How long do you wait?

[kromen]

HI,
It's been years since I've graced the pages of Literotica. I'm sure people I've met here are also long gone. I have multiple unfinished and unsubmitted tales. Long ago, I read Stephen King's book about writing and he talked about letting your stories sit on the back burner for awhile, before continuing. How long have you let a story sit before opening the file again? I wass working on a full novel, based off my previous published work here, but reality caught up to me and I spent more time in reality lately. I'm ready to dive back in the fiction pool. Pardon any typos, it's a white liqour night. Tequila is my mistress.

 

[NotWise]

I don't leave mine fallow for long--rarely more than a week. I set a story aside several years ago to get back to eventually. I had a chance to work on it earlier this month, and I couldn't find it. Losing a story is a risk of setting it aside.

 

[SimonDoom]

There's no formula and no standard answer for me, on this one. I have a few stories that I conceived, outlined, wrote, and published within 48 hours. I don't regret not letting them sit on the backburner. On the other hand, I have stories I started in 2017, shortly after I started publishing here, that remain unfinished. I estimate I have about 50 unfinished stories. Some are just outlines, but others have been substantially completed, and I haven't published them because I feel they need some finishing touches and I can't quite figure out what they are.

Since I'm not doing this for money, I see advice like Stephen King's on this question as being of limited use. I prefer to mix it up more and to write stories with different purposes and different methods. I find it more fun and more creatively satisfying that way.

 

[Djmac1031]

I have several I'm sitting on, for various reasons.

One I think is a great IDEA, but, as a new author, I don't know that I actually have the skills to pull it off.

So I pick at it occasionally, and hope one day I may actually be good enough to write it

Others I'm sitting on because I'm still not sure where to go with them, or if they're worth finishing.

But I don't discard them, because who knows

 

[KeithD]

I let mine sit at least overnight after drafting them and looking at them again, assuming I'm going to post them someplace soon. Longer stand-alone pieces going to the marketplace get reviewed again fairly soon before going to the editor and then again after they come back. Individual stories usually are part of an anthology build and they don't get reviewed again until the anthology is built out and being set up for publishing.

 

[HeyAll]

I've found that letting a story sit on the burner makes my interest go away. If I'm excited about a story, then get stuck, then think I'll get back to it later, it becomes less likely.

My style has always been to write a story, edit it, then submit and move on. Strike while the iron is hot. When you're motivated by a story and its idea, then that's when the writing is the best. It's hard to recapture that passion for a story.

 

[BobbyBrandt]

I typically have two or three active stories in the works at any one time. Each has different characters and plot, and something is always on the "back burner" so to speak. Moving from one to another sometimes has me ignoring a story for weeks or months, but I eventually get back to it.

 

[SamScribble]

For me, it depends very much on what I am writing and for whom. If it's short story with no definite home in mind, it can sit for anywhere from a few days to a few months. But, for most of my life, I have 'written to order'. It has not been unusual to receive a brief for delivery 24 hours later. In such cases, the 'maturation' period is more likely to be measured in hours. 'Faster, faster,' said the commissioning editor.

 

[Rustyoznail]

Depends on the reason. I'm fairly new here, and I had a Geek Day concept that I started writing. The concept was not humanly possible to do, so I filed it away. Two years later I figured out how to take the core idea and make it work.

Other stories are sitting, hoping for the same thing to happen to them.

 

[storyteller19]

I like to do the basic editing right after I finish the 1st draft, mostly just going through the grammar editor and fixing any glaring mistakes. After that I might let it sit for a little bit before filling in the story, fixing the flow of it, and adding details as needed. This way I get most of the mechanical edits out of the way first so when I do the second draft it is a nice mix of writing and editing.

 

[Nylonian]

HI,
It's been years since I've graced the pages of Literotica. I'm sure people I've met here are also long gone. I have multiple unfinished and unsubmitted tales. Long ago, I read Stephen King's book about writing and he talked about letting your stories sit on the back burner for awhile, before continuing. How long have you let a story sit before opening the file again? I wass working on a full novel, based off my previous published work here, but reality caught up to me and I spent more time in reality lately. I'm ready to dive back in the fiction pool. Pardon any typos, it's a white liqour night. Tequila is my mistress.

Basically I am waiting until next Valentine's Day so I can submit mine for a contest next year. I am prepared to wait to flesh a story out if I feel that it's missing something. Years even. I won't publish stories until I feel that they're 100% complete and that I am happy.

 

[Duleigh]

I have one I wrote three years ago just because I felt a need to write, and now I'm considering posting it, but it needs a lot of work. I'm sitting on another one that I wrote over a year ago that really broke my heart. I just now worked up the courage to start posting it - it's in multiple chapters that climaxes in a Winter Holiday entry. The rule of thumb is that there's no rule of thumb when it comes to letting a story age.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

I typically have two or three active stories in the works at any one time. Each has different characters and plot, and something is always on the "back burner" so to speak. Moving from one to another sometimes has me ignoring a story for weeks or months, but I eventually get back to it.

I have lots of stories waiting to be finished, some almost completed, others just outlines. I worked on one story, "Mating Season" for so long that I missed the deadline for the Holiday Contest and had to put it aside. The next year I picked it up again, and I was glad I'd waited -- the story did really well. I like some of the stories I've worked on a little longer. I think put more detail and more thought into a story that I've been tinkering with, as opposed to one I've popped out overnight.

I also work on several stories at once, and bounce between one character and situation after another. I don't think there's a set time to write a story. If I don't like where something is going, I put it aside and go back to it later. I'm working on a Summer story right now that I was writing for last year's contest and hopefully I'll finish it this year, if not, eventually I'll get it done.

 

[KeithD]

I haven't gotten into drafting a story and not finished it--as yet. I can draft a complete story in a day. More often than not that three or four days in the first draft. I have, on occasion, let a story hang longer before completion--I have one such now--but that's always when I have that one completed in my mind and one has popped up that my muse insists get written first.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

I haven't gotten into drafting a story and not finished it--as yet. I can draft a complete story in a day. More often than not that three or four days in the first draft. I have, on occasion, let a story hang longer before completion--I have one such now--but that's always when I have that one completed in my mind and one has popped up that my muse insists get written first.

The same thing happens to me. I'll be working on a story, and a new story pops in my head and it almost writes itself. Normally, I'll get the story that's nagging me done, (so I can sleep at night) then I'll go back to what I was working on.

 

[dmallord]

Not too long. I don't wait much over a week at the longest. At my age, it's like digging a well. After you get so far down the hole or story in this case, you don't have the strength to climb a rope to get back out of it. So who has time to let things sit idle? Just have to keep digging until you strike water and let it float you up...hoping someone thirsty enough will come along and draw you up out of the 'well' with a bucket. At that point, you know you've finished and are, perhaps, ready for a new story. I've worked on my current one, between getting over a severe blow to the head, and would really like to post it; however, it is for the Ode to Mickey Spillane event, so it cannot be posted until July! Has me impatiently tapping my toes!