Hypertext fiction is great! Who cares about linearity Allison, our pre-concieved notions that narrative must take a linear form is boring and outdated. I think back to when I was a kid reading R.L Stines Goosebumps, the most exciting ones were the sparkly ‘Give yourself Goosebumps’ editions. The whole idea was that the reader was an active participant in the story, somewhat niavely I thought of myself as one of the creative minds making up my own version of the story. That’s an exciting feeling! Readers are more intuitive and engaged if they feel an active member. It’s sad that we fall into the linear trap as adults and forget the possibilities of branching stories.

‘Give yourself Goosebumps’ was only a drop in the ocean for the possibilites of Hypertext fiction. Just like informational hypertext it grants the reader power to a mass database of information. I cant help to make parellels with ‘Art Cinema’. Parellels in the nonnecessary need for narrative linearity and importance and expression of characters pychological states. Hypertext fiction would allow for an infinite availabilty to character development and psychological exploration.

Bordwell’s observation of art cinema as ‘less concerned with action than reaction‘, I think holds true to Hypertext fiction. It is OUR reaction to the narrative that determines which direction we want to follow.