ABOUT US
Chooseco is a purpose-built publishing house which brought the groundbreaking Choose Your Own Adventure gamebook series back to print in 2006. Since the series relaunch, Chooseco has sold over 16 million copies as well as expanded its list to include linear fiction with the YA trilogy Weregirl.
The original and best-known gamebooks in the world, the Choose Your Own Adventure series has been translated into 40 languages and has 270 million books in print worldwide. Chooseco has expanded the brand’s presence through selective licensing. Twentieth Century Fox/Disney has licensed the film rights using emerging technology developed by CTRLMovie to allow audience participation in a theatrical release. In 2018, a license of Choose Your Own Adventure: House of Danger to Z-Man Games saw unprecedented success in the first Choose Your Own Adventure board game.
Chooseco is based in North Central Vermont. It boasts a top-notch creative team dedicated to promoting literacy through immersive gamebooks based on the principles of series founder R. A. Montgomery.
EMPLOYEES
Shannon Gilligan
CEO/Publisher
Shannon Gilligan is the CEO and Publisher of the hugely popular Choose Your Own Adventure® (CYOA) gamebook series. She has worked in the field of interactive gaming and storytelling for more than 30 years.
Gilligan first joined CYOA as project manager of an adaptation of two Choose Your Own Adventure books into games for the Atari console in 1982. She began to write for the series as one of many CYOA writers soon after. In the early 1990s, Gilligan was “evangelized” by Apple in their legendary program to persuade and support creatives outside of technology to develop software for the Mac (Apple) platform.
Her mystery game "Who Killed Sam Rupert?" subsequently became the first commercially distributed game to include Quicktime. She formed Spark Interactive to continue her work on game design for the Mac and the PC, and produced and directed Comic Creator, voted Best Software of the Year by People Magazine in 1995. In addition to her pioneering interactive gaming contributions, Gilligan published her first book at age 22, and has penned 14 CYOA titles. In 2003, she and her husband R.A. Montgomery cofounded Chooseco, a purpose-built publisher, for the relaunch of the CYOA series in print and ebook forms.
The series has expanded to more than 100 titles and includes baby board books, picture books for younger readers, and a popular and historically accurate CYOA Spies series based on true-life spies. Gilligan is currently at work adapting CYOA into an interactive cartoon series, while also steering CYOA into new markets in education, gaming, and software. She is a board member of Partnerships for Literacy and Learning and feels strongly that commerce can be positively involved with education.
Lizzi Middleman
Marketing Director
Lizzi Middleman began her career in publishing at Chooseco in 2014 as the Editorial Assistant. After spending seven years primarily growing the marketing department (she wore many hats!), she hopped around the industry at both a mid-sized and Big Five publisher before returning to Choose as Marketing Director in 2024.
Throughout the course of her career, Lizzi has worked on marketing campaigns for literary fiction, including a Read With Jenna TODAY Show Pick and a National Book Award Finalist; nonfiction titles by feminist all-stars like Kate Kelly and Maggie Mertens; cookbooks, gardening titles, baby books, calendars and gift items, and more.
Lizzi holds a BA in English Lit from Skidmore College and currently resides in South Florida with her husband and two kids. In her spare time, she enjoys running (slowly but often), reading, and cooking.
Christina (Chriss) Miller
Sales Director
Christina (Chriss) Miller began her career as a bookseller and museum store manager at the San Jose Museum of Art (SJMA). While there, SJMA partnered with the Whitney Museum of American Art (NYC), and she worked with the Whitney's product development team. Transitioning from non-profit, she worked 12 years as a national sales manager at Klutz, Palo Alto, CA, until their acquisition by Scholastic. She honed her project management skills at HD Supply/Home Depot (11.5 years), overseeing renovation projects in the San Francisco Bay Area.
She officially joined Chooseco in September 2024, after consulting with Chooseco since 2007. She earned a Bachelor of Science in Journalism and an MFA at Ohio University, Athens, OH. She hails from West Virginia and has a daughter, partner, German Shepherd, and cats (plural). She loves walking in the Redwoods surrounding her home.
Dottie Greene
Creative Director
Dottie Greene has over 20 years of design, marketing, and PR experience working for businesses and non-profits in the arts, publishing, and healthcare sectors. She began her journey with Choose Your Own Adventure in 2007, designing one of Chooseco’s first websites, and helped to develop the CYOA “Secret Online Endings.”
Dottie later went on to rebrand the current Classic covers and contributed to several other CYOA book cover and title designs as a freelancer. Throughout the course of her career, she has been a champion of CYOA and was delighted to return as Marketing Manager in 2021 which transitioned into a Creative Director role in 2023.
Dottie holds a BFA in Communications from Moore College of Art and Design. Her passion for film led her to take classes at Santa Fe Community College and she continues to develop a screenplay in her spare time when not playing at the beach with her son and dog.
Benjamin Wilgus
Editor
Benjamin Wilgus began his career in the animation industry, rising from intern to staff writer on the crew of Codename: Kids Next Door. Since transitioning to the publishing world, Ben has been deeply involved in the landscape of comics and graphic novels, with over two decades of experience as a writer and cartoonist for both original and licensed titles. In 2018, he joined the team at First Second Books as an integrated freelance editor, where he worked closely with authors on more than thirty titles, including the NYT bestselling Adventure Zone and InvestiGators series.
Ben currently works as Editor at Chooseco, bringing his many years of experience working with authors and illustrators to the table during an exciting time for the Choose Your Own Adventure list. As a childhood reader of the series and as a lifelong fan of games of all kinds, Ben has great affection and respect for the craft of game books like CYOA, and is excited to see what the future holds.
Ben holds a BFA in Film and Television from New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, and has lived in New York City for 25 years. A native of the Boston area, Ben tries to visit his folks on Cape Cod as often as he can, and has strong opinions on lobster rolls.
Rick Frauton
Office Operations Manager
Rick Frauton has more than two decades of experience supporting small business operations. His broad skill set includes marketing, finance, human resources, IT, logistics, and administration for remote teams. Always pursuing improvements to efficiency and workflow design, Rick has a passion for helping businesses to grow and thrive.
Rick joined Chooseco as Office Operations Manager in 2021 and enjoys collaborating with his colleagues to further the legacy of the Choose Your Own Adventure series for generations to come.
Rick holds a bachelor’s degree in Advertising from the College of Communications at Boston University.
He lives among the Green Mountains of Vermont with his wife and two daughters. In his spare time, Rick enjoys playing guitar and drums, hiking, gardening, and spending time with family.
Peggy McGrath
Office Assistant
Peggy McGrath has worked in the publishing industry for over 25 years. She started her career with a publisher of outdoor recreation and leisure books, and following that, worked a variety of jobs as a freelance proofreader and, most recently, as the community editor for a weekly newspaper.
She currently assists Chooseco staff across all departments, from Editorial and Production to Marketing and Operations.
She has a B.A. in English/Writing from Central Connecticut State University.