Pruning Day

Yesterday my good friend, Sheri, came over and helped me prune my front flower bed.  Where in my yard went from looking like this to:

Okay, the yard actually looked worse than this as the apple tree and forsythia  had pretty much grown together and you couldn’t get through the gap in the middle.

My yard was so overgrown that Jordan was amazed to find out that we have an apple tree in the front yard. When we moved in five years ago, the tree was young and hadn’t started bearing fruit yet.

Pruning is a lot like editing. Sometimes you have to cut back to find the hidden gems.

And sometimes, as I’m finding out now, pruning or editing/rewriting will take you on an entirely new path that you never knew existed.

This past week I’ve spent the time rewriting a carnival scene in my book. I eliminated an entire character who is only in that scene and doesn’t move the plot forward or show character development. But because during the scene she was Bix’s date, the rewrite has been a little extensive.

By eliminating this character, I was able to enhance the characters who were important in the final stages of the book. I’m kind of pleased with the changes although the changes dictate further changes in the upcoming scenes, but I’m okay with that.

This week you can read the first 250 words and my query for Bix at Cupid’s Lit Connection. I’m entry 100.

http://www.cupidslitconnection.blogspot.com/2012/09/cagi-entry-100.html

And this is what my yard looks like now. Like my editing, I still have work to do, but it’s a start.