It's a (Chinese) new year, and after nearly a year of procrastinating, I've finally taken the plunge and started to tie up some loose ends.

Starting with 'The Wall'.

This story I began in the (Australian) summer of 1999, after raiding my father's CD collection and becoming wholly obsessed with Pink Floyd's double album 'The Wall'. At the time, I was writing depressing stories and into depressing material – call it a release of pent up emotion, I was 17 at the time – and I was also beginning a study in Advanced English of utopias and dystopias in literature. Put the two together and you've got what engendered my own take on 'The Wall'.

In hindsight, wonderful thing that it is, I can see it wasn't exactly the greatest time to be starting a(nother) long story. I was going into my final year of high school, and my obsession with depressing literature ended as the time I used to spend indulging in teenage angst was gradually taken over by the Greek classics and maths equations. The last chapter I wrote was I believe not long before my mid-year exams, back in June '00. So after a year and half, I've finally decided to archive this story permanently. Which means rather than leave it as it was, I've posted every snippet, every chapter breakdown, every single idea I ever had for this story. So whilst it won't ever be written, you can at least see what I intended to write. And yes, 'The Wall' was a hanfic, I just never got far enough into the story for Ike, Tay and Zac to appear.

I admit, I always knew there'd be regret in letting this story go, because despite the go-throw-yourself-off-a-bridge-depression it involves, I still think it's a good storyline with a fair bit of potential. I no longer hate the world, my writing interests have moved on; I doubt I could write a dystopic story well now and the truth is that I don't particularly want to. If anyone feels really inspired by the plotline and ideas I've posted here, you're welcome to keep writing from where I left off. Just let me know.

The only person who kept this story going longer than the summer of '99, 2000 was Jenne, who I owe a feast of thanks to. I'm sorry most of all that you'll never get to read the story as I would have written it had things turned out differently.

I apologise to everyone who read this story and has been praying for an update for so long (if you have, I never got your email). My worst habit, being a great lover of history, is getting caught up in looking back – it's about time I started facing the east rather than the west.

diolch yn fawr,
Lauryn