This is a huge obstacle to you going forward. The world is full of scumbags. You found one the hard way. Meanwhile, your novel is a job for pay, not some expression of your soul. If it’s a good product somebody will buy it. If not, you’ll remain an amatuer.
If you treat it like a job & succeed, you’ll get the last laugh. If you treat it like a product of your soul which she stole, she’ll have the last laugh no matter what. It doesn’t help *you *to set up a mental / emotional circumstance in which only *she *can win.
So reframe the emotional situation to one where you win. You’ll live longer & happier & have more success.
Google for some “computer repair” places in your area, call a few to see what they’d charge to get the stuff off your HDD. If too much, ask your friends if they know any computer savvy person that could help you. The joke is that you should find any 12-year-old neighbor kid who can easily fix it. Not so far from the truth.
I’m a retired computer consultant, and in the past 25 years I have been so saddened and frustrated at the vast number of people who don’t back up their computers. Today an external had drive is very inexpensive, and you can even buy a 2 GB or so flash drive that just plugs into your USB port and back up all your documents, pictures, etc to that.
The three most important rules for computers are: backup, backup, and backup. As the saying goes, only backup the stuff that you don’t want to lose. Sooner or later, every HDD will fail.
We live and learn, so try to find some knowledgeable neighbor or a friend of a friend that can help you with this computer stuff. Good luck.
First of all, write the story anyway. Recover the data from the old hard disk if you can, start over if you can’t, but write it. Then you can decide whether you want to submit it for publication or not.
If you didn’t finish reading your former friend’s version of it, stop reading now. Don’t let it into your head. Make sure you do your story your way, without someone else’s influence all over it.
And one more “don’t”: Do not make a huge public deal of it. Don’t go on the attack. It really won’t help you.
Hang in there. Every business has twits. You found one. Rise above it and move on.
