Give Me SPACE!

January. Time for resolutions most of us don't keep. But, I have at least one that I do.

Clearing out/streamlining.

This was my dresser drawer:

Too many shirts, all squished in. When I wanted a specific one, I had to dig through all the others (and you know the one I wanted seemed to always be on the bottom).

Writing is like that; we squish too many words in. And like my shirts, some of the words weren't worth keeping. Consider:

He'd keep on trying.

vs:

He'd keep trying.

Or,

He hoped that she would change her mind.

vs:

He hoped she would change her mind.

In both second examples, the missing words 'on' and 'that' aren't missed. In my mind, it sounds better and my word count will be better utilized. What words can you eliminate from your manuscript? I do a global word search for 'just.' For some reason, I overuse that word and almost every time it can be eliminated. Helping verbs, like have, had, have had, etc. can be removed and it makes the writing stronger, more active. Look:

She had run a mile in record time.

vs:

She ran a mile in record time.

Sometimes you need the helping verb, but most times you can toss them out.

Here's my drawer now:

 The shirts are compact and neat because I eliminated the unnecessary ones (did I really need 3 gray tee shirts? Or ones with stains or holes?).

After sorting through and organizing all my drawers, I had a pile of unwanted clothes that would be better somewhere else, like going to someone in need, or to the rag pile.

Now I'm off to finish the streamlining of my middle grade manuscript; Jac is impatient for her story to continue.

Happy organizing!

Char