In the FlashForum there's a section for registered users called "Critique My Flash". In it, an author provided a story about a Messenger of Death that contained the following passage:

His job at the midpoint had been about as thankless as the administrative one he’d had on Earth. On Earth, he had to direct hordes of people to counters at the Health Card office; at the midpoint, he had to split up new souls into three lines: the Good, the Not So Good, and the Bad. The Good went to Heaven, the Bad to Hell, and the rest stayed at the midpoint, where they made his life hell with their incessant questions. (“When will I go to Heaven?” “Is it my time yet?” “I won’t go Down There will I?”)

The problem with this section is that it's descriptive without really helping us get to the main plot. When I said that it could use some trimming, the author gave me permission to cut it and post the results here. This section is therefore written as if I'm speaking to him rather than to you, Dear Reader, because I'm too lazy to change the original text (and I'd mess it up if I tried).

Anyway, off we go...

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Original:

His job at the midpoint had been about as thankless as the administrative one he’d had on Earth.

We need to know we're talking about his job, and we need to know that you're comparing his Earth job with his midpoint job. But do we really need to know that his Earth job was administrative? I'll say "yes" because you're trying to associate what he's doing with tedium. But we definitely don't need to have the word "administrative" (telling) and the description of the job (showing) from the next sentence.

I also think that the "had been about as thankless" is too passive. First, there's no action; second, you've passed up an opportunity to characterize him, by showing the job through his eyes.

Maybe something like this (change the characterization to suit):

He hated his midpoint job just slightly less then his Earth job.

12 words from 18, or a 33% cut.

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Original:

On Earth, he had to direct hordes of people to counters at the Health Card office;

"had to direct" and the following prepositional phrase string triggered my cutting instinct. At times like this, I break up sentences into their data points to see if I can reassemble them more compactly and possibly delete some. It doesn't always work -- your aesthetic sense should be your guide, not word count -- but it's a good exercise regardless. In no particular order, you tell us: the job was on Earth, there were lots of people, he was directing them, he worked at a health card office.

First, kill "had to". It's a job, so of course he has to. :) Next, find different, stronger words. Here, if they're "hordes of people", how about "herding" them? That leaves us with this:

On Earth, he herded people to counters at the Health Card office.

12 words from 16, or 25%.

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Original:

at the midpoint, he had to split up new souls into three lines: the Good, the Not So Good, and the Bad. The Good went to Heaven, the Bad to Hell, and the rest stayed at the midpoint, where they made his life hell with their incessant questions. (“When will I go to Heaven?” “Is it my time yet?” “I won’t go Down There will I?”)

This seemed to tell me something once, and then again: "First, let me define the divisions, to wit: good, not-so-good, and bad; now let me walk through these divisions, showing that the good go to heaven, the bad go to hell,..." But you don't really need to define the groups before showing where they go, because the names of the groups are already well-enough understood. Define the groups by where they go.

Cut:

at the midpoint, he guided souls into three lines: the Good went to Heaven, the Bad went to Hell, and the Not So Good stayed at the midpoint, making his life hell with their incessant questions. (“When will I go to Heaven?” “Is it my time yet?” “I won’t go Down There will I?”)

54 words from 66, 18%.

---

That gets us here:

He hated his midpoint job just slightly less then his Earth job. On Earth, he herded people to counters at the Health Card office. At the midpoint, he guided souls into three lines: the Good went to Heaven, the Bad went to Hell, and the Not So Good stayed at the midpoint, making his life hell with their incessant questions. (“When will I go to Heaven?” “Is it my time yet?” “I won’t go Down There will I?”)

This is an iterative process, so I'd take a last crack at the first two sentences, which sound a little clunky to me, to get this:

He hated his midpoint job just slightly less then his old job on Earth, where he had herded people to counters at the Health Card office. At the midpoint, he guided souls into three lines: the Good went to Heaven, the Bad went to Hell, and the Not So Good stayed at the midpoint, making his life hell with their incessant questions. (“When will I go to Heaven?” “Is it my time yet?” “I won’t go Down There will I?”)

This version is 80 words, a 20% cut from the conveniently sized original 100 words, and, more importantly, it streamlines the text while adding characterization and without changing the voice.

What do you think?

Many thanks to Bruce McAllister for being a really easy person to work with on the edits for "Game".

