The torment that is the WiP - Discuss

[moonlite_tryst]

That's discuss people, not flame!

As an author who has been a bugger for starting to post chaptered fics and not finishing them this may seem a strange post, but here goes.

Whilst spring cleaning my LJ, I clicked on a link for one of the greatest H/D WiPs ever written IMO. Although labelled as catagorically not abandoned, it has not been updated for almost three and a half years *cries* and who knows if it ever will because the author is now writing in another fandom *cries some more*, which leads me to wonder:

If a WiP has been abandoned for a period of time, e.g. over 2 years or more, and the author was close to the end, should said author post a synopsis regarding how things were going to end for the reader's benefit?

Does an author have any obligation to readers who have followed/are following a WiP, or does the label WiP translate into read at your peril?

Thinky thoughts authors, readers?

Comments

[mordyn4]

omg i am never reading that fic - you guys get so sad when you talk about it :[[[[[[[

Just thinking about the pain of the waiting between chapters for Drop Dead Gorgeous, I know I couldn't handle it.

You know, the person that wrote that Sex Magic fic handed it off to someone else, maybe .... maybe? This author might not ever condone that, though. I have no idea.

Of course, you've all probably imagined your own endings by now, would you want it finished if it was wildly different than you'd hoped?

[moonlite-tryst.livejournal.com]

We do get sad because it is such an incredible story. Magic seems to leap off the page when she describes spell casting. No simple Malfoy cast a spell to be found here. As for the plot; *sighs* the plot is so deliciously complicated.

would you want it finished if it was wildly different than you'd hoped?
The readers know the boys will be together - the author has said so from the start, but how that will happen from the point the fic stopped I cannot imagine and that's the disappointment for me.

[symetric.livejournal.com]

but how that will happen from the point the fic stopped I cannot imagine and that's the disappointment for me.

this. and idk, if it wasn't by her, it wouldn't feel the same.

[moonlite-tryst.livejournal.com]

So true. *nods* Sex Magic isn't quite in the same league.