Singer has already served 100 hours of community service.
'Level 26': The World's First Digi-Novel
Last year's writers strike led me down a path that became the multimedia "Level 26" - a novel, movie and website all in one.
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Pictures from inside and outside the late pop star's Holmby Hills home, including shots of the bedroom where paramedics tried to resuscitate him, a mannequin bartender and a bloody shirt hanging in his closet. See more at RadarOnline.
Short page chapters. After twenty or so pages, the story will stop and you will have the option to log into level26.com and enter a code.
That code will unlock a “cyberbridge” which is a three minute motion picture scene which “bridges” you from one chapter to another. It’s not a recap, but a transition.
Sometimes it’s a love scene. Other times it’s a horror scene or a music video. Sometimes if you call the killer, he might even call you back.
Now, I know what you’re going to ask next --do you have to log-in every time to read the book?
Answer is “No.”
If you want to read the novel cover to cover, you will not miss a beat, but if you engage in the cyberbridges, you will read an entirely new way. And when the book is over, the story continues online on level26.com for the community of fans.
The DNA of the Digi-Novel is reading, watching, and logging in. The idea also allows for product placement opportunities to live inside the book, motion picture scenes, and the home page. The cross-monitization possibilities are endless.
When I pitched the Digi-Novel to eight publishers in New York, we had seven offers the same day. In the end, Dutton beat out Hyperion in a bidding war. Dutton won and we’re doing three books together. So if you want an “edgy version of CSI” which might just scare the crap out of you, pick up a copy on September 8th or pre-order one on Amazon.com.
The “Digi-Novel” is the first of its kind and does something no other book can. Offer the existing crime reader a different experience while at the same time, taking the You Tube generation -- who doesn’t read -- and offer them snack sized scenes wrapped around a written narrative.
It truly is the best of both worlds. Converging generations to experience a “one size fits all” novel in the throws of uncharted technology.
Not to mention "read more."
Comments
Sanderson Palmer Says
I think this digi-novel thing is possibly the best idea ever. A lot of people have difficulty reading more than a few words at a time, and books are so archaic and rectangular.
I remember when that guy invented the printing press and all of a sudden talking went out of style, and for hundreds of years it was really quiet. Now that reading is on the way out, I think word-assisted pictures using digital media in place of horse-powered gramophones and puppets is brilliant, if not more.
Anyway it's pretty exciting to be here on the cusp of the dawn of something really new. I for one will be first in line at the clicking button area to purchase this, as long as the author signs my copy.
Murt Cromwell Says
I think this digi-novel thing is possibly the best idea ever. A lot of people have difficulty reading more than a few words at a time, and books are so archaic and rectangular.
I remember when that guy invented the printing press and all of a sudden talking went out of style, and for hundreds of years it was really quiet. Now that reading is on the way out, I think word-assisted pictures using digital media in place of horse-powered gramophones and puppets is brilliant, if not more.
Anyway it's pretty exciting to be here on the cusp of the dawn of something really new. I for one will be first in line at the clicking button area to purchase this, as long as the author signs my copy.
NOT NOT CHARLES Says
"Inventing" the digi-novel might be a little over-stating. - Interactive/online companion books have been around for years and the "cyberbridge" is just another form of "cinematic cut scene" that video games use to progress the story. "Orchestrating" might be a bit more realistic.
Anthony, I'll definitely check this out when it arrives, but I won't be surprised if you somehow find a way to invent a "creator's commentary" audio track to the damn thing.
Not Charles Says
Yeah, Charles, what's with all the hate?
After all, when Zuiker modestly mentions how he "created the most successful television franchise in history" and then proclaims how he "invented" the digi-novel, it's not like he's being an arrogant jackass. He's just laying down THE TRUTH. (Most people don't feel the need to toot their own horn so loudly and list their own credits in self-penned articles, but that's beside the point.)
Then in the comments when he proclaims: "try not to judge abook by its cover," that's just a free sample of the stellar writing that's made all his carbon-copy TV shows so successful. (That's right, he wrote: "abook" not "a book." Spaces are for pussies who aren't as rich and successful as he is.) I'm sure you'll find more examples of this caliber of cliche recycling when you read Level Whatever.
So lay off, Charles!
Mel Says
Gee, CHARLES: you haven't read it and you've not seen it but you're sitting there behind your computer deciding you know what you're even talking about based on a story introducing the idea of something completely new to the industry? Wait until it comes out. No need to player-hate so early in the game.
anthony e. zuiker Says
Charles, try not to judge abook by its cover. Just like I won't judge a hater by his blog.
Zuiker
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Charles Says
So what you're going to have is a crappy novel(ization) along the lines of one of those Stephen J. Cannell things, with some videos and an online forum. Big deal. People want to read good novels, and any good novel develops its own online community naturally anyway, whether at the Amazon discussion forums or the author's Web site or wherever.
Publishers went for it because of the CSI connection. The plot seems cut from the same cloth, and they can market it that way, just like any television novelization (X Files, Star Trek).
CP Says
With thinking like this, why not cut out all the middle people - unions and management - and let each creative mind deal with distribution on its own terms? If you have a good idea then producers and platforms will pick it up - kind of creative darwinism. Don't understand why writers/actors/directors, even management would want to give administrators a cut of the action on new media.
Even the best creative folks will always need the dollars, the distribution networks and yes, the steadying hand, that management provides but if you have the goods, you don't need anyone telling you when you can work or with whom.
Look to the future at all levels - a creative collective, perhaps?
Let's talk about it without the name calling and the hyperbole, just good, clean, forward thinking ideas.
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