Wednesday, August 14, 2013

My Name is Liz, and I'm a Hoarder

Last week I joined the Insecure Writers Support Group, and it was a smashing success. I discovered a ton of great blogs (check out 'My Weekly Read' on the left-hand side of the page), electronically met a bunch of other writers, and felt less alone in my nail-biting hair-pulling hand-wringing neurotic-isms - um, I mean, writing insecurity. So, a big heartfelt thank you to Alex J. Cavanaugh and all of the other IWSG participants who stopped by and left me comments. I love comments!

I'm still editing away at my poor manuscript, of course. And still having itty bitty little freak-outs about it. And then laughing at myself, which, by the way, is the single best sanity-saving tactic I've ever discovered.

So, in the spirit of good-natured self-teasing (something I just occasionally indulge in on this blog), I'm going to post a little bit more about editing Cloudland. Also, I still can't think about anything else.

My editor sent me another batch of slaughtered marked-up pages a while ago, and when we were discussing the proposed edits, she pointed out a scene - one entire scene, mind you - and suggested that I might not need it.

Let me just repeat that: she suggested I might not need an entire scene!!!

In order to understand my panicked repetition and over-used italics, you have to understand a little not-so-well-kept secret about writers: we are word-pack-rats. Writers talk about language the way that hoarders talk about piles of boxes. Tell a writer to cut a paragraph, and she'll respond with , "NONONO WAIT! DON'T GET RID OF THAT! There might be something GOOD in there!! Let me just see..." *rifles around in manuscript* "Yeah, yeah, this sentence - this sentence is GENIUS! And this one here -"  *more rifling; words fly through the air* "Oh yeah, this one is the KEY TO THE WHOLE BOOK!!" 

We are language hoarders. I realize I'm over-generalizing here, but show me a writer who never minds cutting anything she's written, and I'll show you a pint-sized hippopotamus who plays the violin and sings Carmen in perfect Italian.

This is what I'm talking about when I mention that I'm murdering my darlings: it's an often-used writing expression that points out how common it is for writers to clutch their favorite paragraphs to their chests with crazed Gollum-like desperation, and how important it is to cut those buggers out of the book because they are WEIGHING IT THE HELL DOWN. I write these sections that I think are lovely and genius and perfect, and then my editor comes along and tells me they're unnecessary. And you know what? She's right. Just because something is well-written doesn't mean that it belongs in the novel.

Here's how OCD we are: many, many writers (myself included) keep files of their cut paragraphs/chapters/scenes for so-called "use in a future book". You know, like your Aunt Bertha keeps massive boxes of junk mail and catalogs just in case she ever wants to order something from Ikea. And who knows? Maybe someday I will really use something I cut, and maybe some day Bertha will buy her seventeenth All-In-One Book Organizer/Vegetable Peeler. It's possible, so all hoarding tendencies aside, I'm going to keep that damn file and hope to use something in there, some day.

Incidentally, I didn't cut the scene. Instead, I took a look at why my editor was suggesting that it was unnecessary, and realized that I hadn't written it the way that I had intended. In fact, I'd written it wrong. It sounds dramatic, but I saw that the metaphors I'd used were almost the opposite of what I was trying to express. This is a scene that takes place towards the end of the book, in the magical land in the clouds, where everything is a metaphor; using the wrong one is a pretty major mistake. It was, I think, the last scene I wrote before I finished the first draft of the book, and I was both stuck for ideas and determined to finish the draft, so you can see how I might have rushed through it just a wee bit.

Anyway, I went back to the drawing board and came up with better metaphors, and re-wrote the scene. I'm going to send it to my editor - along with the rest of the entire draft HALLELUJAH!!!!!! - shortly. We'll see if it makes the final cut.

In the meantime, I'm gritting my teeth, and laughing a lot, and committing a hell of a lot of word-murders.

24 comments:

  1. LOVE LOVE LOVE!!! especially the laughing at oneself. That's the best way to handle it!

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    1. Hallelujah for it, right?? We cry our eyes out if we didn't (say the Indigo Girls, anyway ;) )

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  2. Liz...what a delightful post. I really enjoy your writing and could hear you in my head. You painted a nice picture.

    I also stash good sentences away for later use. Nothing on the cutting room floor stays there, and like my Aunt Gladys, who saved every piece of ribbon that came her way in a big hat box, my unused sentences, phrases, pages, etc., go into a document to chew on later. And yes, I do revisit them from time to time. Like the "trophies" of a serial killer.

