Your longest failure

[StillStunned]

Alright, alright, it's not a failure! It's just a WIP, you're going to finish it one day, honest!

But deep down, we all have a few stories we know will never be completed. We've stopped feeling guilty about working on other things. It's been months since we even opened the document.

So, what's your longest? Mine is 42k words. I wrote it for my wife when we spent some time abroad - before I ever joined Lit. A grimdark fantasy with as much sex as plot. A captured mercenary with a past, a princess intriguing against her sisters for their father's favour. Demons, dragons, and loads of sex. Great fun to write, even more fun to read to the redhead. And pretty good stuff too, from before when I started caring too much about "proper" writing.

But it reached a point where I had to start plotting... and I lost interest. I keep promising myself - and my wife - that I'll get back to it one day. But it's been two and a half years and I haven't added a single word.

 

[Erozetta]

Alright, alright, it's not a failure! It's just a WIP, you're going to finish it one day, honest!

But deep down, we all have a few stories we know will never be completed. We've stopped feeling guilty about working on other things. It's been months since we even opened the document.

So, what's your longest? Mine is 42k words. I wrote it for my wife when we spent some time abroad - before I ever joined Lit. A grimdark fantasy with as much sex as plot. A captured mercenary with a past, a princess intriguing against her sisters for their father's favour. Demons, dragons, and loads of sex. Great fun to write, even more fun to read to the redhead. And pretty good stuff too, from before when I started caring too much about "proper" writing.

But it reached a point where I had to start plotting... and I lost interest. I keep promising myself - and my wife - that I'll get back to it one day. But it's been two and a half years and I haven't added a single word.

About 350-375k words in a four novel series. I will edit it eventually. It's only been like 10 years since I finished them.

 

[caleb35]

I'm not sure I'll ever publicly admit to my longest failure. That would require me to admit privately to it first, and I'm still avoiding that, thank you very much

 

[ElectricBlue]

But it reached a point where I had to start plotting... and I lost interest. I keep promising myself - and my wife - that I'll get back to it one day. But it's been two and a half years and I haven't added a single word.

A sequel to my story in the first Geek Anthology, and a sequel to my story in the first Mickey Spillane Tribute anthology.

They're not failures, just not finished yet... About 8k words in each.

 

[cw5523729]

Alright, alright, it's not a failure! It's just a WIP, you're going to finish it one day, honest!

But deep down, we all have a few stories we know will never be completed. We've stopped feeling guilty about working on other things. It's been months since we even opened the document.

So, what's your longest? Mine is 42k words. I wrote it for my wife when we spent some time abroad - before I ever joined Lit. A grimdark fantasy with as much sex as plot. A captured mercenary with a past, a princess intriguing against her sisters for their father's favour. Demons, dragons, and loads of sex. Great fun to write, even more fun to read to the redhead. And pretty good stuff too, from before when I started caring too much about "proper" writing.

But it reached a point where I had to start plotting... and I lost interest. I keep promising myself - and my wife - that I'll get back to it one day. But it's been two and a half years and I haven't added a single word.

31k words, pending for 8 years and counting. And I've accepted it'll never be finished.

 

[WittyUserName]

Alright, alright, it's not a failure! It's just a WIP, you're going to finish it one day, honest!

But deep down, we all have a few stories we know will never be completed. We've stopped feeling guilty about working on other things. It's been months since we even opened the document.

So, what's your longest? Mine is 42k words. I wrote it for my wife when we spent some time abroad - before I ever joined Lit. A grimdark fantasy with as much sex as plot. A captured mercenary with a past, a princess intriguing against her sisters for their father's favour. Demons, dragons, and loads of sex. Great fun to write, even more fun to read to the redhead. And pretty good stuff too, from before when I started caring too much about "proper" writing.

But it reached a point where I had to start plotting... and I lost interest. I keep promising myself - and my wife - that I'll get back to it one day. But it's been two and a half years and I haven't added a single word.

What's my biggest failure? Does my life count?

In all seriousness, after I started reading erotica, I thought it would be cool to write a life story, a retelling that went the way I wanted it to. I've never done it. Although, there are some truths and altered histories in a few of my stories.

 

[KittyOfSteele]

You'd be @StillStunned to learn that there are no failures. Just unfinished projects you can scrape up for parts.

My non-erotic junkyard has a lot. I don't categorize them as longest failures, just things that were cooking but suddenly I ran out of gas. One was a series of Cyberpunk pulp novels within a Shadowrun-like universe revolving private eyes and hackers delving into murders, getting Mcguffins, and entangling themselves into corporate webs of intrigue; the usual. Another one was a post-apocalyptic story that was supposed to be my closet, and it had quite a lot of research and hard sci-fi concepts put to it, aside from metaphysics and existentialist philosophical ramblings. Then there's yet another post-apocalyptic series that expanded upon the lore of a novel that I won a contest to, and a racing videogame project that fizzled out because the artist and I were the only ones on the team working, while the project leader did nothing. Last there's my first novel, which was supposed to be a graphic novel, but while the script was done, I only drew like a couple of pages of it.

