I’ve been thinking about starting a new story, but I think that’s too ambitious while I’m in the middle of editing the mystery stories. I’m working on a couple of ideas (basically a new mystery story and a sequel to Stevie One) but mostly I’m having fun with the editing.

I see a lot of blog posts where people complain about editing. I don’t think I’m more predisposed toward it than anybody else, but I think a factor is time. I’m currently working on “The School Mystery,” which was originally written in the fall of 2007. It feels like the right time to give it a polish.

Some blogs advise finishing that first draft, then putting it away for two weeks (or maybe a month) before starting edits. I agree that two weeks or a month is better than starting immediately, but it seems awfully quick to me. Everybody has their own methods, of course, but I find that it’s good to give myself time to think about a story (and to let it rest while I think about other things). Perspective doesn’t come (at least to me) in two weeks or a month.

It is possible to wait too long. When I was doing final edits on A Sane Woman, I found I couldn’t really write in the same voice anymore. But of course that was fourteen years later.

What have you found works best for you? How long do you wait before starting edits? Or do you wait at all?