If the shoe fits…it may end up at the castle

I’m doing revisions on a fractured fairy tale. I want to get it all polished up and out on submission. Revisions are hard for me. I’m slow! It really is like scrubbing floors and sweeping cinders. And at times I hear voices in my head that sound very much like an evil stepmother and two cruel stepsisters telling me I can’t do it.

But, I love this story and I know for it to have a happily-ever-after that it can’t just show up at the ball. There’s going to have to be some magic involved and guess who has to wave the wand?
Not my critique group!
Not my agent!
But, me! Hard or not, I’m going to have to wave the wand and write the magic words.

Don’t get me wrong . . . my critique group and my agent are an important part of this. They may suggest the mice or the pumpkin. They may remind me to add tension…like a clock striking midnight. All of this will help move my story toward the ball. But I’m the one whose words will have to waltz with Prince Editor. I’m the one who will have to have that spit and shine that will make Prince Editor fall so in love with my story that when I leave the hint of a glass slipper, he will see a perfect fit for the castle (publishing house).

So, hard or not, I’ll scrub the floors and I’ll sweep the cinders. I’ll block out the nagging voices. I’ll keep revising until my words waltz. And somewhere between a pumpkin coach and midnight, the glass slipper may be just get my book into the castle and out into the kingdom.

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Penny Parker Klostermann’s debut picture book, There Was An Old Dragon, is coming from Random House Children’s Publishing Fall 2015. You can follow her on Twitter @pklostermann and visit her blog HERE. Penny is represented by Tricia Lawrence.