The story he sent me was around 1050 words long. After we went through a brief round of editorial changes -- points of clarity, use of the serial comma, all that kind of stuff -- we hadn't saved any words. That's when we started to cut. If you look through my archives, You'll see that I usually target 25-30% and I often get 15% or so. We only needed about 50 words (5%), so it's almost too easy of a goal. :)

Since the story is available in full online, I won't give the entire story here, as I usually do; instead, I'll just give you the parts that I actually cut, and say why.

Original:

This is a game called Is Love Possible? It’s a virtual game—real cutting-edge interface software—that (l) draws on your life, hopes, and fears; (2) may or may not, my therapist tells me, have any therapeutic benefits; and (3) with a discount costs over two grand through my therapist, and to run it needs another three in hardware from Circuit City, Best Buy, wherever.

The locution "this is a that" can almost always be trimmed at least a tiny bit. In this case, it goes from "this is a game called" to "this game is called": one word. Similarly, "tells me" is the same as "says".

Looking at prepositions, as usual, leads to some easy savings that don't change the tone much: "with a discount [costs over two grand] through my therapist" condenses to "with my therapist's discount". Slight reshuffling of the sentence is in order (sorry, but the pun's already there and I'm leaving it).

"to run it needs another three in hardware" just seemed a little long. Since the entire paragraph is about the game, and the verb phrase just prior ("costs over two grand") has an implied "it" or "the game" as its subject, we can use the same implied "it" as the subject and people should know what we mean. That leads to "needs three more in hardware".

Result:

This game is called Is Love Possible? It’s a virtual game—real cutting-edge interface software—that (l) draws on your life, hopes, and fears; (2) may or may not, my therapist says, have any therapeutic benefits; and (3) costs over two grand with my therapist’s discount, and needs three more in hardware from Circuit City, Best Buy, wherever.

65 words goes to 58: We've cut 11% of the first paragraph.

In paragraph three (level one of the game), the narrator's father says

“I love you, but this can’t go on any longer, Dorothy. Don’t you know how love works?”

"Can't go on any longer" is the same as "can't go on", an easy two-word cut. No information loss, no significant style change.

The next paragraph (level two) contains one redundant phrase. Here it is in context:

...I’ve taken a stunning 30-year-old girlfriend and don’t intend to bite her. This upsets the Brothers, my kids. They’re very worried. When Great-Granddaddy flips, what’s going to happen to them? “Don’t you love us?” they ask.

Clearly they're very worried, because of what comes before (they're upset) and the question that comes after (what's going to happen to them?). Cut "They're very worried" with no information loss and no style change at all in the surrounding sentences.

One of the challenges with any cutting exercise is avoiding style changes. Bruce has a strong style here, a little breathless (note the lack of commas in places like "In the third level I've been given a planet to rule", which, in that case, is followed by a fragment), tightly focused, highly introspective. I don't want to overcut, and since I don't have to cut a lot in this case, I could skip level three. By the same token, of course, pacing is one reason to cut as much as is reasonable, but I thought level three could stand.

Moving to the fourth level of the game: it's one of the biggest paragraphs of the story, so I thought I should try harder here. I liked the tone, though, so I had to be really careful. Here's the original:

In the fourth level I’m myself and I’ve got a mission, an important one, the kind you’d see in a thriller. I’ll need a team to pull it off, so I Google my own name. When I’ve made a list of the other fifty Bradford Mackeys I can find—among them, a guy in Maine who makes beautiful rustic furniture out of twisted juniper, a guy in Wales who raises prize-winning pigeons that carry his (our) name, an RV salesman, a bush pilot in Alaska, a Calgary news anchor, and the only police officer who’s ever successfully sued a felon—I contact them and ask them if they want to join me in my assignment, which is to rescue a little boy from the Romanian orphanage that holds the record for training the most serial killers. About a third say “yes.” One of them wants to come, and I tell him he can’t. He’s a horse trainer, has broken his back, and is going to be in a wheelchair for months. He starts crying, streaming video, and I relent. When we finally leave for Bucharest—from twelve different cities on four continents—there are fifteen of us. Interestingly, four have red hair, two are Jewish, four Catholic, two Buddhist, one a defrocked Baptist minister and one a science fiction writer. We’re going to make a great team, but can we save the boy? “Do we have enough love in us to pull it off?” the pigeon-raiser asks for the tenth time.

