Previous Post   > > Part of the problem is that I waited too long to solve that problem.  When someone watches a multi-part movie or reads a multi-part book, and they don't like how it's going, they usually don't stick around till the last part.  I think what happened so far turned off the audience, and it's almost certainly at the point where quite a few people won't care what Part 3 says anymore. > > I doubt that's true.  I can't speak as to whether breaking it up into chunks caused more problems for you, though.  I can see how it might have. I figure if I would have posted it as one long story there wouldn't have been any questions about how it ends, and therefore no angry readers.  Little too late to fix that now, though. > Again, only you know what you had originally planned, but most of the criticism has focused on the questions that have been raised:  Why would Akiko do this, and why behave as she did when confronted?  Those could still be answered in a new part 3 without any rewrites to the first two parts.  Ian offered one such addition by e-mail, and I had ideas for others even before reading his.  I can understand if you say you couldn't do your originally planned ending without major changes to what came before, but that doesn't necessarily mean the whole thing needs to be scrapped. The second question is easier to answer:  Akiko didn't expect to see Chiaki so angry.  One of the points of the story is that Chiaki has changed too, so she no longer blindly accepts that Akiko has her reasons for everything.  Now that the story is dead, though, the next part would have been the "negotiation" stage, where Akiko's lawyer gets her out of questioning/jail at the police station (Jack and Vicky were there) because of some sort of problem with evidence.  In short the whole ordeal creates a new reputation for Akiko in the criminal world.  But she also loses the faith of Chiaki. >>I still have a point I'd like to get across story-wise but I have no idea how to do it anymore.  Part of the problem is that my own cast isn't large enough or balanced enough for them to provide that kind of motivation to each other.  And sadly the point is to damage Chiaki's relationship with the organized crime families, so it can't be a gentle interaction like the rest.  In other words it can't possibly work right now. > > Well, give it some thought after you get a little distance from this.  Personally, I think there are many ways this could still work. Maybe, if I come up with an entirely new story.  I just don't have one. > Well, allow me to be possessive and all that, but frankly you don't need anyone else's approval besides my own.  I created Akiko, and set up her status quo.  She's part of my rogue's gallery.  Everyone is free to use her... provided, again, that they put her back more or less where they found her.  As such, it's my job to keep track of her, who is using her, and what can and can't be done with her. I figured I would have at least had to deal with killer shrike, you, and Ian.  That's a lot of correspondence for one rather short story. > And, again, I have collaborated with most everyone on the board, and I have eagerly devoured the finished stories once they were posted.  I think you greatly underestimate people's interest even when they have some broad idea of the plot. Maybe.  I think about it though, and feel like it can't work now because I failed the first attempt and the second would just look like trying to salvage something that's badly broken. > > It's not that I don't like collaboration, it's that I'm not good at it.  My timing is terrible, my writing schedule is too strict - I usually don't like to spend 2 or 3 months writing something because I'm waiting for replies. > > Well, in my experience it doesn't usually take months to work out the details of these things.  Still, collaboration means being open with how things will go... It's not a question of writing something and then getting approval so much as it is suggesting an idea and then incorporating the feedback you get into it.  You have to be flexible to change.  Change isn't the problem for me, timing is.  I would send an email, wait a few days, and then give up and start writing anyway (usually because at the time I don't have something else to write in the meantime).  Then I'd either end up posting it without getting an email reply and then have the person get upset, or I'd get a reply after it's mostly written and either have to do some serious re-writing, or the reply would be something like "I don't like the idea because..." and I'd have to scrap it.  Quite a few short story concepts have been scrapped that way, fortunately before they're posted though, and sometimes before they're completed. All of that aside, though, I ran into two problems at once.  I was only using Akiko in a transient capacity, not really changing that much in the long run (aside from her relationship to Chiaki), but I didn't post the entire story fast enough to make that clear, and I drove away the audience because of it.  And because part 3 isn't written yet I couldn't quickly post it to make my point.  So I was left with 2 choices:  Pull it and scrap it or rewrite the entire thing.  I don't have any ideas for a rewrite, so I had to scrap it.

> I figured I would have at least had to deal with killer shrike, you, and Ian.  That's a lot of correspondence for one rather short story.

You don't need to deal with me at all, since I'm not Akiko's creator. And unless there's something Vizh and HH have concocted some kind of stryline involving the character I don't see why you would have needed to correspond with Ian either.

Everything else Adam said was pretty much spot on. If you're going to use other people's characters you should leave them in the same condition you found them in, and use them in a way that is consistent to the past and shows the audience their strengths. We all fail to do that at times, so you shouldn't feel that discouraged.