    Again...great post and it's a pleasure getting to know you and have you in the IWSG.

    M.L. Swift, Writer

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    1. Thanks so much!! It's fun to write, and I always hope it's fun to read :)

      Yes, our murdered sentences are a lot like serial killers trophies, aren't they? I kind of love that ... there's a story idea in there somwhere...

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  3. Oh...one other thing...it's awfully hard to follow you. Might I humbly suggest twitter, FB, and other buttons? Many people also use bloglovin' as a reader. :)

    M.L. Swift, Writer

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    1. Oh man, this is the third or fourth time someone has said that to me. I'm still trying to figure the follow stuff out, and I think I'm not doing a great job. Every time I've gotten a comment like that, I've added some buttons, but I don't think they're a) in the right places, or b) the right buttons.

      Thank you for the feedback - I'm going to look around at other blogs (yours too!) and see what others are doing...

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    2. For something simple (to get you started) try making a list. Go to your dashboard, choose layout, then pick a gadget and click. Choose the html gadget and try this:

      < a title="Follow Me on Twitter" href="https://twitter.com/lizblocker" >Twitter @lizblocker < /a >

      Now, I had to spread out the brackets so it would show up in this comment, so you will have to delete the space in between < and the "a", lizblocker" and the > and the spaces in < /a > (condense it all, deleting any spaces).

      Do that with each way to follow, substituting your facebook url for the twitter url and adjust the title appropriately (follow me on Facebook).

      Did any of that make any sense? It will make a link similar to my sign off.

      M.L. Swift, Writer

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    3. After you remove the spaces, it should look like this:

      Twitter @lizblocker

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    4. This comment has been removed by the author.

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    5. Oops! Sorry to be messing up your comment area. If you'd like to see what I'm talking about, check out this other blog:

      brightstardimmed.wordpress.com

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    6. Well, duh! I just saw the buttons on the far left!

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    7. Oh my God, no apologies, please!!! Thank you so much for your help. Those buttons on the far left were added AFTER your feedback, and very much thanks to it :) And I'm going to go add the Twitter follow button, too. I honestly can't thank you enough, but I'm sure as hell going to try by telling everyone I know to read your blog :)

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  4. Love this post. Murdering our little darlings is never easy. :)

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    1. It isn't, is it? They just cry out to be saved.

      Thank you for coming by!

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  5. I know how you feel. My editor suggested to me that I had an entire chapter that could be deleted. I was so sure she was wrong until my CP agreed with her *sigh* and then I hit delete.

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    1. Oh NO. I was hoping you'd say, "until my CP said it was the best chapter I'd ever written and told me I had to keep it." UGH. That stinks. I hope you saved it in your murdered darlings file... if only for the sake of still having it somewhere.

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  6. Ha! You're so right! I'm a hoarder in life, too. Or would be if I had more space. I am very loathe to get rid of anything. But Words... wonderfully written paragraphs, even if they add nothing, are VERY hard to get rid of. I can do it in a later draft when overall I am trying to shorten, but I keep those early drafts, too. (and your solution is one I've used a bunch of times--figure out the disconnect of why they hate it and you love it and reframe is to they better understand you)

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    1. There's always the feeling that you just might NEED something, at some unforeseen point in the future, right? I've created a rule that if I don't touch something for 2 years, it's time to get rid of it. No such rule applies for stuff I've written that ended up in the 'cut' folder, though.

      So... does the reframing strategy work?? I hope so...

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  7. I absolutely keep a cut scenes file. It's pages and pages long right now. It's the only way I can bring myself to cut something out of my WIP, because I know it's still on life support somewhere else. :P

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    1. Yes, exactly! It's cut and dreadfully wounded, but not completely dead ;)

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  8. Glad you were able to rework the scene and keep it.
    I'm the opposite - a bare bones writer. Everything needs more.
    And good to hear you had such a great response to your IWSG post. It's an amazing bunch of writers.

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    1. You're the second person who read this post and told me you have to add more when you write. I can't decide which is worse ;)

      Thank YOU for starting IWSG!!

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  9. Yes, it's very hard to face the fact that a scene you love isn't adding anything to the story, isn't it? :-/

    Belated welcomes to IWSG by the way!

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    1. Yes, it sure is. I resort to all kinds of denial and bargaining tactics to keep EVERYTHING I CAN ;)

      Thanks for the welcome, and for stopping by!

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