Chopsticks, an app we developed has been listed in Apps Magazine’s Best Apps Ever feature (issue 30, March 2013), they write that Chopsticks “completely redefines digital fiction in one stunning app”. This comes hot on the heels of our “App Of The Year 2012” accolade for the same Penguin Books USA published app.

The aforementioned app has also been nominated for an internal Best Digital Product award by Penguin Books US and also nominated is the recently released This is Not an App (an app we produced on iOS & Android). The team (#TeamKeri: Citrus Suite, Keri Smith, Penguin Digital US & Perigee Books) won this award last year for Wreck This App and we’re proud to be in the running again. You can read more Citrus Suite news below.

• Chopsticks: APP OF THE YEAR 2012
• Citrus Apps: more than 500k downloads
• Mystery Seekers: number 1 app in 15 countries including US & UK
• Citrus Engine: built over 25 apps 2012 on iPhone, iPad, Android phones, Android tablets, PC, Mac, etc.
• Wreck This App:  voted best digital product of 2011 (by Penguin US)
• White Label Apps: confidential projects, very hush hush

Chopsticks, an app we developed for Penguin Books US, has been named “App Of The Year 2012” by Apps Magazine.

Massive thanks to the writers and staff at Apps Magazine who work so hard to uncover hidden gems like Chopsticks from every corner of the various app stores.

Even though Apps Magazine had previously placed Chopsticks in a list of the ‘top five book apps ever’ it was a nice surprise to open this month’s issue and see the end of year round up…

‘There are clever little touches throughout that makes this app feel like it is right at the cutting edge of iOS interactivity without compromising on the minimalist nature of the interface,’ just some of the praise awarded to the Chopsticks app by Apps Magazine.

And from Jessica Anthony, co-author of Chopsticks,  ‘as the talented developers at Citrus Suite began sending us pages of the app, we watched in breathless awe as Glory and Frank’s story literally came to life. It was like magic’.

From our point of view it was a pleasure to work with Jessica Anthony and Rodrigo Corral to tell this version of their story.

Our respect to the digital team at Penguin Books USA, our friends at Razorbill and Penguin Young Readers Group - bold enough to make this project happen and assigning the development duties to the team based here in Liverpool, UK.

Developing the app was the sort of exciting challenge we love. We believe we created an app that is not only thought-provoking but also offers each reader an emotional experience with their time spent in the world of Glory the piano prodigy.

The Chopsticks app is an interactive version of the ground breaking book by Jessica Anthony and Rodrigo Corral – a book which found many fans through its visual approach to storytelling. The aim of the app, released simultaneously with the print edition, was to further enhance the qualities of the story, offering the user a different, unique experience through the content contained within.  Apps Magazine describe it, ‘memorable and utterly compelling for so many reasons; it’s a daring presentation of interactive fiction that jumps between so many different types of book and story. Then to combine it with a smart and gorgeous interface only helps to suck in users effortlessly.’

According to Apps Magazine, ‘Chopsticks changed the way we thought about interactive books and impacted us more than anything else this year’.

It is an honour to be involved in with an app that has made such a strong impression.

If apps are to be a part of the future of books, we’re happy to be involved in projects as ambitious and rewarding as this one.

Read Apps Magazine’s original review for Chopsticks here.

Team Citrus 12/12/12

Fresh Ideas, Sharp Solutions.
Citrus Suite is a creative design studio producing apps, software, games and digital artwork. Developer on iPhone, iPad, Android, PC, Mac, Web, HTML5, Facebook and IPTV platforms.

Development of apps from Liverpool, UK.

Chopsticks is the latest app developed by Citrus Suite for Penguin Group USA.
Read more here…
Wall Street Journal
Los Angeles Times
Chopsticks Tumblr
Penguin Teen
Amazon
Citrus Suite blog post Chopsticks in the Wall Street Journal

About Chopsticks
Glory is a piano prodigy. After her mother died, she retreated into her music. Her father raised her with the goal of playing sold-out shows at Carnegie Hall and across the globe. Brilliant and lonely, Glory is drawn to Frank, who moves in next door.

Musical notes reveal treasured mementos and stolen secrets as Glory loses herself in Frank’s paintings and drawings. Links bring the music of their shared mix CDs to reality. Vibrant videos play the shows and clips they watch together and breathe still photos to life. Scrapbook images move as the text flows from Spanish to English. Their late-night IM conversations whisper, blinking down the screen. Frank becomes Glory’s connection to the world—and her escape from reality.

Before long, Glory is unable to play anything but the song “Chopsticks”; F and G notes moving closer together, and farther apart.

Glory disappears. But nothing is what it seems. And we must decide what is real, what is imagined, and what has been madness all along…

A breathtaking cohesion of images, songs, videos, letters, love and loss, the Chopsticks app draws on a full spectrum of media to create a fully immersive novel experience.
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“…seeing deceits and red herrings laid bare in photographs and documents, rather than reading about them, makes the book’s punches hit hard.” –PW

“Spellbinding and inventive, this title will attract teens and compel them to reread and revisit each clue to the hauntingly ambiguous ending.” –SLJ Starred Review

“Eerie and edgy—and effective as Poe.” –Kirkus

Pictures are not only worth a thousand words in “Chopsticks.” In hands as talented as Anthony’s and Corral’s, they’re just as emotionally resonant. –LA Times

“Like the young artistic love it describes, Chopsticks is beautiful and strange and haunting. The story’s crooked path is made luminous by its extraordinary images. Chopsticks is like that one ex lover you never shake off—the one that was a mystery—beautifully distilled.”
–Junot Diaz, Pulitzer Prize winning author of The Brief Wondorous Life of Oscar Wao

“Reading Chopsticks is like watching people kiss in the street: it’s private, it’s beautiful, it’s lonely, it’s wild, it’s secret, it’s everywhere and you can’t look away.”
–Daniel Handler, author of Why We Broke Up
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-Touch the music notes to discover interactive features
-Links to songs from their mix CDs/playlists
-Spanish/English text alternates in the notes and letters
-Images move to reveal hidden scrapbook mementos
-Embedded videos play the shows and clips they share
-Text appears to convey quiet conversation
-IM conversations slide down the screen
-Important news clippings and articles underline with a touch
-Moving images breath life into the snapshots

Fresh Ideas, Sharp Solutions.
Citrus Suite develops apps, software, games and produces 3D digital artwork. Developer on iPhone, iPad, Android, HTML5, PC, YouView, IPTV platforms (YouView, Google TV, Apple TV, etc.).

Development of apps from Liverpool, UK.