Adventures

1. Midwinter Murders

All over the BookWorld, reports are coming in about characters dying horribly when they really shouldn't. St Tabularasa will have their work cut out training up a lot of new generics to take their now vacant parts in their respective narratives. This killing spree has to stop, and it has to stop NOW.

Who wants to see all these characters dead? Is there a conspiracy going on or is this the work of a sole homicidal maniac? And why are the witnesses strangely vague when it comes to describing the culprit?

Setting: Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë, the Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer, Agatha Christie's Miss Marple novels, and any other books containing characters you want to throttle. The more the merrier!

2. Derivative Friction - The Other Eyre Affair

19th Century literature has never been more popular in the Outland. In the BookWorld, riots are breaking out all over the Jane Austen spin-offs, and things aren't looking much better in the Brontë camp - Jane Eyre is getting particular attention.

JurisFiction agents have to regularly patrol the derivatives to keep them in check - what if one of the derivative delinquents were to get out and infiltrate the real thing? This must not be allowed to happen. Not on your watch!

Just watch out for deranged and homicidal French girls, brooding former governesses, mad wives in attics, families with pronounced Electra/Oedipus complexes, and torturous clergymen. Thought this would be a walk in the park? Think again ...

Setting: A multitude of awful Jane Eyre derivatives.

3. Life, the BookWorld, and Everything

One of the most important things for JurisFiction agents is the ability to work together for a common cause. Concerned that the group has gone off in far too many different directions since your last mission, the Bellman (head of JurisFiction) has decided to send you on a team building exercise, In the Science-Fiction genre.

Don’t Panic! Where better to go than a book where few dare go on character exchange programmes, because of the sheer improbability of what hides within? You thought grammasites were difficult - try a whole fleet of poetry-loving Vogons, personality prototype machines, self-centred galactic presidents (not that it gets to his heads or anything), tea-guzzling humans and little white mice.

All you need to do is to get to Magrathea and live to tell the tale. It can’t be that difficult … can it?

Setting: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1979) by Douglas Adams.

4. Eat Wasp a Dork end Story Might

It is a truth universally acknowledged that all classics in possession of a good story must be in want of a horror plot ...

You are on a routine mission, delivering a fresh stock of D-grade zombie Generics to the Horror genre, when a bomb suddenly goes off, throwing you and your team to the ground. As the smoke clears, the zombies are gone and there’s a strange buzz in the air.

If you can’t deliver the Generics on time, you’ll leave a lot of readers hanging, and that might jeopardise the entire Horror genre. Question is, who would want to do such a thing, and why?

Grab your Travel Book and a suitable weapon, and start investigating!

Setting: Based on: Any old horror story you can think of - and the collected works of Jane Austen.

5. Shadow the Sheepdog (Plot Adjustment)

In this one- or two-player mission, you need to go back in time to the perennially sunny world of Enid Blyton, lashings of ginger beer and all, to make sure a book has a happy ending. It should be a walk in the park, even if you’re a Cadet. You can’t possibly mess it up, because the book has been out of print for a long time.

You might just need to keep an eye on the locals …

Setting: This adventure is a roleplaying adaptation of chapter 19 of The Well of Lost Plots (2003) by Jasper Fforde, which in turn is based on Shadow the Sheepdog (1963) by Enid Blyton.

NOTE: Because it’s an adaptation of an actual chapter, this adventure probably runs a lot better if the players haven’t actually read The Well of Lost Plots.

6. Harry Potter and the Character Exchange Programme

Someone has stolen the Half-blood Prince's copy of the Potions school book from the cupboard in the Potions classroom and replaced it with a very cheap and unconvincing-looking knock-off. Could it be one of the myriad of people from the Character Exchange Programme that keep passing through? There is a distinct fanfiction-y smell about it all.

Setting: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2005) by J.K. Rowling. Fanfiction island.

7. Meanwhile in Narnia

In the land where it’s always winter, never Christmas, odd things are happening. Someone has been stealing petrified Narnians and selling them as souvenirs to hapless visitors on character exchange programmes. Some have made it all the way over to Horror, and Aslan is very concerned.

To make matters worse, someone’s smuggled in a lot of unauthorised items into Narnia. Is it the same person? Can the Jurisfiction agents get to the bottom of this and get the plot back on track before readers are going to notice anything’s amiss?

Setting: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (1950) by C.S. Lewis, The Shining (1977) by Stephen King.

8. Locks, Stocktakes and Two Smokin Braids

There’s a problem in Children’s Fiction. Again. This time, the Pippi Longstocking books have had a strange influx of unauthorised candy and something’s not quite right in Villa Villekulla. For starters, doesn’t Pippi seem to have more gold than you remember? Your stock list says one thing, the book should say quite another.

Where is the sudden increase in money coming from? Who’s behind it? And how come a nine-year-old girl is the strongest person alive?

Setting: The Pippi Longstocking books (1945-1948) by Astrid Lindgren, and The Hobbit (1933) by JRR Tolkien.

9. Growing Up is Optional

The agents are back at Villa Villekulla - Pippi’s “curlicue pills” have gone missing. Who could possibly want pills that ensure you never grow up? Meanwhile in Neverland, Captain Hook is secretly concerned about the extended absence of Peter Pan. Could the two cases be connected somehow? After all, Peter Pan famously never wants to grow up …

Setting: Pippi in the South Seas (1948) by Astrid Lindgren, Peter and Wendy (1911) by J.M. Barrie, Bachelor Boys – The Young Ones book (1984) by Ben Elton, Rik Mayall and Lise Mayer.