Isn't that fun? Hack it up anyway.

There's an "appositive" (I think that's what it's called) in the first sentence: an explanatory phrase set off by commas. "an important one" both slows down the pace of the text and might be cut because "an important mission" is the same as "a mission, an important one". Five words becomes three.

Then look at "When I’ve made a list of the other fifty Bradford Mackeys I can find—among them, a guy in Maine..." The context of the story makes it clear that he's making a list, and the action that he takes afterwards ("I contact them") makes it clear that he's not doing anything else, so mentioning the list isn't needed. Then I also don't need "among them" because I'm just going through examples of the names. Result: "When I’ve found fifty other Bradford Mackeys—there’s a guy in Maine..." 20 words becomes 12: a 40% cut for that section.

In the list of names, I took out the final "and", before "the only police officer who's ever successfully sued a felon". You could argue that technically it should be there, but Bruce was creating a partial list, and I think cutting it off without an "and" makes it feel like it's trailing away rather than attempting to be complete. Your mileage may vary.

"I contact them and ask them if..." doesn't need the second "them".

"About a third say yes" can go to "A third say yes". Nobody expects precision in a statement like that anyway, right?

"is going to be in a wheelchair" is the same as "will be in a wheelchair" (two words cut), and "we're going to make a great team" is the same as "we'll make a great team" (two more).

This is a great example of a paragraph in which a lot of little changes make a big difference. 251 words (a quarter of the story!) was cut to 227, which is about 10% -- and half of our overall 50-word goal.

The fifth level gave us two more words: The original said "Peter Pan and the Big Bad Wolf are both on acid", which is essentially the same as "Peter Pan and the Big Bad Wolf are on acid." And maybe there are Disney purists out there who will argue with me, but I thought the "Fantasyland II snack stand" could become the "Fantasyland snack stand".

The sixth level is the one that cracked me up the most. I didn't cut it, but not for that reason.

In the seventh level I made lots of little cuts. Here's the original:

In the seventh level I’ve fallen in love with an Apache girl who, in order to become a woman, is dancing for three mind-altering days on a steer hide, the little scars on her arms recounting the years of her life. But I’m also in love, or was—I remember this now—with a French girl in Montreal, where I lived for years to avoid an old war. And before that (it’s coming back now) I was engaged to, and married, and lived happily with—until my death at 46—a deli owner’s daughter in Yonkers. And as I watch the Apache girl dancing (I’m 18 and she’s 16, so it’s okay—the reservation police look the other way) I see myself living another two grueling centuries during which I manage to fall for sixty-six women, one of them not even from Earth. “Is it possible,” says the shaman, who’s taken a break from the ceremony to have a Pepsi, “to love, really love, someone who isn’t your own species?”

"in order to become a woman" is just "to become a woman" -- "in order to" is a really common waste phrase that you can almost always shorten to "to".

"But I'm also in love" doesn't really need "also", because he's remembering what's happened before as if it's now, and there's more than one other love, and it's seemingly impossible. (If it were necessary to show that there were a love triangle, I would have kept "also".)

"where I lived for years to avoid a war" already has the sense of bygone time in it, so although one might argue with the point -- the two sentences aren't technically identical in meaning -- I deleted "old" where the original had "avoid an old war".

"And as I watch" went to "As I watch". The "and" is supposed to link the thoughts of older days to the current image of the Apache girl, but I think they're already linked sufficiently.

"during which I manage to fall for" went to "during which I fall for". "manage to" is strictly a junk phrase here, which could be used for tone but is eminently cuttable.

"the shaman, who's taken a break from the ceremony to have a Pepsi" doesn't need "from the ceremony". That's the only thing going on in the scene, so you don't need to point it out.

The ending contains a few cuts, too, but only in one sentence: “That’s not what I asked. I asked you whether you beat it.” That can be trimmed to "I didn't ask that" (five words becomes four) and "I asked whether you beat it" (deleting the first "you").

That's it! A nip here and a tuck there, and we've gone from fifty words over the mark to three words under.

Thanks again to Bruce for letting me suggest modifications to his work, and then for accepting all of them on the first reading. As I said at the outset, it was a pleasure to work with him.

Comments are welcome, as always.

