Hi Reza,

I believe local-file should import (guix utils) and use 
current-source-directory. Something like:

(define %cwd (current-source-directory))

(let ([...]
       (version-file (string-append %cwd "/VERSION"))

   [...]

    (source (local-file (string-append %cwd "/../..") "my-package-checkout"
   
   [...]

The current directory may not be where the VERSION file is.

giacomo