The Writer's LIfe: judging and revising and young authors

I spent some time last week judging 4-H writing projects. As usual, I marveled at how good  the entries were ... many of them much better than I was at the same age. It's great to know there are still young writers and readers out there. It's also great to know my own childhood writing has disappeared.

Then I dove back into revising Fire On Mist Creek, which I wrote last fall and edited in early winter. Revision isn't all that much fun to me, so I made myself a promise: Once I get this manuscript done ... I can start work on another story. The most fun parts for me are brainstorming the story, writing the first draft, and those little edits later on, when the story's mostly done and I can relax a little. (Maybe I should have promised myself cake.)

Major revisions of the rough draft, on the other hand--pulling stuff out, moving it around, changing whole scenes and so on--not so much fun. It beats self-promotion, though.

You know what else it beats? Writing a synopsis. I hate writing synopsis ...um, synopsi ... um, synopsises. Unfortunately, for the purposes of an upcoming submission I've paused the revision, and gone over to finish the synopsis, first.

Still a better job than assembling axles at a factory, or working at a bee moth larvea farm. Trust me on that.