My writing partner just read the latest version of my novel. She liked the changes. First, I kicked out one of my heroine’s children and gave her actions to Gloria, who is now more complex. She had further suggestions for improving the novel, so I ask the question, When do you say, “The End”? When is a book finished? Raymond Carver kept editing his stories, even after the New Yorker had published them. And yet I want my story to be as tight and polished as it can be, so that I can be satisfied. Will a reader be satisfied? I don’t know.
