naomi_jay | Crush, Kill, Destroy (Reply)

I've been killing my darlings today. I had an ephipany about Something Wicked and ruthlessly hacked out the last 2000 words I wrote. I replaced them with just over 2000 new words, so my word count has actually improved. Huzzah to that! I don't usually make massive changes during the first draft, but I felt this new chapter just had to happen right now. It's scary, tense, dark and much, much better than what I chopped out.

It was still kind of painful to eliminate those original words though, so I kept them and they'll form part of the next chapter. A little editing, a little cleaning and they'll be fine. I do struggle with this kind of editing, because I get very attached to my dialogue and imagery. But sometimes you just know the book will be better for the changes and I think this is one of those times.