From the pulp novels I rescued character concepts that ended up into my current characters. I'm recycling plotlines too. I do want to bring it back to life though, because it's been almost ten years already since I incepted those concepts, and now I feel like I can do justice for them. The universe itself is the first thing that I rescued, and it is the current universe in which both my D&D Urban Fantasy campaign takes place as well as my work, starting from The Woman at the Speakeasy. Of course, canon between those two is different since I don't mask anything in my campaign. Everything happens in our actual home town, not a disguise of our home town. Since I stopped doing Cyberpunk, I dropped the concepts of hard sci-fi, but I still keep those at bay when I need them. The philosophy went from existentialism to libertinism. I learned a few lessons by writing a videogame story, so I apply them too, and my graphic novel that fizzled out is what told me I should do neon-noir.

I do want to rescue many of those though, now that I can update them to fit them into the current canon. Maybe, this time, I can make the graphic novel the way it deserves to be done.

I didn't fail. I learned.

 

[ShelbyDawn57]

I won't call it a failure because it's a very good story that I just need to edit. It's a 50K+ traditional romance that I wrote before I started publishing here. It's been siting for over six years waiting for some love. Who knows, now that you've called me on it, maybe I'll spice it up a bit and publish here in Romance.

 

[Five_Inch_Heels]

Started when then Doc grabbed me by my ankles, hung me upside down and smacked my butt.



Hasn't ended yet.

 

[Voboy]

My longest failure is my penis.

My second longest is a novel written in response to a really, really great idea I've had for years, one which I think would make an all-time great story (in literary terms, not in Lit terms). I've made a start on it twice, and failed both times after about 40-50k words.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

My longest failure is my penis.

I can't decide whether you're showing off or not...

 

[YmaOHyd]

Only 1500-2000 words, but it's one I've been thinking about since I started writing. The issue, essentially, is that I can't figure out how to make it interesting to anyone but me.

 

[KittyOfSteele]

I feel like this is relevant to this thread.

 

[TheLobster]

I can't decide whether you're showing off or not...

He says it's the longest even when it's f(l)ailing. Definitely showing off.

 

[Rob_Royale]

About 35k words in the two parts of Freebody Manor that I have no idea how to end. I did myself no favors by writing a second chapter with no plan.

 

[Ian_Snow]

I finished a 110k word novel and realized after about ten minutes it was too godawful to ever be published and wasn't worth rewriting. There were a few salvageable parts to it I kept and later used elsewhere but it was truly the biggest waste of two months of my life I've ever done.

 

[crookedletter]

I finished a 110k word novel and realized after about ten minutes it was too godawful to ever be published and wasn't worth rewriting. There were a few salvageable parts to it I kept and later used elsewhere but it was truly the biggest waste of two months of my life I've ever done.

You wrote a 110k word novel in... two months?

 

[KittyOfSteele]

You wrote a 110k word novel in... two months?

At 250 words per every 10 minutes, it takes 4400 minutes to write 110K. That is 3 days, 1 hour, and 20 minutes.

With a constant writing speed I see that possible. I've done 50K in less than 30 days; 110K would take me twice the time personally speaking.

 

[crookedletter]

At 250 words per every 10 minutes, it takes 4400 minutes to write 110K. That is 3 days, 1 hour, and 20 minutes.

With a constant writing speed I see that possible. I've done 50K in less than 30 days; 110K would take me twice the time personally speaking.

That's crazy impressive to me. I shoot for 10 pages, ~3000 words, in a week and I reward myself with many beers if I manage to hit it.

 

[KittyOfSteele]

That's crazy impressive to me. I shoot for 10 pages, ~3000 words, in a week and I reward myself with many beers if I manage to hit it.

Hey, as long as the number is greater than zero...

 

[SimonDoom]

I don't accept that any of my unfinished stories are failures. They're just . . . delayed successes.

 

[NuclearFairy]

I'll get back to them someday, the longest one is probably 9k words. It's a werejaguar story that I'll get around to when I'm stuck on everything else that's crashing through my head at high speed.

My longest one that I don't know when I'll get back to it though is 7k words about a zoologist, and a botanist who get transported to another world where the only familiar animals are those that can transform into humans. I'll get back to it, someday.

 

[Ian_Snow]

You wrote a 110k word novel in... two months?

Yeah, thereabout. It helps that I have no life. Hah.

 

[calmlikeabomb]

Non erotic sci fi. About 120k words in, before I realized I needed to be a better writer to actually do it justice.

But I don't consider unfinished works failures. I regret the finished works I never got the courage to publish.

 

[RejectReality]

Currently... Gates of Enchantment ( Dark, Sci-Fi/Fantasy ) is at 21k words. Probably not even halfway. Starr Search ( Probably going to Les ) is at 30k, kink-heavy older man with a OF girl. Probably not even halfway. Still trying to come up with a combined title for the one I was last working on elsewhere as RR. It's around 40k with a couple of "episodes" left.

The last one will probably get finished the next time my muse wakes up. It's really close.

And, of course, Sisters of the Mists as Dark. I think it's around 200k and not even halfway.