Dusting Off Old Manuscripts

Remember your first story? I don't. Seriously. All I recall is it was either horror or YA mystery and I wrote it in a blue spiral notebook. I went on to write a series of short stories and two more novellas, all before entering high school. Then I became interested in the 1920's and 1930's, particularly gangsters and Prohibition, so my stories revolved around those subjects. (Believe it or not, I still have a few pages of those stories.)

By the time I went to college and decided to major in English, my interest had shifted to more "literary" work and I was writing poetry and character-focused stories about expatriates in France during WWII or revolutionists during the Hungary uprising of 1956.

It took me nearly 20 years, a few poetry, review, and freelance article publications,before I came back to my dark genre roots. Okay, maybe not that long, but you get the idea.

During this time, I found I was writing but not producing. Oh, I would start a story, then the inner editor would kick in and I'd abandon it. So one day I decided I was going to write a story without going back and reading what I'd written until I finished. And I did. That was a YA horror, which will probably never see the proverbial light of day.

My next project was also my first NaNoWriMo: a dark vampire historical. Yes, I did finish it.

And, like the YA horror, I promptly pushed it aside as worthless. After all, I'd been taught first novels aren't publishable. (Although technically it wasn't my first...)

I couldn't help but wonder if the vampire story just needed a chance. So when I came across a class that focused on revamping abandoned manuscripts, I thought why not? Granted, I'd learned a lot about writing since that first NaNo, taken online classes, joined writers groups, worked with critique partners, etc. Maybe I couldn't salvage the entire book, but if parts were worth saving, it might be worth it.

The fate of this particular manuscript is still unknown. Then again, the class just started. :-)