The 45,000 words he cut
What changed when one of our authors stopped trying to keep everything
Hello đ
Quick update on a few things this week, then a craft piece I want to share.
A note from the Pages community
Pages, the community I launched a few weeks ago, has its first members in. Ben is a startup founder in Berlin writing his first novel: a summer camp thriller about a group of kids who realise something is feeding beneath the island. Judith is in London working on a Victorian-era science fantasy about an asylum that âcuresâ violent criminals by removing their capacity for choice.
These are not casual writers. Theyâre serious people working on serious books, and the conversations inside Pages reflect that. Weâre talking about manuscript problems, character decisions, structural questions and the actual work of writing rather than the dream of it.
If youâve been writing alone and want to be around other writers who take it as seriously as you do, four of fifteen founding member slots are gone. Eleven remaining. Founding membership is ÂŁ200, going up to ÂŁ250 once we close it.
The craft piece: knowing when to cut
One of our authors, sent us a memoir manuscript that was over 350,000 words. By the time we finished editing Part 2 with him, he had removed about 45,000 words from a single section.
His editor Jane didnât ask him to cut for the sake of cutting. She kept finding paragraphs where the writing was beautiful but the story wasnât moving. Descriptions that worked on their own but slowed the chapter down. Moments where the writerâs pleasure in the prose had quietly overtaken the readerâs experience of the scene.
Most writers I work with have the same problem. Theyâve poured everything into the page. Every sentence feels precious because every sentence cost them something to write. So they keep it all.
The instinct is the same one that ruins most first drafts.
Hereâs the test Jane uses with her authors: read each paragraph and ask whether the story would be weaker if it werenât there. Not âis this beautifully written.â Not âdid I work hard on this.â Just: would the story suffer without it?
If the answer is no, the paragraph is decoration. It might be a beautiful decoration but if the story doesnât need it, the reader doesnât need it.
The hard part is often accepting that good writing on a page isnât the same as good writing for the story. They overlap, but they arenât the same thing. A passage can be technically beautiful and still be slowing your manuscript down.
When the author finished reviewing Janeâs edits on Part 2, he sent her this:
âYou edit with a rare combination of encouragement and precision. Never intimidating, always stylish, and with a healthy dose of humour. You have the eyes of an eagle and the instincts of a master storyteller: spotting the tiniest loose thread while never losing sight of the entire tapestry. They never felt like corrections; they felt like collaborative improvements. To borrow from the ancient Greeks, youâve been my Athena in this process â wise, sharp-eyed, and quietly steering the hero toward glory.â
This is what good editing should feel like. Not someone correcting your work. Someone collaborating with it.
If youâve been working on a manuscript and youâre starting to wonder whether youâre too close to it to see whatâs working and what isnât, you probably are.
You can book a strategy call with my team here.
Or submit your manuscript for feedback here.
Until next week,
Patrick
Iâm guessing thatâs the anxiety you see in writers, especially first time writers. Theyâre afraid that editors are editing out stuff because they have to be seen to be cutting. âWhat if my book is the one book that doesnât need anything cut. What if my book is the one masterpiece and theyâre cutting for the sake of cuttingâ. đđđŹđł
Creativity is creative. ;-) Sometimes way too creative.