Would you spend time editing an old story?

[doravg]

I have been playing an MMO the whole day, but now I want to do something different. Back then, in 2020, I did not know about grammar checkers and my word vomit stank, to put it nicely.

I will edit it now, but I am curious as to how many of you would pick up a four-year-old story.

 

[KoyukiMegumi]

My current story is almost three years old—maybe two. I'm re-editing it with everything I learned while re-releasing it. So, it all depends on how much love and care you pour into it. So, yes, I'd pick a four-year-old story as long as I loved every minute of it. And guess what? I still love re-reading it after all this time, even though it's my 20th time doing so. Hahah!

As for the reader side, well, as long as the book is compelling, anyone would pick a read!

 

[LilRora]

This would obviously heavily depend on the story and the state it's in, but I would probably not touch it. Rather than trying to edit it, I would rather leave it as is and write another story in a similar setting or with similar characters, a spin-off, or reimagining, or whatever other name fits.

 

[doravg]

My current story is almost three years old—maybe two. I'm re-editing it with everything I learned while re-releasing it. So, it all depends on how much love and care you pour into it. So, yes, I'd pick a four-year-old story as long as I loved every minute of it. And guess what? I still love re-reading it after all this time, even though it's my 20th time doing so. Hahah!

As for the reader side, well, as long as the book is compelling, anyone would pick a read!

The old flames are always the ones we value the most, right? High five! =)

This would obviously heavily depend on the story and the state it's in, but I would probably not touch it. Rather than trying to edit it, I would rather leave it as is and write another story in a similar setting or with similar characters, a spin-off, or reimagining, or whatever other name fits.

That is what I have been doing for the last 4 years, but that story won't leave me alone. It is like that one time I stole my brother's chocolate bar, when we were little and staying at our grandparents. I did not feel better until I gave him another one on Christmas, since I was not allowed chocolate every day. You can imagine the wait from June to December. The wrongs have to be righted.

 

[RepresentingEnvy]

Yes, I did so recently for most of my stories.

 

[QuercusMalus]

In the process of. Though it's a lot older than 4 years... my first notes/ideas on it were a decade ago.
What's funny is other than a few of the characters being mostly the same, and the setting being the same, the first version was very different from the original notes, and the current version is even farther off. But this round I have added roughly 40k words so far, deleted or moved entire sections, and just overall, it's a hugely better story for it, even without the improvements in my writing.
In some ways it's harder to go back and fix the story than just start a complete rewrite from the ground up. I find myself trying to put sections in from the previous versions that turned out well, but no longer fit with the story flow, so you have to be willing to delete enmasse, which can be tough when you're emotionally invested in a story you spent so much time working on.
Not too mention the horror of rereading your old work and realizing just how bad it was.

 

[doravg]

In the process of. Though it's a lot older than 4 years... my first notes/ideas on it were a decade ago.
What's funny is other than a few of the characters being mostly the same, and the setting being the same, the first version was very different from the original notes, and the current version is even farther off. But this round I have added roughly 40k words so far, deleted or moved entire sections, and just overall, it's a hugely better story for it, even without the improvements in my writing.
In some ways it's harder to go back and fix the story than just start a complete rewrite from the ground up. I find myself trying to put sections in from the previous versions that turned out well, but no longer fit with the story flow, so you have to be willing to delete enmasse, which can be tough when you're emotionally invested in a story you spent so much time working on.
Not too mention the horror of rereading your old work and realizing just how bad it was.

I feel you. The cringe is strong with me at this moment XD.

 

[wresch]

I just went back and rewrote an entire series - for the second time. I needed to. I found lots of simple grammar stuff, but I also found paragraphs that made no sense, or characters saying things badly. I loved the basic premise of all the books, so why would I not want them to be better? What is wonderful about ebooks is we have the freedom to update and make things better. Why wouldn't we take advantage of that? Fortunately, Smashwords - and now draft to digital - allow my updates.

Do I also write new stuff? Sure. But I take time to polish my old favorites.

 

[Zagaroth]

I started writing my story two years ago. I am still going back to fix things occasionally.

Mind, most of this has been implementing edit suggestions from others (I started over on RR, so there is a lot more history than is shown here), but sometimes those suggestions point out areas where I need to figure out the rewrite, rather than offering a specific suggestion.

Thankfully, a lot of the editing work has been taken up by my wife acting as my editor, but I am still the one who decides whether to implement the edits as-is, change the way that portion is edited, or very rarely decide that I want to leave that section as-is.