Writing Wednesday: Kill Your Darlings, Darling

Please excuse me for being late posting, but I’ve been trying to figure out where to go next on this winding writing journey. After coming to grips with the receipt of an R&R, I decided it was time to go on and read my full manuscript. After all six weeks is a good amount of time to really get some distance between me and my writing. I was dreading getting to chapter four. Apparently, chapter four is where things really went to pot for this story. The editor said one solution she didn’t recommend was SCRAPPING THE ENTIRE CHAPTER. The one she suggested involves some major cutting and rewriting. Either way, I knew chapter four was going to be dreadful. What sort of awful things were waiting for me when I got to this much defamed chapter?

Here’s the thing, though: I LOVE chapter four. Actually, I’m pretty happy with everything up to chapter four. That doesn’t mean that I don’t see things to change, places to strengthen, etc. It means that I see what an awesome story with intriguing characters I set on those pages. And chapter four has some of the best prose I’ve ever written. The dialogue is good and fast moving. I love what it shows the reader about my hero’s character and the kind of person he is under all his bluster about duty and responsibility, and I love the kid he’s talking to in it. But some of that really great stuff has got to go on the cutting room floor, never to be seen again outside a blog post or newsletter post publication.

It’s very easy to get chuck awkward prose in the digital trash bin. It’s easy to rewrite an area that just isn’t working. But what about truly good writing that just doesn’t belong in the story. What do you do with your orphaned darlings? Do you save them in hopes of using them in another story? Do you relegate them to file thirteen? Do you give them new life as bonus content on WattPad, your website or in newsletters? Do you have any strategies to make it easier/more bearable to get rid of those creative gems that just don’t fit in your current masterpiece?

XOXO,

Erica

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