Anna, I sympathize with you completely! I was in a position like yours a few years ago. I had about 15 stories on the archive, and after re-reading them, I realized that they were horrible. Absolutely horrible. I didn't know that dialogue had to be in different paragraphs, for starters. And it just gets worse from there. One of my stories even introduced a Mary Sue character. So I decided to ask Kathy (you can tell how long ago this was, because she was archive EIC at the time) to remove my stories from the archive. I did rewrite two of the original stories I had on the archive, and they because Trials of the Heart, which is currently on the archive. However, looking back at it now, I am again seriously considering rewriting it. I haven't even touched the other stories from that universe because I've really lost intrest.
As, over the years, you've been the only author who's asked to have story files replaced, Nan, it hasn't impacted that much on the workload, so it hasn't been a problem.
I'm sorry to disagree. I have asked to have several files replaced in your tenure as EIC, LabRat. In fact, just last summer, I rewrote Final Forgiveness and The Newlywed show. I asked for them not to be GE'd because they were beta read by Tricia, an incredibly kind GE, and also for the same reason you said. I didn't want to take up a GE's time that could be better spent working on a new story. I think that if is my right as an author to do whatever I see fit with my own stories. If I want them removed, I should be able to have them removed. If I want to rewrite them, I should be able to replace the existing files. However, I do not think it is my right to demand another GE. I do not expect a prompt response to taking down or replacing a file, but I like that I do have the option to change my stories.
I took a long absence from FoLCdom, and I almost wish I would have thought to write under a different pen name! I always thought, through the years, that the reason people didn't read my stories was the bad first impression they got from my original stories. If they started reading on the archive with any of my older stories, they would have realized that I was a horrible writer. Hopefully, now that has changed since I have several Kerth nominations and, shockingly, even a win!
I am still thinking about rewriting some of my older stories. I mean my way older stories -- ones that were written in the '90's
. . . okay, and FF2, which was finished in '01. Even though there are some things that still make me cringe about some of my newer, old stories, there isn't anything as majorly wrong as in my old, old stories, so I guess I will leave them as-is.
Just think, Anna, to make you feel better, I was the same age as you when I first started writing, but English was my native language
. Think of how much better you are than I was!
- Laura
