Ah, the refined and elegant distilled wisdom of my entries here. I'm just like all those eighteenth-century literati types. Really.

But seriously. Revising sucks. We've both spent the evening trying to ruthlessly revise our own best stories, based on other people's critiques, and it's been awful. It's the worst feeling when you know in your heart exactly what you wanted the story to be/say, and no one else gets it...and you're forced to change the bits you personally loved (thus feeling like you're sacrificing your baby and selling out on your own self-worth) or else leave them be and face the real possibility that no one except you will ever "get" it.

And of course, there is just no objective way to ever know what the Right Thing to do is, when revising. Which suggestions are right, even though they make you grit your teeth with resistance? Which ones are Wrong, even though everyone else agrees on them?

It would be so much easier if there was a higher authority we could check in with on this....and who would then promise to really and truly publish the Correct Result.

Sadly, until then, we'll just be forced to listen to our own intuition mixed with huge doses of often-contradictory advice from others, and spend a lot of the time being confused and worried and frustrated.

But maybe the stories are getting better....?????????????