The site has gone live, and I intend to get back to some of the cutting work I had done in the past. If you click on the archive links, you'll be brought back to my personal Web site, where I used to host the blog. Please always remember to come back to Flash Fiction Online to get the content you're looking for.

Regards,
Jake

The cutting blog has been dormant for longer than I'd like, and it will remain so for a little while longer. I'm starting a professional flash fiction market, and I'm in development mode. I promise to start cutting again once that's off the ground. Give me a month or so.

Thanks,
Jake

This is from Meg. She tells me that it probably has too much flashback. I'm willing to agree -- I make the point with a few metrics later on -- but I've mostly stuck to cutting this piece. Here's the original.

The air lay stagnant on Kate's exposed skin, viscous with sweat. Outside the heat was oppressive, and inside... and she could not bare her legs to take advantage of even the cool of evaporation. Only a few children even pretended to listen to her history of the Crusades. The rest slept, spittle pooling on their desks.

How could information be expected to infiltrate sleeping minds?

But David Leland still watched with avid interest. It didn't seem to matter what she taught, he seemed hungry for the knowledge of things and places beyond the small town that had always been his world.

She looked away, reminded again of Joseph, constant companion of her youth, David’s brother. Joseph, voracious for her company, jealous of any sign that she had interests that did not include him. When she had been accepted to the new Brigham Young Academy, he had suddenly discovered a zeal for higher education and began planning to follow her to Provo. She had presumed he stopped short of proposing merely because he was only seventeen to her sixteen. But she’d been patient. There would be plenty of time.

Kate's thoughts returned to the present as a pen fell to the floor with a clank.

"Ah hem." She slapped the ruler down on the desk, finally rousing even the drowsiest child from his afternoon slumber.

"Are there any questions about the Cathar Crusade or the Episcopalian Inquisition of the Waldensians?" She waited. No hands went up. "Good. There will be an exam on the subject tomorrow morning. And I will be visiting each of your homes this weekend to share the results of this semester's progress with your parents." The children looked at her as though she were the most nefarious witch in the entire world.

If I were evil, I would make you experience what I feel every day. The excruciating pain of her swollen legs was not the worst of it. The worst was the way children she'd known and loved their entire lives now taunted her and ridiculed her, trapped as she was in her disease-distorted body.

She held the schoolhouse door open, and the students exited like rocks released from a slingshot. She recalled the words of her physics professor as he'd released the ball he'd held high above his head, 'And thus we see potential energy converted to kinetic energy.' Did any of those bouncing, skipping children even know what 'kinetic' meant? Kate turned away from the bright heat of the outdoors to the oppressive dark heat of the small schoolhouse.

Her eyes had not yet adjusted to the dark, so she almost walked right into David Leland.

"Pardon me, Miss DeLong." David looked down at his hands in rueful embarrassment. His voice came out slightly stilted as he continued. "I wanted to say that the bellicose behavior of the medieval church resulted in heinous acts of depravity."

Kate stood still for a moment, stunned. "Why David Leland Heywood, thank you. And may I say that you used each one of those vocabulary words perfectly correctly." A smile began to creep onto her face, reflecting her inner transformation from jaded spinster-schoolmarm to joyous teacher. David looked into her face at that moment. Her joy in the magnitude of his achievement mingled with her awareness of how much her approval meant to him. The smile slid from her face.

So Kate, will you foil David yet again?

She thought of that first day she had understood his intent. She had fled outside to the back of the chapel, unwilling to watch as Joseph and his young bride, Margaret Henrie, returned home to Panguitch. David had found her in tears. Silently he had gathered her in his strong arms and rocked her back and forth. It was the first time any man had touched her since the disease caused her ankles to swell like mutated gourds. Clothing concealed the details of how the deformity thickened her legs and arms.

By the time she discovered the disease affected her breasts and privates, she'd almost not cared. After all, what man would ever know?

But that day, with David's arms around her and the reality of him filling her senses, she'd realized that her body didn't know it was horrific, that no man could desire a woman trapped in such a prison. Her body felt the same heady delight that had coursed through her when Joseph had first held her and kissed her for the first time. But she was no teenager. She'd gently but firmly extracted herself from David's embrace, thankful for the serendipity of a prior appointment to make her excuse real.

