Holly scrutinized the first sentence of her novel. It was odd how not reading it for months had given her a wildly new perspective. When she was writing it, she'd been too close to the material, she hadn't been objective, hadn't made herself consider the fact that she was wrong in anything that she did. There were mental grooves worn deep in her mind that only now were swept away like footprints in the snow.

It ... sucked.

The ecstasy of seeing her work in print was instantly deflated by how awful she judged it to be. A single sentence of description?! That was how she had begun her magnum opus? Why in God's name would that entice a reader to keep reading? Not to mention that it was absolutely dull, and used the passive voice.

Instantly she tried to shift the blame. Why hadn't her editor caught it? He was a waste of her money, she mentally declared. Her greatest chance at fame was ruined because of him. But deep down, she knew that the fault was really hers.

Damn.