Thriller fans are being asked to contribute to a new novella, working alongside three crime authors.

The #youdunnit project is being run by Penguin and Specsavers, sponsors of the CWA Crime Thriller Awards. Starting this week, it is asking fans of the genre to contribute ideas through social media for character names, settings and other details, which writers Nicci French, Tim Weaver and Alistair Gunn will turn into new works of fiction.

Each writer will use the same material to create a different story, with a free e-book of their efforts released in October.

French said: "We’re looking forward to seeing ideas from crime readers for the #Youdunnit experiment. To have much of the plotting taken out of our hands could be a blessing or a curse—time will tell."

Penguin marketing manager Tim Broughton said: "It will be fascinating to see them apply their own individual writing styles to the narrative framework created by the crime fiction community online."