My editing process, using “That Summer at Aunt Jackie’s Alpaca Farm” for reference.

It started at Viable Paradise. On Monday, we were given prompts. Mine were cottagecore and alpaca and fire. On Thursday, we had to deliver the stories.

First, I need a sleep in between. So a wild, pour out draft, throw down that mud. Sleep. Then revise, reshape that clay.

I don’t count draft numbers, never kept old drafts. But I do have different versions for themes, or word count requirements.

I’m not too precious about my words.

In fact, I’ve returned to expand an idea before. Check out “Fox Spirit’s Retelling”. Compare it to “The Huli Jing of Chinatown”. The first was basically an outline of the second, which grew to more than 4x its size.

You can revisit ideas! You can revisit characters. Robin McKinley wrote Beauty and then nearly twenty years later Rose Daughter, retellings of Beauty and the Beast.

Of the earlier versions that I remember, Big Jackie was previously Uncle Jack, but then I realized I needed to pass the Bechdel Test.

I also had trouble getting the opening scene. Did I want it at the narrator’s mother’s stall? No, too far removed. Did I want the two brothers showing up at the house? No, I wanted an early introduction to the alpaca.

Names are hard. Sometimes you just grab who you know. Trey was this neighbor we had who was always sitting outside his apartment, making the entire apartment’s community’s business his business. The narrator’s name is close to a name I’m already using in another story. Liam’s was from a baby name website. Pick a name that’s long enough that you could do a ctrl + F replace without winding up with a particitrousers situation, but not so long that reading aloud is difficult.

Finally, the most dramatic change in the edits with the magazine’s editors was adding more details about what happened with Eric and the alpacas.

This is a look at my process, not a prescription for your process. As long as you’re writing, submitting, your process is working.