Writing a novel is challenge enough when you're in charge of your characters' destinies.

When you put the readers in charge, well, that gives the writing just the kind of edge Kristin Coronado's seeking.

Each week, she gives readers the next chapter of her novel, "Pushing Buttons," at Hatch, a new online magazine aimed at people in their 20s and 30s. Then she lets them choose where the story goes.

And, even if they vote for the most outlandish scenario, she has to go where they tell her.

That's roughly the equivalent of getting this column under way, then pausing to ask you to vote on what you'd like to hear about next:

1. Who is this "Kristin," anyway?

2. Why write a serial novel online?

3. What's "Pushing Buttons" about?

4. Since we're talking about online stuff, tell us why they call Howard Dean the Internet candidate.

See what I mean?

Kristin, who turns 23 next month, grew up in Richmond. She found the first outlet for her creative writing in Manchester Middle School's literary magazine. In high school, she switched her focus to journalism and worked on Manchester High's newspaper and The Times-Dispatch's InSync section.

While she was at the College of William and Mary, she continued writing for The Times-Dispatch and had summer internships here at the paper and in New York at People magazine.

She graduated in May with a degree in English, then moved to New York when she landed another internship, this time at Entertainment Weekly.

Right now, she's back at People in a temporary secretarial job, filling in for someone on maternity leave. At nights and on weekends, though, she covers celebrity events.

"I'm not scared to approach a celebrity now, because it's part of their job, and they know it's my job, so it's really two people fulfilling their jobs. And if they're rude to you, it's not personal. I'm there to get the quotes.

"It's funny, because I never thought I'd be the girl yelling, 'Snoop Dog! One question!' without hesitating about it."

But, believe it or not - and she says her friends can't believe it - she's not sure standing on a red carpet and yelling questions at celebrities is what she wants to make her career.

That's one reason, she says, she looked for a way to get back to the creative writing she loved in high school and college. She did it by answering an online ad seeking writers for a new online magazine, Hatch. Then she convinced the editor she could write what she calls "a choose-your-own-adventure type novel."

In the first installment, which appeared in mid-December, Sadie and Cam (short for Camille) start their adventure sitting in group therapy for obsessive-compulsives. One of Sadie's problems is pushing buttons that don't ask to be pushed, which, in this case, means the emergency stop on the elevator she's riding in with Cam after the day's session is over.

What should happen next?

1. Sadie and Cam get stuck in the elevator together and are forced to get to know each other, and, as a result, become friends.

2. Cam becomes frightened, thinking Sadie is trying to mug her and begins attacking her to save herself.

3. Cam laughs and tells Sadie she used to do the same thing. That is, until she met someone who changed everything.

4. At that same moment, the fire alarm goes off.

Readers chose No. 3, and Kristin wrote the next installment over the Christmas holidays. Now that the holidays are over, she has started a schedule that has her writing one chapter a week. "It's posted each Wednesday, then we let people vote till Sunday at 10 a.m. From there, I have to Monday evening to write the next one. So it's a really fast turnaround."

Kristin likes it that way. "I think journalism has taught me I want to get things done real fast. I'm used to hearing what people think right away."

With a more traditional, off-line novel, "it's a very long process."

In college, she used to recruit her roommates to listen to her writing. "They'd sit on my bed, and I'd read a couple of pages to them, and they'd follow along with the story. Knowing that someone was interested gave me the drive to keep going."

She hopes to get similar results online, where, "I know I have a deadline every week, and I know that there are people who are going to critique it in a sense."

That doesn't mean the project is easy. "With a novel, you kind of have your direction. If you look at a novel, sometimes you just have a few pages that are progressing the plot that aren't funny. But with this, it's like you're trying to write these three or four pages that can stand on their own."

Kristin says she and her editor have talked about the possibility that readers will vote for the most ridiculous scenario, but that hasn't happened so far. The first week, readers voted for her favorite.

She voted, too. "I voted once," she said. "I voted for the one that actually got the most, which is kind of cool. Maybe it was more mysterious than the others."

If it's not yet 10 a.m., you still have time to vote on what will happen in Chapter 3 of "Pushing Buttons" at www.hatchmagazine.com.

"This could almost be like a little continuing saga, a soap-opera story that keeps going," Kristin said.

And you can have a say in where the story goes.

But it's too late to change the course of this column. You can't make me answer Question No. 4.