One of the big things I need to do with my revisions is to cut some of the length of the novel. I know there are sections where the pacing slows down, or the story gets caught up with subplots, so I'll take a closer look at those.
To help with that, I'm revisiting all the critiques from my amazing critique group MiG Writers. I'm going through them carefully, not for the picky details (those will come later), but for larger ideas that affect the whole novel. Wow - it's so helpful to have a good critique group! My group members put a lot of thought into their comments and I'm taking them seriously.
There's some great advice for editing over at The Blood-Red Pencil. I love the idea of getting a quick feel for the pattern of tension and conflict in a novel by assigning a ranking to sections or chapters and making a graph to see how it looks. Maybe that will help me decide what sections I need to cut (another painful process).
What's your best tip for deciding what to cut?
Everyone is talking about the Blood and Pencil post today. I'm off to check it out. Thanks!
ReplyDelete