Thankyou also, Cliff, for the advice. The process wasn’t quite as rushed as I perhaps made it sound – I had planned the story for this anthology and it was written and edited and I was fairly happy with it. I was checking formatting and pruning wordcount at the last minute, however. And then of course the minute I hit send I (as always) could think only the worst of the story : )

I have a lot of respect for the time and work editors put in, and in this smaller market where everyone knows everybody else, I’ve met many of them and definitely don’t want to waste their time. So I do try to craft the story, edit it well, make sure it is in my language of choice (in Trudi’s phrase) and properly set out for their requirements.

And still crushing loathing of my writing kicks in the minute I put it out in the world! The only cure for that seems to be to start the next story.