Recreating Old Stories

[BDANR]

Hey all,

 

Have any of you written a story in the past that you wanted to redo/recreate? I have a box full of old novels I wrote back when I was in elementary and middle school. I had great ideas, dabbling into sc-fi, medieval, even paranormal, but they were written from a child/teenage perspective. I thought of trying to re-create them and make them for a more of an adult and YA audience. Has anyone had any experience with this and can give me pointers on where to begin? Story examples?

 

Let me know! Your assistance is appreciated ^_^.

Bryant

[MrM]

I had a couple. One was a Sci-Fi saga called 'Galactic Crusade'. LOL It wasn't exactly another rip off of Star Wars though. It had its own story, tech, and characters. One of the characters in it ended up becoming 'Joraan' in my Thinning Veil series.

 

Another I had was called 'The Planet of Horrors'. Interestingly enough, Ridley Scott sort of had the same idea I had in making ALIEN Covenant. It was basically a planet where EVERYTHING was out to kill you. I was happy that Sir Scott used the spore throatburster idea. I had that way back when I was 14! Hehehehe!

 

I may resusitate The Planet Of Horrors and train a little more mature mind to it, though I think it might lose something. Teens have a great way of innocently creating the most horrible horror ideas imaginable! LOL

[Comicality]

 

So lucky! Hehehe!

 

I've lost sooooo many stories online that I worked really hard on. "Boy Repeated", "Magic Man", "Crave", "Empty Corners", "Techno-Sapien"...and I was so heartbroken to lose those stories that it's nearly impossible to try to recreate that magic again. So it's awesome that you still have your original copies on hand to rebuild from.

 

But the whole point is to keep that 'magic' from the first draft. You're obviously more experienced and more nuanced in your craft and your ability to put a great story...but there's just something so special about that first, spur of the moment, expression of your true emotions that really makes a difference. So if you're going to rewrite it from scratch, I'd say, keep that original vibe. Even if it seems a little outdated. The heart of the story is what counts. It's not so much a recreation as it is a deeper explanation. You know?  

[BDANR]

On 10/9/2017 at 11:16 AM, MrM said:

I had a couple. One was a Sci-Fi saga called 'Galactic Crusade'. LOL It wasn't exactly another rip off of Star Wars though. It had its own story, tech, and characters. One of the characters in it ended up becoming 'Joraan' in my Thinning Veil series.

 

Another I had was called 'The Planet of Horrors'. Interestingly enough, Ridley Scott sort of had the same idea I had in making ALIEN Covenant. It was basically a planet where EVERYTHING was out to kill you. I was happy that Sir Scott used the spore throatburster idea. I had that way back when I was 14! Hehehehe!

 

I may resusitate The Planet Of Horrors and train a little more mature mind to it, though I think it might lose something. Teens have a great way of innocently creating the most horrible horror ideas imaginable! LOL

What an interesting mind you had  ! I will check those out, thank you for your examples! And you're right about the interesting ideas you think up when you're a teen. I may have to do a bit of editing to take away some of the more...vivid imagery I had written back then  .

Edited October 10, 2017 by BDANR

[BDANR]

13 hours ago, Comicality said:

 

So lucky! Hehehe!

 

I've lost sooooo many stories online that I worked really hard on. "Boy Repeated", "Magic Man", "Crave", "Empty Corners", "Techno-Sapien"...and I was so heartbroken to lose those stories that it's nearly impossible to try to recreate that magic again. So it's awesome that you still have your original copies on hand to rebuild from.

 

But the whole point is to keep that 'magic' from the first draft. You're obviously more experienced and more nuanced in your craft and your ability to put a great story...but there's just something so special about that first, spur of the moment, expression of your true emotions that really makes a difference. So if you're going to rewrite it from scratch, I'd say, keep that original vibe. Even if it seems a little outdated. The heart of the story is what counts. It's not so much a recreation as it is a deeper explanation. You know?  

No! My heart hurts when I hear of other authors who've lost stories they've written in the past :(. I'm sorry to hear that happened to you.

 

I would like to have a digital copy of them. I've been carrying this box around for seven years now. If I lost them, I don't know what I'd do.

 

I love what you said in your last sentence: a deeper explanation and not so much a recreation. Like fleshing out the story with my current abilities? I think this would be a helpful way to approach it, that way I'm not making the story into something that it wasn't (or worse, making it into a story I no longer enjoy). Thank you for your advice Comicality :).

[Comicality]

(Hugz) Yeah, some of those losses HURT! Hahaha! But who knows? Maybe it'll be better the second time, right? You've just gotta keep that frame of mind sometimes.  

[Myr]

I have everything I've ever written copied to the cloud and on every computer I've got. lol.  I even have typed assignments going back 22 years... 

I also have a handy notebook full of stuff I wrote by hand.

Lots of old tidbits and ideas get recycled into future stuff for me.  (especially scenes I really love)

 

[MrM]

31 minutes ago, Myr said:

I have everything I've ever written copied to the cloud and on every computer I've got. lol.  I even have typed assignments going back 22 years... 

I also have a handy notebook full of stuff I wrote by hand.

Lots of old tidbits and ideas get recycled into future stuff for me.  (especially scenes I really love)

 

 

This is the reason you are our fearless leader. You are, like, organized and stuff!

[William King]

Just something to think about, I like the idea of a story about a young boy who is writing a story and this book would tell both the story that boy was writing and the life of that youngster as he was writing it. Quite a challenge, but a different take on using a story you wrote when you were younger, perhaps a fantastic opportunity.

[BDANR]

8 hours ago, William King said:

Just something to think about, I like the idea of a story about a young boy who is writing a story and this book would tell both the story that boy was writing and the life of that youngster as he was writing it. Quite a challenge, but a different take on using a story you wrote when you were younger, perhaps a fantastic opportunity.

That sounds like a cool idea! I like the idea of using a child's pov to tell the story. Challenging, and it'd be a good read :). Thank you for that!

[Brayon]

I have 20-30 completed stories sitting in my one drive, and another 10 on old fashion paper. I've lost close to 10 others, in my last move, that I don't think I can recreate.

Sadly, these stories will never see the light of day.