Ever since she had been careful to never encourage David. But he had not waivered in his quiet kindness. He never joined the discussion of whether her scourge was due to her own sin or the sin of another. David simply accepted her.

The dark years at the Academy had scarred her soul. The darker reality of being pariah in her own hometown was worse. But her barriers were washed away in his steady, unflinching devotion. Melted in his regard as the ice on the mountains evaporated in the heat of early summer. His faithfulness had freed her.

She never knew what it was that he saw in that moment. But his face lit up like the sun at high noon. Perhaps her smile crossed the invisible line she'd maintained between them since that January afternoon. He closed the distance between them, gathering her in a kiss.

When they broke for breath, he gently stroked her hair away from her forehead.

"Marry me, Miss Delong." As the silence stretched, he added, "Please?"

She couldn't help it. She laughed. The first laugh she'd uttered in five years.

"I will. I will.”

It's already pretty tightly written, but let's see what we can do with it.

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Original:

The air lay stagnant on Kate's exposed skin, viscous with sweat. Outside the heat was oppressive, and inside... and she could not bare her legs to take advantage of even the cool of evaporation. Only a few children even pretended to listen to her history of the Crusades. The rest slept, spittle pooling on their desks.

How could information be expected to infiltrate sleeping minds?

I can't help but read viscous as a description of skin, when logically I think it must describe the air. Since we have two images of the thick air already, let's eliminate one.

Outside / inside doesn't help describe the scene significantly -- if we know it's a school, and we know it's hot inside, then I think most readers will know it's hot outside. Based on the ellipses, Meg may be trying to say, "it's hot outside, and you know that when it's hot outside, man but it's hot inside." But I don't think this gets us very far.

Always look for forms of to be, was in this case, as candidates for cutting. Not that you should always cut them -- some statements are really clunky or imprecise without to be -- but they're good to check. In this case, Meg has separated the fact that it's hot (heat was oppressive) from her characterization of Kate (could not bare her legs). So we could incorporate the heat into the rest of the description.

That said, I think Meg has done that already. The fact that she want to cool her legs indicates that it's hot, so she's showing and telling us that it's hot. Let's just show it.

to take advantage of tends to be a waste phrase. As Richard Lanham says in Revising Prose, you need to determine who's kicking who. (He and I both know that it's "Who's kicking whom," but he doesn't care and I'll follow his lead here.) In this case, the evaporation would be doing the cooling, so let's say it that way.

I think the next two sentences are okay. I could cut the first one, but I don't like the results: Few children heard her history of the Crusades. It could also be Few of the children, but that saves no words, so I'll keep Meg's style. I could cut even, but I even pretended characterizes Kate differently than pretended would -- it makes her more impatient with the children, whereas pretended by itself is neutral.

Finally, the last sentence in the block has a to be that I'll cut. I think it sounds more natural with "can" than "could" -- that's the author's call, but I'll make the edit here anyway.

Cut:

The air lay stagnant on Kate's exposed skin, and she couldn't even bare her legs to let evaporation cool them. Only a few children even pretended to listen to her history of the Crusades. The rest slept, spittle pooling on their desks.

How can information infiltrate sleeping minds?

48 words from 65: 26%.

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Original:

But David Leland still watched with avid interest. It didn't seem to matter what she taught, he seemed hungry for the knowledge of things and places beyond the small town that had always been his world.

There's an authorial choice here: does David seem hungry for knowledge, or hungry for anything she teaches? I'm assuming the latter, even though the former would condense the paragraph better. :)

I keep stumbling over "with avid interest". It feels redundant, or like the author is trying to build up the hype by piling words on top. (I think I would have come across this potential cut anyway because I always scrutinize prepositions, but this particular phrase gives me pause.) Now, I know that some people don't like adverbs, but sometimes they're still better than the alternative. We can either (a) change the verb "watched" to something that implies avid interest, or (b) make David watch "avidly". I can't think of a better word at the moment; and I'm on the train, so I can't go to reference.com; so I'm going with the latter.

Oh, and I don't think you need "still" in that sentence either. "But" implies that David's behavior is exceptional, and the sense ongoing-ness of his actions are implied in the next sentence. Result: "But David Leland watched avidly. It didn't seem to matter what she taught..."

Then again, "It didn't seem to matter what she taught" is a long way of saying, essentially, "always". So even "No matter what she taught" can probably go away anyway, replaced by "He always..."

