Deleting

Sometimes you have to delete a chapter.

Case in point - current project. Friday afternoon I wrote a chapter. This morning I deleted 95% of said chapter.

Why?

Because it just wasn't working. I knew it when I wrote it, but I kept on writing it, and, well . . . DELETE!

I didn't trust my instinct on the chapter. Okay, I did, but I didn't, and it's a whole confused mess. Ha!

I knew what I wanted to write, to convey in that particular chapter. I wrote what I thought I wanted to write and convey in that particular chapter. But . . .

. . . it just wasn't working.

Today, I deleted a bunch of paragraphs, rewrote them and . . . voila!!! Yes, the chapter works much better now and also provides the jumping off point for revelatory passages about the victim in this current murder mystery.

There are two perspectives about every person: the known and the unknown. Those perspectives are often shadowed by misperceptions.

By using revelatory passages, I strip away the misperceptions and allow the reader a deeper insight into the victim, one not shadowed by jealousy, dislike, or any of the other factors that cause someone to talk bad about a person.

Why does it matter? Well, to me, as a reader, I want to care about the victim. I want to know who they were beyond the scattered comments of other characters that, quite often, paint a bad portrait of the victim.

So, at least in my murder mysteries, I plan to show who the victim was beyond those bad, often limited comments, that only present the victim in a two-dimensional format.

S