That would make a great title for a book, no?
Last night, I cut a minor chase scene that had been a piece of a dream I had the night I dreamed up the inciting incident of my fantasy WIP The Crystal Bearer. I'm not okay.
Unfortunately, it just didn't fit anymore. I used it to showcase a portion of Ghuli's power, but she does it again later, so I'm half okay with not using it. I need to figure out if I need to show her doing it against her will, though, because she wasn't able to control her powers at this point.
This cut comes during a time where I had also just told a friend, who was adapting a story from an RP in which she and a friend participated, that they're going to think everything is important to the story because of how close they are to it. I introduced them to the inevitable and painful term, "kill your darlings." So of course, I have to take my own advice. But *blubbers in my head* I loved that scene.
On the bright side, I do have another story where it will fit nicely. In my dream, I ended up jumping out of a window to safety (and catching a ride on a white tiger, which was normal for my dreams lol), but in this other story, I needed a character to fall from somewhere somehow, so at least I'll see that scene again.
Greetings
- Debra Renée Byrd
- Delaware, United States
- Deborah Hawkins, penned Debra Renée Byrd, began writing after a blank book project in elementary school and never stopped, fashioning stories based on her favorite TV shows and movies before creating more original works. She studied at the University of the Arts and Florida State University before settling down and graduating from Temple University. She now resides in her hometown of Dover, DE, where she spends most of her time at work or at church. She loves fantasies, superheroes, is a trekkie and a brown coat. She loves television and lives for Final Fantasy video games, having collected most of them. She has read a myriad of authors, and her favorite authors change whenever she finds a new book that changes her life... "When you can't run, you crawl. When you can't crawl...well, you know the rest." -Tracey, Firefly, "The Message"
5 comments:
You totally have to hold onto those kinds of scenes. In this day of easy publishing, you never know when you'll be asked to contribute a short story to an anthology, or when a "novella" will be a good idea for promotion. Kill the darling, but keep it around just in case.
I've killed plenty of my own darlings before, so you're not alone! I agree, it isn't easy, but this kind of thing must be done for the sake of the story, unfortunately, heh. That's great how you'll be able to use this scene elsewhere, though!
Yeah, sometimes the end up working better elsewhere. It isn't easy to cut scenes, or to kill characters, but sometimes it needs to be done. I'll let a story "rest" for a bit so I can come back with fresh eyes and a more open mind.
Cutting out scenes we like hurts, but hold onto it! When you publish your book you can share it on your blog as a deleted scene. :D
So awesome that you'll be able to use it in another story though :-)
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