I've Just Gotta Ask

When is the right time to put down a WIP for a new idea?

I finished my first ms last year.  It took me over two years to write because I got in my own way, comparing myself to other writers, not thinking I was good enough.  Then there was the guilt of doing something so time consuming without pay, the editing pains, pure laziness...and the list goes on.

Once I FINALLY finished, edited it three times, got it critiqued, and read by a beta, I realized it was crap.  It wasn't that is couldn't be decent...it just wasn't.

I ended up changing so much I decided to just start from scratch.  I am half-way through and am now at a stand still.  My characters don't want to talk to me, and maybe it is because their mad I've been cheating on them.

Here's the thing...for the last two years, I have had an idea simmering in my brain and this past weekend it wouldn't shut its pie hole so I plotted the story out all the way to the crisis point.  I am loving it and thinking about putting the other ms on the back-burner. 

So let me ask you, is it right to put an ms away that you have poured three years of your life into, for another?