Collaboration of the Dead

It appears that I will be participating in a collaborative effort with several other writers who have been published by the Library of the Living Dead and in other publications.  I believe the term for what is planned is a mosaic novel.  To the best of my understanding, this is how it works:

A coordinating editor or contributor brings together a group of different writers and sets the stage for a story they will develop together.  Each writer is assigned a couple of different chapters they will write, either in a random order or perhaps in an organized setup.  The order is determined and then the first chapter is written, edited, and then passed along to the next writer.  That writer produces their chapter and then hands it back to the coordinator, who edits it, puts the two chapters together, and hands both of them to the next writer, who reads, reviews, and crafts a third chapter in the story.  This continues on, and perhaps circles back through all the authors after they have all had a hand in crafting one chapter each so that they can complete their other chapter.  Finally, when all the chapters are done, they are compiled and then hopefully published.

The project I will be working on was a spontaneous idea from one of the writers at the Library who has not planned further ahead than getting us all together.  Whether it will end up being published by the Library or by another publisher remains to be seen.  So as it stands, it will be a very exciting and unique experiment for me as well as the other writers involved.

I will admit, I am nervous about this, although the collaboration here is more generalized than one might experience if they were writing a novel in tandem with another writer and the communication is far more intense as you both strive to complete the story and make any differences in writing styles work.  I am not sure with this mosaic novel whether the expectation is that we will all be writing in the same style and keeping the story consistent, or if the expectation is that everyone will be allowed to go crazy and really twist the story around as we see fit.  It will definitely be a new and exciting experience for me, one which will definitely help me grow as a writer.