Show, Don't Tell

RIGHT NOW: Finishing coffee, getting ready to write. Kids are at sports skills camp. Listening to 95.7 until I put on my mood music: Cocteau Twins- Four Calendar Cafe. Glad it's Friday!


When I finished my book, my word count was just under 100K. Yep, 100K! When I started writing, I worried I wouldn't have enough to say, but instead my story just took off. My plot thickened, my characters evolved, secrets were revealed.

What a great feeling!

Happy to be finished, I handed my manuscript over to my sister-in-law for editing. She used to be an editor and is familiar with the Chicago Manual of Style. She made some cuts, did some red-lining, and impressed on me the importance of showing, not telling.

Well, hadn't I done that??

Taking her advice, I went back to my manuscript and found that I had a lot of fixin' to do. So I cut, condensed and sharpened my writing. But I still felt like my manuscript just wasn't "there."

Then my cousin Jan Burke sent me her suggestions and you guessed it...one of the things she said was, "you might want to go for more show than tell."

Hmmm... I said to myself.

I take constructive criticism well and so I took her advice and picked up my manuscript (after not touching it for over a month) and alas, I saw...really saw what they both meant!!!

I get it now! Really get it!! So I've been editing, and I'm loving it. My word count is about 93K now, and I'm still not done with editing. But one thing's for sure, I'm enjoying being with my characters again and helping them to be better than they were.