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

[potteresque_ire]

*Huggles*

Yeah, it's the writing that really makes and breaks a story. And, for me at least, it's the process of penning the details and hammering out the little things that tells me for reals if the sketch I have in mind really works. I know a lot of authors who don't need that, but that's because they've spent extensive amount of time and effort thinking and plotting out the story and kind of ... immersing themselves into the world they create. So if the author has moved on and hasn't really given much attention to providing an end to her WIP, then what she provides as a synopsis may not be well thought out and may prove to be a letdown more than a closure that her story deserves.