I'm making good progress on my next story, but it's non-linear.
I jump about writing bits of various chapters. I rewrite and revise others.
It means I can't publish chapters as I go, at least not yet.
Example, I add some plot twist, then go back to add foreshadowing.
Sometimes, I decide to change a character name.
Often a chapter is too busy, too much going on. I have to split it up into multiple chapters.
I guess I must wait for the churn to settle down. :)
This is how I almost always write, part of why I publish so rarely. I'll brush in parts of scenes but not have a clear idea how to link them at the time so move on.
Such an approach is hardly uncommon. For most who write like that, we simply wait until the entire story is done before posting anything. This has the added benefit in that, once the story is complete, you can officially publish—if you're so inclined—before you begin posting, and thus allowing readers the option or purchasing the entire story is they're too impatient to wait.
In fact, I often take it even further, offering a substantial discount for those who're interested—often for a full series—as selling a combined set is cheaper than selling the individually. However, in that case, you often require a proven history as an author (i.e. an ability to regularly write convincing engaging books, no matter the subject matter or topic).
In my case, I don't consider any first draft to be complete until I see how the story ends, so I'll know where it's going and I'll then add all the necessary foreshadowing and misdirection to ensure the final conclusion isn't painfully obvious to readers. But adding the foreshadowing before you know the full story arc is putting the card ahead of the whoring horse.
But you're still feeling your way forward, which necessarily takes time as you likely don't know who you are as an author yet. Once you do, it'll be much easier knowing how best to write your stories.
And yeah, changing character names mid-stream isn't uncommon either, either because you have other characters with the same name or because their name simply no longer fits them for whatever reason. (I'll often name my characters using the names of my previous protagonists, forgetting which characters my current protagonist is, as after a while, it gets to be hard keeping track of ALL those names. ;)
It means I can't publish chapters as I go, at least not yet.
Your writing habits make completing the story before posting the way to go, for you.
I am not aware of any significant advantage to the post as you write methodology. I am also aware of many major disadvantages to that methodology.
Remember that once a chapter is posted, the content is locked into your readers' memory. Making changes other than correcting errors to a posted chapter is not a good idea. It upsets your readers if you change the details on which the story is based. Doing so can confuse you readers; especially if you make multiple major changes to the same or multiple chapters.
For myself, I find that getting feedback from readers along the way can often improve the book in ways that would be hard to reproduce if the book was finished before publishing. Not impossible - nothing is 'done' until it's published - but it's harder to add and fix after primary editing is done.
I completely agree about changing substantive content after publishing. That's usually a bad idea.
However, for those who post online and publish independently, then fixing the inevitable typos, or correcting misassumptions once a reader points out what's wrong with what you wrote about an unfamiliar subject, won't change the story itself, as they're simply spot fixes, corrections, not changing the plots (hopefully) at all.
But, that's also why I never rewrite. Because every time I do, the story goes in an all-new direction, creating an all new book, a perversion of the old one rather than my writing something new and original. I've tried, and at least for me, it NEVER works. But, that's likely just me.
That said, one thing I HATE about SOL lately, are all the authors who've been reposting their older works, so there's no way to tell what's new and what's been there all along. Which really pisses me off! As just like when I 'revise' an existing work, streamlining a story you often remove the extraneous parts, which are often the most-loved segments.
So for me, I'd rather see revisions posted under a new title, so I can at least compare and contrast the two works, seeing what happened to my favorites scenes and where the new work may have gone astray.
That said, one thing I HATE about SOL lately, are all the authors who've been reposting their older works, so there's no way to tell what's new and what's been there all along.
If the author updates the story, it will be noted at the end where there's a first posting date and then an edited or something like that date. If the author deletes the original story and then posts a revised version, you can't tell necessarily.
This is an interesting point. For me, I'm torn between updating all of the chapter versions to 2.00 (something Laz would have to do for me) or posting a revised version as a separate story. The second is somewhat more intellectually honest, but likely confusing to readers.
An alternative is to repost all of the chapters and also post (or otherwise make available) the previous versions.
I have readers who will want to see all of the changes. Only one planned change truly affects the story, and it affects it in a truly minor way - one part of a vacation takes place in a different city, to fix a screwed-up train map error on my part - no effect on characters, plot, etc. But they'll want to see what else changed, I suspect. This isn't going to be the Star Wars Special Editions, even, in terms of changes.
There's some question as to how long those should be maintained, though. At some point, the new version is 'the story,' and the old versions should sail off into the sunset.
For me, if I were doing that, I'd add a notice before the changed portions, explaining what's I'd done and why. At least for me, that seems like a more straightforward, honest approach.
Then again, I have been known to save the new version and then do a 'compare and contrast' between the two to highlight specifically what has changed, yet that only works if you're saved the original, as after a few decades, the list of 'save stories' can become a bit overwhelming.
Yep, that's what I was referring to, yet this seems a new phenomenon, where someone authors repost their older stories in order to keep their story active on in front of readers, if effect, trying to 'gin up' additional votes. The problem with that is, there's no way to tell which IS a new version, a new revision of which is just a recycling of the same old crap (no offense to those recycling stories, as we all do what we need to, to get ahead).
Example, I add some plot twist, then go back to add foreshadowing.
Sometimes, I decide to change a character name.
Often a chapter is too busy, too much going on. I have to split it up into multiple chapters.
Those are some of the reasons I complete a story before posting. There are also times something happens in a later chapter than affects a previous chapter so I have to change the previous chapter to make the later chapter work (not necessarily foreshadowing).
I applaud those of you who complete your stories before posting. It seems like half of the stories posted never get finished. cmsix was famous for that. He would get bored with a story and start a new one.
More often, he's start a story and then have no clue how to continue it. There's a reason he penned more incomplete stories than any other on SOL, he'd always start off strong yet he'd petter out only partway through. Yet he inspired many SOL authors who could and did write full complete and engaging stoires.
Essentially, he never quite grasped the concept of a 'story arc' so never knew HOW to fully develop a story. Which is sad, all that potential yet no dedication to the storytelling craft at all. Possible ADD, maybe?
I'm making good progress on my next story, but it's non-linear.
When I first read that, I felt a cold knot of fear in my stomach. Then I realised you meant the progress was non-linear, not the story :-)
AJ
Technically, that would be "meandering" rather than "non-linear", which does describe many SOL stories.
'Non-linear' would be the applicable term if the reference is to a discrete state progression, where the map is an ordered set of directed vertices. I would guess that is where the term for 'non-linear video editing' comes from.
It would may not be correct where the reference is for a time domain plot of the content, as that could indicate a progression of literary content that is directly proportional to time.
Whatever the term is supposed to mean, I do know of at least two well-known S/F writers that have used that method.
I felt a cold knot of fear in my stomach. Then I realised you meant the progress was non-linear, not the story
The movie "Pulp Fiction" is not linear.
The movie "Pulp Fiction" is not linear.
It can work well but it's very difficult to pull off. I've even read a few stories on SOL where it works quite well. I've read even more car crashes though.
AJ