Paksworld

Final days of  my work based on the editor’s notes.   What left for NYC already a few thousand words shorter than it had been, is now almost 3000 words shorter than that…and you would not miss one of them.  Well…maybe a half dozen, but you’d have to have read it before.

How do editors and writers decide what to cut?  Well…think of the classic example: Michelangelo saying that to make a statue all you do is cut away the stone that doesn’t belong.    It’s much the same with words, though figuring out what doesn’t belong is a bit tougher.  After all, if you’re carving a cube, and there’s this triangular lump sticking out one side…that doesn’t belong.   If the “David” had chin-wattles, that wouldn’t belong.  But with a story, especially the first of several that share a story arc…does the bit about the pony and the wildcat belong or not?  (There was no bit about the pony and the wildcat: I just made that up.   I made the whole thing up, but you know what I mean…)

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This snippet is from a passage that will not appear in the book–my choice, not an editor’s cut, so the scene was never fully fleshed out.  You have conversation, nothing else.   However, as a snippet, I don’t mind sharing it with you.  I believe, when the book comes out, you will agree that this and the extension of it (several more pages full of spoilers) were better left out.

Location:  Verella, the Verrakai house in town.  Time: 14 days after Kieri Phelan left Verella for Lyonya

Speakers:  Duke Haron Verrakai and his brother.

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