A Murderous Tuesday Museday

Guys, I have some bad news.

I have to kill some darlings in my book.

No, I don't mean that some lovely people will be meeting an unfortunate end. I mean that I have to take out a section of my book that I thought was really clever.

I had a blast writing the beginning of this book during NaNoWriMo. I flew through it, patting myself on the back the whole time at how brilliant I was. I even showed my husband what I'd done (he doesn't usually read my stuff until it's very polished).

But I just got feedback from my first reader that let me know the beginning was not clever and brilliant, it was repetitive and frustrating. She spelled out exactly why she feels that way, and she is ABSOLUTELY RIGHT.

So the beginning must be changed, and that darling piece of writing I loved must be killed. I'm quite looking forward to it, actually. The great thing about growing as a writer is learning to see which feedback is valuable and needs to be incorporated into your work, instead of getting hurt feelings because someone doesn't think every single thing you write is perfect. I'm looking forward to the changes; I sincerely feel they will make the beginning of this book stronger.

So for Tuesday Museday, I encourage you to take the reins and cut out those parts of your MS that you know aren't working, even though you love them.

Need fresh eyes on your query letter or Twitter pitch? I'm offering up a couple critiques this week. Query Kombat is coming up, and I'd love to help you get your query nice and shiny. Let me know in the comments if you'd like me to take a look!