A few days ago, we received the editorial memo on Six For Gold from our editor, Barbara Peters. Yes, Poisoned Pen Press still does things the old fashioned way. Books are edited before they're published.

Invariably, Barbara shows Mary and me how to do a better job of what we set out to do. She manages to see at once what's missing from the story. It's remarkable, in retrospect, how we always forget to include some of our best scenes in the first draft.

Nevertheless, for me the editorial memo is a near death experience.

As a writer, I'm convinced that I'm an utterly inept imposter and that, further, no mere mortal has the right to change a single comma of my perfect prose. A lawyer might call it pleading in the alternative, but in this case all it means is that my ego loses either way.

Now I've got over being outaged by the desecration of my art, and humiliated by being exposed as a fraud, I guess I'm ready to start the rewrite.