I love the digital era. In the great old days I’d have typed everything, made carbon or photocopies, and spent way too much in postage. I’d have waited months for news on a manuscript. Now, for the most part, I deal with Word doc format files and rapid email communication.
Such as this morning, when I got an email request for seven tiny changes* on the fantasy mms, to be done ASAP. I know why, too – though I’m not jinxing that development by talking too much about it here. It could lead to something wonderful or fizzle out, and it’s too early to call. My cynical self is of course planning alternate options in case of fizzle, while my inner five-year-old is Snoopy-dancing.
Of course I fixed the errors and sent off the corrected draft within two hours. They were reasonable requests, and I was neither insulted nor traumatized by them.**
And now I’m eyeing my version of glass slippers.
* Seven errors out of a 53K mms is pretty good for a working final draft. That probably represents fifteen years of on-and-off writing, at least twenty revision passes, five submissions to shorter fiction markets, and over 46,000 added words from the original story. If a publisher is interested in this beast, there will be more edits and revisions. It’s a horribly inefficient way to write. Welcome to my mind.
** I’m still amazed by the number of writers who balk at all change requests. I have seen abusive and/or clueless editors, but I’ve also seen authors who viewed their errors with the fervent adoration of a Biblical literalist. If someone else can show me a better way to say something, I’m happy to learn from them.
This episode proves once more to me that an idea is like raw ore, but revisions are where alloys are smelted and forged.