Hive-mind writing: how two children’s authors brainstormed a book on Twitter

Zana Fraillon at her home in Melbourne with fellow children’s author Bren MacDibble on Zoom from Western Australia. The pair collaborated via Twitter to write The Raven’s Song, an adventure story for young readers set in a post-climate change, post-pandemic world. Photograph: Ellen Smith/The Guardian

It’s a chilly night in Melbourne and children’s and young adult fiction writer Zana Fraillon is trying to write dialogue for her character. She’s stuck. Instead of making more coffee, she’s hitting up Twitter for some ideas. It’s a hive-mind moment.

Fraillon posts asking her writer buddies for help: “My WHOLE book relies on me discovering the next line.”

Of that night back in 2019, Fraillon says: “I was working on a novel, and I was having a plot problem. I’m not big on social media but I posted a question on Twitter to all the writers out there, asking, if this is the situation, where can I go with this?”

Okey dokey twitter peeps. I need your help. Finish this dialogue (please?):

'Don't you want to know the truth?'
'The truth about what?'
'......................................'

(My WHOLE book relies on me discovering the next line...yep - I have no idea what my book is about.)

— Zana Fraillon (@ZanaFraillon) August 13, 2019