When Christopher Rickaby wrote the novel Shuffle, he did so with iTunes in mind. The book, published under the pen name James T. Raydel through the fiction-collective Lulzlit, is comprised of seven chapters that can be read in any order and shuffled around, much like a playlist in iTunes.
There are seven possible beginnings, seven possible endings and readers can decide how it plays out. The stories are tied together through different songs found on an iPod. At the end of each chapter, a reader can click on an iPod graphic to decide which chapter they’d like to read next.
Rickaby explained his idea to Allison Horton at Vook. He said:
As I was listening to a Johnny Cash song, I hung my head on my iPod one afternoon and the image of the shuffle mechanism and the possibility of shuffling seven stories that were each distinct but connected by shared themes and images leaped into my head. I thought that it would be a great way to structure content that had been designed specifically as a purpose-built e-novel, not just a print book that happened to be available via iBooks, Kindle etc. To create, in short, a book with seven possible beginnings and seven possible endings letting the reader decide which is which.
The eBook is available for $6.99.