A problem I'm having with OT is fitting in some background so someone who hasn't read Rape in Holding Cell 6 can keep up with Jake's references to what happened between him and Antony. A lot of the trouble boiling up in OT stems from that story's fallout. This was a deliberate decision and fits in with the overall theme...but it's making things tricky now that I've cut so much explanation.
Fact is, I've cut another 9 pages, and the story reads a lot faster and smoother. But I don't know if I feel that way because I know the background or if it really just doesn't matter that much. It could go either way. I may just keep revealing bits and pieces as things progress, make it a shadow mystery.
Slashing the filigree is proving to be painful. And yet...it makes sense. The first few pages of a book determine whether or not you'll finish it or eventually put it aside. I've done that a few times with books -- usually getting to around page 100 before I stop making myself read.
For example: I've only finished one of William Faulkner's books -- The Sound and the Fury -- because his prose is so dense. I had to drop a class I was taking in college because I hated his writing so much. And as much as I love The Foundation Trilogy, I could not read the god-awful prequel to it written by Asimov because Hari Selden was made into such a gullible twit.
Don't want that to happen to my books.
Fact is, I've cut another 9 pages, and the story reads a lot faster and smoother. But I don't know if I feel that way because I know the background or if it really just doesn't matter that much. It could go either way. I may just keep revealing bits and pieces as things progress, make it a shadow mystery.
Slashing the filigree is proving to be painful. And yet...it makes sense. The first few pages of a book determine whether or not you'll finish it or eventually put it aside. I've done that a few times with books -- usually getting to around page 100 before I stop making myself read.
For example: I've only finished one of William Faulkner's books -- The Sound and the Fury -- because his prose is so dense. I had to drop a class I was taking in college because I hated his writing so much. And as much as I love The Foundation Trilogy, I could not read the god-awful prequel to it written by Asimov because Hari Selden was made into such a gullible twit.
Don't want that to happen to my books.
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