This is from a reply to a different post in a different forum, but it sums it up good enough for here...
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Heyyyy :)
You know, when I first started posting to online sites, my first hundred stories were all short. 2000 words for me was a long story back then. I wrote hundreds of them. Some real stories, some just scenes really. But they were complete, they gave me tons of valubale experience with just building a story, or part of a story, posting to public opinion, and withstanding comments good and bad. Gradually I started getting longer and more ambitious and my first few years really served me well and continue to influence my approach and mind set to writing.
I think some readers, not necessarily yourself or anyone here, but some reader get the big eyes and have been sitting on an idea or two for a long time before trying to write it as a story. They end up starting something very large and very involved without the experience or the tools to really tackle the job. I think a lot of the incomplete stories we see are by relatively new authors who just gave up in frustration, or from time issues that they didn't anticipate. Others were perhaps frustrated by scores or feedback (or lack thereof) ...and that's too bad.
When people have asked me for advice (as if I know anything) I always say start small. No multi-chapter stories, just 2-5K words, crank it out and post it and do another one. Do a bunch of those. Not good for everyone perhaps, but that is my advice because it worked well for me. It was like taking little babysteps into the kiddie pool before I went for the diving board.
My suggestion to you, is to complete your stories by changing the code on SOL or asking Lazeez to do it. Mark them as complete where they sit, and start something new. The yellow stripes go away, you get some emails from people saying "Why did you do that?" but the monkey is off your back with just a little pain and you're free to try something else. Plot and outline your stories in advance, identify where things are happening and especially the end. Write towards a specific goal with a clear path in front of you. It's methodical and I don't like it personally, but it is useful to demonstrate a process that you can later intuit.
Does that make sense? I'm never sure when I try to talk about this stuff. The important thing is to move forward. Unfinished business that will always remain unfinished, needs to be dropped. You can always go back to a completed story and add to it. I've done it with a dozen of mine and I have a bunch waiting for a continuation that I marked complete because I didn't know when I'd be able to get back to them. They're my strategic reserve :)
Best always,
rache
My big writing tip...seriously