"seem" [to matter] / "he seemed" are redundant qualifiers, even if they didn't have the same root word. Cut one.

"for the knowledge..." seems long. Meg is packing in data: let's see what we can do with it.

• hungry for knowledge
• what knowledge he's hungry for
• he lives in a small town
• he had always lived there
• he was mostly limited to it

What can we do with all of that? I don't want to change the voice too much, and changing, say, "hungry for knowledge" to "eager to learn" is a big deal.

Notice a minor contradiction: no matter what she taught, he was hungry, it says; but he was hungry for things bigger than his small-town home. To be pedantic about it, if she taught him something about his home town's history, would he be hungry for it?

Trimming might look like this: Make the change to "always"; "things and places" can probably be cut (it's just more than is necessary to get the point across). "He always seemed hungry for knowledge she could teach that went beyond the small town that had always been his world." (28 words to 21, 25%.) I don't love what I did here, though: "THAT went beyond the small town THAT had always been his world." It galumphs.

So let's cut more deeply: "He always seemed to hunger for anything she taught that reached beyond his small-town world." This is a deeper cut (15 words from 28, a 53% cut) and also eliminates that minor contradiction.

Note that "small-town" needs a hyphen; it's now a compound adjective that modifies "world", whereas before it was a noun phrase that was the object of the preposition "beyond".

I was tempted to say "He always hungered for...", but I think that's a POV violation -- an easy-to-gloss-over one, but a POV violation nonetheless.

If Meg thinks the paragraph can live without the "she taught" I'd pull that out, too. (17/28=61%.)

Cut:

But David Leland watched avidly. He always seemed to hunger for anything she taught that reached beyond his small-town world.

Wow. That's a lot of effort to cut 44% of 36 original words. Next paragraph.

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Original:

She looked away, reminded again of Joseph, constant companion of her youth, David’s brother. Joseph, voracious for her company, jealous of any sign that she had interests that did not include him. When she had been accepted to the new Brigham Young Academy, he had suddenly discovered a zeal for higher education and began planning to follow her to Provo. She had presumed he stopped short of proposing merely because he was only seventeen to her sixteen. But she’d been patient. There would be plenty of time.

We've just gone from direct observation of her frustration and surroundings to a daydream, so I don't want to lose the somewhat langourous (which is not to say "boring") quality of the writing here.

I like the first sentence. Lots of data, given in pulses, like three waves in an incoming tide.

"of any sign that she had interests that did not include him" seems long. How about "of any interests that did not include him"? Or "of her outside interests"? Or even "of anything that might distract her from him." As always, it depends on the author. "Jealous of any sign of outside interests" shows deeper jealousy than "jealous of any [implied actual] outside interests". We see in a moment that his jealousy is short-lived -- he marries someone else -- so I think the intensity level may not matter. On the other hand, if David loves her intensely, then showing that intensity in Joseph might be a form of foreshadowing. I think I'll leave it for Meg to pick something, if she thinks the alternatives work -- I'm not going to mess with something that could be that meaningful.

Forms of to be are always worth looking at ("Always look at forms of to be": 7/9=22% :) ), like "had been accepted". Also, I don't think we need to know that BYA is "new". So how about "When Brigham Young Academy had accepted her"? And I don't think anyone needs "suddenly", because it's clear that her acceptance to BYA is the trigger of his interest in Higher Ed.

I might cut "had" from "had discovered, and from "had presumed", if it's possible she still believed that. You could also cut one of the last two sentences -- "But there would be plenty of time." -- but I like the way they emphasize her mindset. These are all style choices I leave to Meg.

I will make one little non-cutting edit, because there's a small temporal issue. The flashback is written in a form of past tense (what is it, grammar mavens? Past perfect?) that uses "had" to indicate actions already completed. So technically, there would have been plenty of time. But we're in her head, and "would" is a kind of conditional (again, not sure if I'm using the term right), and since we already know that he didn't actually propose to her, it sounds funny in this flashback. In other words, "would" only fits if the flashback were written in a tense that allowed conditionals, which the past perfect doesn't. I don't know if anyone else would notice, but I recommend saying "They had plenty of time."

