I've been writing for a long time. Not only on my stories, but as a technical writer and a training developer. Sometimes it catches me by surprise when I realize how much my writing has changed. Last night I told you that I was going back to Dragon Summer, after abandoning my attempts to change Tycho Station. Parts of this story contain some of my earliest writing attempts. Tonight as I edited the Prologue, which is one of the first things I wrote, I edited out 15 pages of extraneous information. Some of it I saved for future use, but a lot of it I just deleted.
The new prologue is much better. More action, less passive voice, less "stuff" that does not belong or does not add to the story.
How did I figure out what to do? How did I know what to cut?
The biggest factor I believe is the passage of time. Hours and hours of writing. Listening to experts and reading other's work. In other words Experience.
I go back to Heinlein's Rules:
You must write
Finish what you start
If you follow those two rules, consciously or subconsciously, you gain that valuable commodity known as Experience.
At least that's what I think.
Tomorrow I will post the old and the new prologues on the exercpts page and you can judge for yourself. Right now I have to get back to the story. See how far I can get tonight before I give up.
Dave
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