I hate reading unfinished stories. When's the next chapter coming out? Some authors are regular, every Wednesday or whatever. For those, it's like a serial TV show and we wait for the next exciting episode but it's not a problem because we know it's coming. Some stories, however, haven't been updated in four months or three years and you know that the author never finished it.
I have one long story, the Swarm Cycle "Ending This Mess" which is done except for going through all the proofreader comments. I have another short story "Learning to Please" that is almost done and I'm trying to concentrate on filling in the last couple of gaps. Right now those are my priorities.
I have 20 or so unfinished stories in my own files. I work on one or another whenever it seems right. Are any of them ever going to be completed? I don't know. My life is getting busier again, and as I get older it seems my ability to concentrate is fading away anyway.
I don't want to post them on SOL yet 'cause they ain't done. Still, that's an awful lot of labor that I don't want lost, and I'm egotist enough to think that some people like to read my stories. I was talking to another author here about one of his unfinished stories, and something that's been in the back of my mind for a while jumped forward.
What if I started publishing them with titles like "Unfinished: Lessons" and "Unfinished: The Burglars" and "Unfinished: After the Party"? That gets them out where people can enjoy what's there without any expectation of another chapter soon. All three of those examples are over 100K, so there's something there if people want to read an unfinished story.
Pros? Cons?
-ZM