Revisions. And Do-Overs For Yesterday...

It's revision time!! Actually it's BEEN revision time. And it will be, for many weeks to come.

It would be so cool if life had revisions. At the end of the day I could skim through my mind and adjust things I said and did... or after a major mistake just hit the delete key, hehe. Delete-delete-delete!!!

If life had revisions, here would be mine for yesterday (yesterday was a pretty good day, so revisions should be easy):

1. Revise to show me cleaning the syrup from breakfast off the table. (This means I could delete the unnecessary "Ants All Over the Table" scene later on).

2. Revise to show me wearing shorts to the picnic at the park, instead of the semi-short, flowy peasant skirt I DID wear. (I didn't realize it would be windy. Changing this would mean I wouldn't have to endure the "Constantly Clutching the Sides of Her Skirt to Avoid Flashing Both Friends and Strangers" sequence).

3. Revise to show me skipping the ENTIRE "Vacuuming the Stairs" scene, even though friends were coming over later. (First off, real friends don't care about stair cleanliness. Second, it would delete the "Vacuum Falling Down the Stairs and Taking Diana Down With It" scene. The vacuum fell ON my left middle finger, which now hurts like crazy! I fell DOWN the stairs, luckily landing on my bottom but I landed hard and now I have a gross bruise and ouchiness, boo-hoooo me, all because of that stupid vacuuming the stairs idea!! REWRITE PLEASE!!)

4. Revise to show me lending Mockingjay to my Best Friend instead of my Good Friend. (We were all going to dinner and a movie-- they were coming over first and this is why I even vacuumed. Good Friend stopped by the house like an hour before Best Friend. Subsequently, Good Friend saw Mockingjay on my bookshelf first-- a whole hour first-- anyway, revising this scene would delete the "Best Friend Pouting" sequence I'm enduring now, and also "Diana Feeling Guilty" *sniffle*).

Anyone else have some revisions from yesterday? Want to share?

And oh yeah... 5. I would revise to show myself remember to bring my purse to dinner and a movie with friends. The revisions just keep going!

Since we're on the topic of revisions, here is a Mini-SCBWI Conference Learning Moment if anyone is interested...

At SCBWI I learned that editors typically give about three to four months for revisions, depending on the author, and a bunch of other variables, of course. (When are there NOT variables in publishing?!) One editor at a workshop said that-- in her experience-- an author being too speedy on revision turnaround usually meant revisions would have to start again, because often the author who returns revisions too quickly rushed through them. Every writer is different, so I'm assuming she meant in general... if anyone out there revises like a hot rod and it works for you, then great! And I personally don't know whether she's right or not... what do you think? Is her experience surprising? Did you figure that revising "too fast" would mean a less-than-thorough job? I have to admit, I thought that editors wanted revisions completed as quickly as possible-- the faster the better! Good thing for me that I was wrong, I guess, because I go through scenes over and over when I'm revising and it takes time to do that with a whole entire book!!! Hopefully I'm not too slow either...