My god. It’s happened. The Borg have finally reached our homeworld. And they got to the Penguins first. I like the idea of a hive mentality, though. It’s so … structured. Of course, someone has to be the queen and, sweethearts, [snap] I’m yo man.

Can creative writers put their egos to one side and work successfully as a team? That’s the question Penguin and De Montfort University are exploring with a new literary experiment – a collaborative wiki-novel.

Based on the principles of Wikipedia, the free online encyclopedia, the novel, called A Million Penguins, is open to anyone to join in, write and edit. None of the words, characters or plot twists will be attributed to any individual and – and this is the element of the project most likely to bruise delicate egos – participants are free to edit, chop and change other writers’ work.

This is wild. (See the wiki here and its attendant blog here) I see two possible outcomes: (multiple)murder(s) conducted via FedEx or a novel so homogenous and bland it will make the temperature of the universe 1000 billion years hence seem like a rollercoaster of peaks and valleys.

But it’s a really neat idea. Regardless of what you think about a pudgy farmboy getting his ass kicked in a boxing ring, Penguin is really trying hard. I so hope the first line was “The night was sultry.”