Have you ever MST'ed your own story?

I didn't mean to MST my story. All I wanted to do was write notes on a draft one of my old novels. (I've always liked the story, and I know someday I'll get it right.

But as I went on, my comments got snarkier and snarkier. For example, "God, she sounds like an obsessed teen-ager. Wait, I think I WAS an obsessed teen-ager when I wrote this..." But I couldn't help getting snarky. My characters tended to say stupid things, whine, and throw temper tantrums. The writing was sophomoric -- which is appproriate as I finished it during my sophomore year of college.

Heck, I even named an alien after my pediatrician. Dr. Yim became Dr. Y'ym in my story. (Because everyone know that al'ien cul'tures use l'ots of apos'trophes.) I hope my pediatrician didn't mind being named after an alien whose mouth was in his chest.


Anyway, the MST'ing has turned into a real learning experience. The more I looked for ways to make fun of my old draft, the more I found ways to improve it. The story has a pulse again!

jamiehall said:

This is the only MSTing of writing I've ever seen.

Click to expand...

That's a classic.

I didn't go the "full budget" route with Mike, Tom Servo, and Crow. Maybe I should try that someday. I know some authors put deleted scenes and other "DVD extras" on their web sites. Is the world ready for an author putting up a MST'ed early draft? (For that matter, most authors don't even like to show their early drafts. In a book on revision, Mike Resnick shared some of his drafts to show how he revised his work. But that's pretty rare.)