!!!!!!!
(September 14, 2014 - 10:22 am)
This is AWESOME!!!!! I have a few ideas of my own.
Character: Elliza
Lives: On an island in the middle of the ocean
Family: Mother [queen Rosetta] her father [king Smith]
Her parents died while Elliza was a toddler. The people of her tribe took her in. She later realizes that she is special. She also realizes that her parents were killed by evil warriors. And she has a sister named Belliza, who was captured by the evil warriors and brought to the evil king Drazx. She figures all this with help from a leatherbound book that has been hidden for years. She sets out on a mission to find and save Belliza.
Good idea? I LOVE Cricket and I think I will write a book starring Eliza someday. CRICKET IS AWESOME!!!!!!!!!! This is like a dream come true!!!
I LOVE you, Cricket!!!
P.S. Ladybug is too bossy. But I love Pussywillow. She is so cute!
(September 27, 2014 - 6:16 pm)
I love your suggestions!!!!!!!!!!!!
(September 28, 2014 - 10:52 am)
Hi buggies!!!
I love everyone's suggestions, and I have some myself.
Rucky- a Pair of boots that are a conspicuous yellow and htat connot sink in quick sand and can float. These boots can give off a very high chirp, like a bat, that has a message in it. This message can only be heard by the person your calling. It's your call for help. These boots fell so like that you sometimes forget you have them on.
Thorm woods- and evil and dangerous forest, where vines wiht fangs that will strangle you and suck your blood live. big and mean animals who seek revenge and the evil forces( whatever there names are, doeas anybody have a suggestion?) also live and thrive.
Squill- the future version of a squirll. These animals have tiny fury tails, but they are so strong that in one push you'd be flying throught the air. Their eyes are orange, and they swirl around and around like a spiral when they are not sick. They are very ugly, but they have a disguise system so that when you look at hem you think they are soo cute that you fall inot a deep dream for 8 hours. Once they bond with 1 master, they will not bond with another, even when their origional master dies.
Thenks for letting me contribute in any way!!!!
p.s.- I've had your magazines for a while, but I never knew about this online program! Silly me.
(September 28, 2014 - 10:51 am)
Character Profile:
Full name: Amaris Belladonna Nightshade
Age: 11
Height: 5' 2"
Gender: Female
Hair colour: Jet black
Eye colour: Golden
Lives with: Lupa and her pack
Rank: Sagamore in traning and Praetor of the Fifth Legion
Race: Drakonia
Hero/Villian: Heroine
Past: Daughter of Luna/Selene, left to die in the woods because she was a girl. Found and raised by Lupa the She-wolf, became a Hunter of Artemis at age 15
(October 7, 2014 - 2:07 pm)
THIS IS AWSOME!!! We all get to use our creative writing talents and art talents.
(November 7, 2014 - 11:01 am)
Hi Everybuggy who reads this!
I am writing a fantasy story myself! I love fantasy and The Hobbit is the best. I saw the third one in the theaters. O M GOSH IT WAS THE BEST! I cried in it. All you hobbit lovers, PLEASE comment.
My story is about a dryad named Irene whose dead mother's craving for power left her the inheritance of the hatred of Enchantelle, a Naiad. It is her place to protect the dryad's forest from Enchantelle. How can she do it? She makes a discovery and, with the help of her pet baby dragon, Pockets, she attempts to defeat Enchantelle and the other Naiads in a battle which will change her life forever.
A few sentences from my story:
Irene floated about like a whisp in the early morning. The moss, damp with dew, made every step under her bare feet silent. Irene could see the lake now, a pale blue trim outlining the sunrise. She could already taste the fresh fish in her mouth. It was now very near! SPLAT! The sound cracked the silence, making her heart race. Irene froze, and waited for the whole forest to come out with Lunaflies lanterns...
(January 13, 2015 - 9:28 am)
Wow, this made me cry! I remember your story like it was yesterday that it ended, but it turns out that I was only 8-9 when it was published
<3
(February 13, 2015 - 1:50 pm)
It is waaaaaay past the summer of 2014. I want to participate anyway. Are Fred and Emily still accepting ideas, or have they already picked everything? The story isn't done yet, so if they are still accepting ideas I will post lots. And LOTS!
Fred and Emily are not still accepting ideas for "The Girl Who Writes the Future." However, the Crowd Sorcery section is still open for anyone to submit characters or words and for others to read them and maybe use them in their own original stories. The possibilities are endless. That's what Chatterbox is all about.
Admin
(March 11, 2015 - 7:11 pm)
I know it might probably be a bit too late to submitt ideas, but there's one that I've had for a while for a magical creature, and I just wanted to tell you about it: They are called Rahjons, and they're these wolves that wander the night sky. Only a few people can see them. They are the ones that sing the stars into existence.
(March 13, 2015 - 3:42 pm)