I was reading Brfan's new "The Golden Age", and he mentioned Madsoam2's "Lisa's Path" as his favorite story. So I searched for it. And today I reread most if it, and read a couple of chapters that were new to me.
Madsoam, this is such a great story. So many of us have posted that it is either the best story, or the best story in the realistic category.
Don't rush to finish it. Keep doing all the chapters you want. Take your time. I'm sure a friendly moderator will go in and adjust your initial 3 years ago to 6 years ago if you ask.
But please, please, please, find time to add a chapter every year. Don't stop. (I'm not at a membership level where I can do a search to see what you've written recently.)
However, if you do think this is a fitting end for this story, and it is a lovely climax (ha!), then how about starting a new one !!!
I can only imagine how much time and skill went into creating Lisa's Path. As several others have said, the parallels in my early life are strong, just I never got to marry my Lisa.
I remember a few years ago we were posting about what we wanted more of in stories, and a few of us, a minority at the time, posted more realism. At the time I was thinking "more realism means heights under 6'6 and weights under 300 pounds" (something like that).
I had completely forgotten about this story and what can be done with true realism.
That said, if the only stories we had in our genre were stories like Lisa's Path, or Modesty Blaze, the genre wouldn't exist. They're just so time consuming and difficult to write. But when they do turn up they are wonderful to read!
I'll just add that we readers appreciate the work of all the authors in all the subgenres here. We appreciate the time and effort and imagination you all put into your work.
Thank you.
K+++ to every author, in particular today Brfan and Madsoam2