What about a storyline, or a novel with multiple endings? Can you make a novel like this? It is rather unusual, but hear me out. I was looking at the Legend of Zelda game Majora’s Mask recently, and it’s not just a time-traveling game, but it has puzzles and teaches you how to plan where to go and when in order to succeed. You have a route to play through and its different every time you play.
Visual novels are a type of media that are part game and a lot of story. They also have beautiful illustrations to enhance the story. Check out the artwork for Jack Jeanne. It is a game available on the Nintendo Switch and features gorgeous artwork and a story created by the mangaka Sui Ishida. Jack Jeanne is set in a drama school. It has romantic subplots and rhythm game elements. Visual novels use video, music and game-like elements to progress the story. Some are more game-heavy, others more novel-heavy stories. They always present you with different storylines and different love interests. They are multi-ending stories.
Otome Games and the Life of a Reborn villainess
When the visual novel features a female protagonist these are often called Otome games. Otome is a Japanese word that generally means maiden. I haven’t played Jack Jeanne, but I want to. (Must do more research!)
Generally, the first time you play an Otome game you fall for one guy, and the next time you play the game, you go for a different guy and you get a different ending.
However, lately, otome games have become a backdrop for a new type of story. It is know as the Reincarnated Villainess story.
The basic idea is that someone from our world is reborn as the Villainess, or antagonist of an otome story. They find themselves inside the game world, but rather than suffer a terrible fate, they fight back. They change things, try to avoid the female protagonist, and inevitably change the storyline.
There are dozens of webtoons out there with this premise, and more anime every season featuring a villainess.
Webtoons with Reincarnated Villainess:
I am the Villian by Seji
https://www.webtoons.com/en/romance/i-am-the-villain/list?title_no=4937
Not your typical Reincarnation Story https://www.webtoons.com/en/romance/not-your-typical-reincarnation-story/list?title_no=5556
Anime about a Reborn Villianess:
My Next Life as a Villianess: All Routes Lead to Doom, is an anime in which Catarina discusses the multiple endings, or the routes in her life, and how they all lead to doom. She is facing so many all bad endings and she wants to avoid that at all costs. So, begins her plan and soon everyone in the story is caught up in her shenanigans.
Or try this show: I’ll Become a Villianess who goes down in History.
Not Another Harem Anime
Visual novels with male protagonist typically have a harem of girls for him to court. There are so many I don’t know where I’d start. If I had to recommend one Fate/stay night is a famous visual novel with three routes and three different girls. They include a female King Arthur named Saber, a feisty magic user named Rin, and the childhood friend/girl next door with a big scary secret named Sakura. The story involves a battle royale between mythical heroes to summon the holy grail. It created a super-sized franchise known as the Fate universe, and it all started with Fate/stay night.
But visual novels aren’t just about romance. Steins Gate is a famous time-traveling visual novel. I bought it recently in order to experience the mind-bending story for myself. So far, I’ve enjoyed it, but it starts out fairly slow. There’s a big setup and big payoff in the story later. The first game I played with multiple endings was called Zero Escape, where you used your knowledge of the characters and events from previous playthroughs to solve the final puzzle.
This type of storyline isn’t explored as much in novels. Because it’s not easy to do. The movie Clue tried to do this, giving us three different endings, and different culprits, although it eventually lands on the one true ending.
How do you write a novel with multiple endings?
Can a Novel have multiple endings or routes?
As I was writing my Fairy Doctor books, I found myself facing a conundrum. A friend pointed out I had a love triangle. I never really intended the Fairy Doctor story to be a love triangle, but there is one!
The main character, Lillia has two men in her life: the enigmatic, rich, and dangerous Baron Brimclif, or the sexy, Latino bodyguard Marquez. Personally, I preferred one, but as I wrote the third book in her story, (what I thought was the the final book in my series) I ended up in a situation where she was with the other man. (Insert swearing and cursing and oaths!)
This caused me no end of grief until I realized I could write both. One route where Lillia ends up with the Baron and another route where she ends up with Marquez. I mean, maybe I had readers who also would prefer one man to the other. Suddenly, my final book became two books.
How to solve a love triangle
Write two books. Yes, two of them.
It’s a little like cheating only, no, it’s not. Multiverses are a thing (or they were for a while. Did I miss that trend?)
This is also not a ‘why choose’ romance. We’re not talking about a polyamorous or a menage a trois, because that’s not my interest, even if its yours. I look for one-on-one romances, always have.
So, imagine the Twilight series with another book at the ending where team Jacob gets their best boy, instead of what actually happened. Breaking Dawn can still exist, but so could another book with different vampire-werewolf problems. There are other astronomical phenomena: auroras, comets, meteor showers, supermoons.
What about a blue moon and an alternative universe with Bella and Jacob?
The same book but different
Fairy Doctor Book 3 and Book 4 have a few similar settings like the Fairy Queen’s Dungeon and Fairyland. There’s a moment early on where the story diverges. It’s at the end of Chapter 2/Chapter 3 when Lillia notices the bottle of “fairy ink” is either half empty or half full. That’s the moment. It’s not some momentous occasion, there’s no big choice for the character, but it was at this precise moment that the author decided that everything in the book either went one way or the other. This is where the universe split apart and you get two endings.
In a visual novel, this would have been a choice for the reader, like a certain dialogue option. However, unlike in a game, when you start reading a book you don’t get the option to diverge/ You also can’t save the game, pick one option, change your mind and restart. You have to read the entire book and you your one ending. Games allow you to have multiple endings and interactions between them.
So, I’ve decided to release the last two books as a set, a 2-for-1 deal. You’ll have both options available. I wrote the Baron’s first, so it’s Book 3. But you can skip it, if you prefer Marquez and read book 4. If you want all the family secrets, and history, then you’ll have to read both books when they’re out later month.
So, keep an eye out for the upcoming release of Fairy Doctor 3 Rest in Peace, the Baron’s route, and Fairy Doctor 4 Rest in Peace Segundo, which is Marquez’s route.
Then you can decide which man Lillia should end up with.
Who do you prefer?