Hey Gabi! Thanks for your great question. The truth is that I don't know when that frontier from embarrassing to worthy is finally crossed. Usually it happens when I'm not paying attention, when I'm just trying to get from really crappy to less crappy.

There are things about "finished" work that a writer will never be wholly satisfied with. Somebody said that you don't finish a book, you simply abandon it. And he was talking about published work.

What I do know is that there are many writers who never find readers because they can't bear the gap that always remains between what we write and what we imagine having written. They can't stand for readers to read the work they did, so they never publish. But I say that is a shame.

Regarding your last question, I don't think there's anything to be embarrassed about in "young" work. Every book sets its own terms, and its success depends on how well it fulfills those terms. In general, a first novel--my own WHAT CAN'T WAIT included--is a bit less ambitious, trying to do something small well rather than trying to take over the world and failing. (Of course, there are exceptions, like Junot Diaz's first novel, to name just one.) I feel my second novel, THE KNIFE AND THE BUTTERFLY, is more ambitious. I stepped outside of my comfort zone with the plotting, for example.

For me, being a writer is setting a new challenge and doing my best to fulfill it. And knowing that I'll (still) write a lot of crap along the way. I don't think the crap every goes away. But we hide it in writer's notebooks and scrivener files that the reader never sees.

This is another reason that a good editor is indispensable. He will spot any crap that sneaks into the final manuscript.