When I first began writing I was eager and ready to learn about the
craft. I subscribed to a couple writing magazines and bought a few books on
writing with the hopes of finding the secret formula to becoming a good writer.
I learned quickly there is no one magic formula. Every writer is different and
what works for one will not work for another. Despite this fact, there is a lot
of good information out there for writers to consider when trying to improve on
their writing skills.
A few years ago I read On Writing
by Stephen King and came to the part on a revision formula passed on to him by
an editor. It was 1st Draft - 10% = 2nd
Draft. At first I was excited. There was an actual formula and it was
deceptively simple. If you have an 80,000 word story you cut 8,000 words. The
math loving part of my brain readily latched onto it but my creative brain
didn't understand it at all and was horrified. How am I suppose to cut 10% of
my story and still have the story I want to tell? It would take much longer for
me to grow as a writer before I could understand this formula and effectively
utilize it.
A little further into the book, King relates a humorous anecdote that
has stuck with me. He was relaying a conversation he was having with his wife
as she was reading a first draft of one of his novels. It was in regards to a
couple pages of the main character's back story that King thought were
important and was defending them to his wife. Her response was, "But you
don't have to bore me with it, do you?" The two pages of back story were
cut to two paragraphs.
Boring readers is what every author wants to avoid and that little
anecdote is always there in the back of my mind. When writing my novel, Entangled, I had a couple instances
where I was going to write more than what was needed for the story. In one
scene, Sonya just received a search warrant to obtain bank records of a
suspect. I had written two sentences leading into a scene about her going to
the bank when I stopped. I started asking myself questions. Does anything
happen at the bank other than getting the records? No. Is going to the bank a
critical scene in moving the story forward. No. What is important? Finding if
the bank records hold any important information. Then that's the part we need
to get to. That is the part readers want to know, not what it is like to go to
a bank. They already know that. I would be boring them and slowing the pace of
the story.
Another scene involved a flashback with Connor. It was his fifteenth
birthday and he receives a rifle as a present. He is angry about the gift and
assumes it was his father's idea. Connor is shocked to learn that it was his
mother's idea to get him the gun because he knows she hates guns. I was going
to elaborate on her dislike of guns by talking about the gun safe, her
disagreements with his father over having guns, her fears for the children
getting injured, etc. I simply left it at, "She hates guns." There
were a lot of different emotions going on in the scene culminating with the
shock that the gun was his mom's idea. If I would have gone on and elaborated I
would have watered down the emotional impact of the scene. I had to trust the
readers would understand the conflict the mother would've had in getting the
gun for her son and let the readers, along with Connor, feel the full impact of
what it was she valued more than her principles.
Over time and with much practice, I have grown to understand the formula
to be one of conciseness. For most writers, especially beginners, overwriting
is a normal part of the process as we work our way through our story's first
draft. While I don't calculate the amount of words that I need to drop, I am
always looking for places where I can be more concise. Many times it is the
case of less is more when it comes to emotional impact of scenes, better
dialogue, and quickening the pace of the story. I find the more confident I
become as a writer and the more I trust my readers, the easier it is to do the
cutting.
If you happen to have the chance, check out Writer's Digest September 2015 issue. It focuses on revision. The
article "Reader is my Copilot" by Marie Lamba gives good examples of
what I have mentioned in this post in much more detail. "The Great
Revision Pyramid" by Gabriela Pereira is also a good article on how to
approach revision by seeing your story in layers.
