It’s probably because I’ve been doing nothing but revising and editing the same two stories every day for weeks now that I’m getting, well, sick of it all.
There comes a point in editing your own stuff when you work the story up to a level and it’s totally satisfying. Even when submissions deadlines draw near you just won’t submit if you don’t feel it’s right–though years ago I used to get so excited that I sometimes thought a story was great when it really wasn’t but just couldn’t recognize it. Nowadays I sort of go in the other direction because I have that much more writing and reading experience behind me and have set the standards higher.
There’s a point too, however, when you go beyond that place in a story where it works, and the whole thing just takes on a sort of hokey feel and you just want to trash it after all that work. That’s about where I am with these two, the roller coaster ride slowing as it draws near the platform and I just want to get off.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology