Should I edit or just rewrite the whole thing?

So I have been working on this one (Untitled) series for about 3 years know. It was my first real attempt at writing a novel, and the process was slow. I haven't worked on it in months (perhaps almost a year?), and just today i opened up the file to give it a read through. I was yet again reminded how horrible my writing was during my preteen years and very early teen years. So many things have changed since I first started writing it, it's like a whole different story from when I first started. I decided I should edit the first half of the story and get everything in order before I continue writing. Trying to find a good place to begin, I realized that it would probably be better (and easier) to just start it over from the beginning, using my first half-draft as an outline.

So what do y'all think I should do? From the way I see it, these are my choices-
1. Finish writing it, but then break my back and causing myself a lot of frustration editing it.
2. Edit it as it is, causing myself a lot of frustration (and probably loose hope in the story in the editing process)
3. Start over, do a complete rewrite.

I'm leaning towards the 3rd one, and instead of typing it out on my laptop, I'll be old fashioned and write it out with pen and paper. But I know a lot of y'all have been in the same position, so please tell me what worked best for you.

Continue writing as if the changes have been made. Finish the story, to tell yourself, "Yes, I can finish this project." And write it as if the changes have been made means you don't have to rewrite as much.

But, once that's done, rewrite it from the start until you're happy with the old draft, then continue editing that draft until you find another chunk you're unhappy with and rewrite it. If at the end you need to rewrite it all, just continue with it.

Another reason I said to finish first is you don't want to trap yourself in the circle of constantly editing and rewriting. I was in that circle for a long time. It's not pleasant.

Hope this helps!

~Rosey

Yus. The best thing would be to finish it. And then go over, editing it.

I'm in the exact same boat as you, actually, and I have to say that Rosey's advice is what has worked best for me. My current novel project is not my first novel project, but it is the first one I've been able to stay interested enough to work on for more than a year (I'm coming on my fourth). Most my other projects died before reaching the 10K word mark (often before even reaching 5K), but I've managed over 40K so far which frankly floors me.

Of course, in four years, there have been a lot of changes since I first started writing, and every time I go back and read through the first few chapters, I have this insane urge to rewrite them. But I don't because one rewrite tends to lead to another rewrite, which leads to another, and eventually, you find yourself months later with x number of rewrites, no new material, and a loss of interest in the story. It's what happened to all the other novel projects of mine.

So yeah. What I do is chant to myself the first draft mantra: "First drafts always suck. Stop worrying about the suck. Fix the suck in the second draft, after the first is finished." And then I plug on, making a note of the new changes, how to best set up said changes in the rewrite, and then continue writing as if they had been planned from the start.

It's been working marvelously so far, and I usually managed to get out at least one new chapter a month... until I ran into this odd writer's block where I still wanted to write the story but just couldn't, but I seem to have licked it. :3 If you're getting frustrated with writing the story, it might help to take a break from it (by writing a short story or some poems) or even writing it in a different way (like by hand if you usually type it out, which is what you seem to be planning).

I went through this same thing with my novel. I had lost interest in it, but one day picked it up again and really looked at it. I needed to figure out why I had lost interest and how to regain that interest again. It turned out, for me, I didn't like how the story was and the story itself didn't make sense. I plotted it out a bit, making what turned out to be huge changes to the story/characters/plot/setting/etc. For me, I had to go back and rewrite because 1. my writing had been horrendous and my inner editor just couldn't stand it (a weakness, I know) and 2. I wasn't able to formulate the new plot in my head enough to just pretend the changes had been made (they were really really big changes, though). I needed to rewrite the changes and see how that went.

Since then, I have forced myself to not think too much about plot of previously written parts (and I haven't lost interest, so it hasn't been neccessary) and I do the whole "just keep writing, fix the suck later" thing Ky mentioned. Might I say, it works very well and is a fantastic strategy

Really, it depends on how well you work on something. I could do the rewrite without losing hope then, and keep my interest going without massive edits until I finish the draft now. Some people can do that, some can't. If you can do the whole keep going thing, definitely do that. If you, like me, can't go on without making those changes then rewrite. (Also, if it's just writing style that changes then I suggest just keep going. If it's plot changes, then consider rewriting/editing).

Alright, I'm done rambling. Good luck!

-Lauren-