The Dead WIP File

 

Ah, the cemetery of dead works. The gravestones list and limp far into the distance. Some mark the resting places of stray ideas that never had a chance to mature. Others memorialize stories and characters that almost made it. Some stones stand guard over the ones that never stood a chance. 

Occasionally, in keeping with the philosophy that nothing is ever wasted, I take my shovel into the damp night and rob a grave. Metaphorically, of course, because really, it's just a question of searching some computer files. The thing is, I almost never resurrect a corpse, dress it up, and then teach it to sing 'Putting on the Ritz'. Instead, I slice the heart, guts, or brain out of the poor dead thing and transplant the organ(s) into whichever patient is on my table at the time. 

Situations. Snippets of dialogue. Whatever suits the more viable subject being stitched together. Mad scientists and evil geniuses should only ever plagiarize themselves, in my view. And then, only once. One heart cannot be sliced in half and shared between two patients if you expect either to live. 

Thining back across the stories in my files, the only time I resurrected the dead, the story was only mostly dead. With a little magic called 'a competent editor', that story didn't just walk, it grew wings. Maybe it is all dressed up and singing 'Putting on the Ritz'. 

Resurrecting the Dead WiP

Have I ever resurrected an old project? How much of the original did I keep? 

Funny you should ask. As I'm wrapping up my current WiP, I'm eyeing an old WiP whose conceit works, characters hold up,  plot...not so much. When I wrote this WiP fifteen years ago, I wasn't a plotter. I was a pantser, and the meandering of the story reflects why I no longer write without a plan. Dear reader, it is bad, so bad. While writing this WiP, I distinctly remember wondering how the big-time authors of SFF knew what scenes to leave in and what to exclude (it's called a plot, dummy). Needless to say, I wouldn't dream of publishing the WiP as-is. Currently, it's a 275k high fantasy elemental assassin story that goes too far in some aspects and not far enough in others while leaving lots of "uh, what?" moments.

Fortunately, the more I write, the better I get (at least I like to believe that). I've published seven books (soon to be eight) since then. Theoretically, I might maybe be able to salvage the settings, the magic system, the characters, and the GMC of the protagonist. The story itself? Total rewrite.

~shushes the other unpublished books locked in the trunk 

and buried in the yard, never to be seen again~