You gotta fit in

I did a mini-editing session last night, and found a couple of speedbumps.

There were a couple of scenes in there that I remember being important when I wrote them, but seemed stagnant with the direction my novel wound up heading as I get close to the end. I had a couple of choices to make: Whack and hack, or Spice and Nice.

The Whack and Hack is simple: Chop them out and go on as if nothing ever happened. The Spice and Nice is a little more tricky: Make them worthwhile by jazzing them up with a new coat of paint to make them look good to the rest of the novel.

Sadly, some of that stuff was beyond repair, and not even I - their creator - could save them from being out of style. However, jazzing some of the stuff up can make your novel even better, I've found.

Remember, those thoughts and ideas fit in somewhere once upon a time, so maybe they're not that far away from being in the club once again. I've been able to turn a couple of them around (with a snip here and a snip there and adding some more words over there) to make them great.

I've found that a ruthless editing pen is a must, but it's OK to give some scenes a chance to say their peace before you hit that DELETE button.