I need to completely edit one of my stories. Completely as in reformatting it; breaking out chapters into individually posted chapters; reworking each chapter, and changing the end tag.
Can I simply remove the main body of the story and leave a story under construction in it's place?
I'm asking because the story I'm currently working on will reference that story. Plus, I've learned a bit since posting that story and I want to clean it up.
So . . .
I’m not going to answer your question, because I think it’s probably an Admin question and I don’t want to give the wrong info. But I do want to say that I feel your pain. I had to do massive amounts of editing on my first two stories after I first posted them. I wouldn’t have been so cavalier about the potential for errors today. On the flip side, I pushed 280,000 words out in around three months. My productivity since then has collapsed. It’s a balance.
— Emma
Better plan
Post your new chapters as new work. Put a link in the old story to the first chapter of the new one, leave the old story where it was. Maybe change the name of it. Tell me what you ar doing in PM and I can help you work out how we will link things together and maybe hide the old version while the new one is being posted.
Let me know. :)
Hugs,
Erin
= Give everyone the benefit of the doubt because certainty is a fragile thing that can be shattered by one overlooked fact.
Other options
It's your story, and you can do as you wish. The following is not meant as advice, nor as a suggestion that you *should* do this or that.
As an alternative to deleting the story now, and replacing it with a notice that the story is being revised, you could just add the notice at the start of the old version. Then you could finish the new, follow on story, revise the old story, and post them both at the same time, when both are ready.
I have also seen occasions where the old version is left intact on BC, and the new revised version is posted as well, allowing people to compare the two versions if they are so inclined.
Best wishes
Lindsay
Hmmm. Only a few 'little' thoughts ...
The Really Big edits you have in mind ... if done 'in-place' have great potential to very much confuse people who read the 'old', and then the 'new' version.
In-place edits can make comments 'go strange'.
Suppose someone had commented on the old version "Why did you kill 'the bad guy' - they might have been redeemed?" -- and then in the new version, the 'villain' does get help and becomes a friend/ally of the main character ... this can get really confusing.
I think this might be a good way. Put a paragraph at the front of the current/old story" "Author's note - I'm doing a major re-write. Please enjoy this version." (Unless you really, really hate the current version ...) Then, when you've done the rewrite of your "story X", post the new one as "Story X - Rewrite".
Oh, and please make sure the stories 'point' to each other.
One last thing - please do the edits 'off line', on your own machine(s). Edits done on BCTS, and then things are different each day we come to read ... That has us reading in an "Un-Fun House of Mirrors". And I'd certainly bail out' long before I ever close to the Kudus and Comments buttons.
Thanks.