Choose Your Own Adventure

Okay--time for a quick show of hands:

How many of you have a secret love for Choose Your Own Adventure-style books? 'Cause I know I do.

I used to have over a hundred of those wonderful time-sucks when I was a kid. Tragically, they were destroyed in a storm--all of them. : (

I recently added several to the children's shelves here at the Lion. Many of them were titles I once had. I've been tempted to buy them, myself, but have resisted thus far. Still...The Circus of Fear calls to me (You, too, can be held captive in an evil circus as a young orphan girl who trick rides on griffins and tames displacer beasts while fighting to bring to justice the secret ruling class of Greyhawk!) , as does that trippy literary left turn, You Are a Shark!.

I sold one of them today to another closet Choose Your Own fan, and we had a lively debate over which series was the best. I was partial to the Endless Quests, while she was a purist.

That sale prompted me to wonder: Anyone else out there with this particular guilty pleasure? Did you read them as intended (I did), or were you a rebel and went straight through them cover to cover? Or--horrors--did you defy all ethical standards and sneak peeks at the various outcomes before choosing your path?