The Rains of Sichuan {Choose Your Own Adventure} // Wattys 2019

"If we want to survive this drought, you will have to make it rain."

In this short-and-sweet Choose Your Own Adventure book, you will be taken on a quest to discover why the rains haven't fallen on your tiny little chinese village - and to remedy the situation before the drought kills you all.

Enjoy an epic adventure in medieval China and unravel a terrible plot. This is the closest you can get to actually playing a tabletop RPG - grab a piece of paper or your Notes app, a couple dice or a random-draw website (link in the Welcome section), and get ready to charm, magic, and fight your way through the land. Become a Monk, a Warrior or a Shaman and fulfill your quest - bring the rains back to your village!

Once you're done, don't hesitate to leave a little comment at the last page saying who you chose to play, and whether you reached the end... or died a gruesome death!

***

This book was born after my martial arts teacher told my boyfriend and me that he wanted to have a roleplaying afternoon with our group - a live-action roleplaying afternoon, based on Gong Fu and China. I devised the story and wrote it, incorporating Gong Fu training as the tests, and real combat as combat tests. It took a couple of months to bring it all to life, and over five hours to play through the scenario.
I enjoyed writing and playing this scenario so much that I decided I wanted to share it with even more people, going back to a traditional dice-casting system for all tests and combat. I wanted to make this a deeper kind of CYOA than the usual "do this or that - oh no, you die!"
It required effort and time - I began writing this book in January and only finished mid-March, even though I knew exactly where I was going with it, but this was a lovely, thrilling experience. I hope it can be so for you too.
Cam