Cut:

She looked away, reminded again of Joseph, constant companion of her youth, David’s brother. Joseph, voracious for her company, jealous of any sign that she had interests that did not include him. When Brigham Young Academy had accepted her, he had discovered a zeal for higher education and began planning to follow her to Provo. She had presumed he stopped short of proposing merely because he was only seventeen to her sixteen. But she’d been patient. They had plenty of time.

81 words from 87: 6%. I'm not unhappy about that. There's good character development here, and a nice rhythm. It's not all about word count.

---

Original:

Kate's thoughts returned to the present as a pen fell to the floor with a clank.

There is a string of phrases here that sound too pedestrian to my ear: "to the present as a pen fell to the floor with a clank." (The actual rhythm would be something more like, "to the PRESent as a PEN fell to the FLOOR with a CLANK.") Let's get the data together and try again.

Data:
* Kate's thoughts returned to the present.
* A pen fell and made a noise.
* The noise was the cause of Kate's return.

Cut:

A pen clanked onto the floor, bringing Kate back to the present.

12 words from 16, 25%. You could say "Kate's thoughts", but I don't think you need to.

---

Original:

"Ah hem." She slapped the ruler down on the desk, finally rousing even the drowsiest child from his afternoon slumber.

Minor cuts here.

Cut:

"Ah hem." She slapped the ruler on the desk, rousing the drowsiest children from their afternoon slumbers.

17 from 20 = 15%.

---

Original:

"Are there any questions about the Cathar Crusade or the Episcopalian Inquisition of the Waldensians?" She waited. No hands went up. "Good. There will be an exam on the subject tomorrow morning. And I will be visiting each of your homes this weekend to share the results of this semester's progress with your parents." The children looked at her as though she were the most nefarious witch in the entire world.

I think her initial question is good as is: a little pedantic, making sure the key words are there. I like the punch of 'She waited. No hands went up. "Good...." I even like "There will be an exam on the subject tomorrow morning" (though you could probably cut "on the subject"), even though it uses "to be" (the alternatives don't really help).

The next sentence is structured around a form of "to be" and can be condensed. Also, the prepositional phrase "of this semester's progress" raised a flag for me; I think she wants to share this semester's progress, not the results of this semester's progress. I can collapse prepositional phrases "of your homes" and "with your parents" into one. And I don't think we need "this semester's".

The next sentence has at least one prepositional phrase that can be condensed. I wanted to change "she were the world's" to active voice, but couldn't think of an elegant way to do it.

Cut:

"Are there any questions about the Cathar Crusade or the Episcopalian Inquisition of the Waldensians?" She waited. No hands went up. "Good. There will be an exam on the subject tomorrow morning. And I will visit each of your parents this weekend to share your progress." The children looked at her as though she were the world's most nefarious witch.

60 words from 71, or 15%.

I should pause for a moment and talk about prepositional phrases. I've been struggling with how I should express this for the last few posts, because I always look at them and think, "Oh, good! Prepositional phrases! Something to cut!" and then I end up not even cutting them. So what gives?

Well, first, note that I don't hate them. I don't think we can always eliminate them, or that we should try to eliminate all of them. But looking at them almost always bears fruit. Let's look at how looking at them informed the changes I just made.

• Sometimes you can collapse them using a possessive ("the most nefarious witch IN the world" becomes "the world's most nefarious witch")
• Sometimes they show that the author misdirected the verb. Above, the author probably wrote "share the results" and then wanted to answer the question, "results of what?" That made her go on, "OF this semester's progress". But it's really the progress that she wants to share -- "results" was a red herring, which is why she needed the prepositional phrase to explain it.*
• Too many prepositional phrases often give the text a repetitive, galumphing feel. It feels like the mind starts a thought and just starts piling additional facts into it. You can often restructure the sentence to be clearer, which often results in more compact prose.

Enough of that for now.

* You might argue that we can't share progress, but only the results of progress or the measures of progress. That's a legitimate argument, with which I disagree in this case. But the principle I've expounded here is still true, even if you disagree with its application in this case.

---

Original:

If I were evil, I would make you experience what I feel every day. The excruciating pain of her swollen legs was not the worst of it. The worst was the way children she'd known and loved their entire lives now taunted her and ridiculed her, trapped as she was in her disease-distorted body.

Note that we use italics to set off internal monologue (i.e., thoughts) from the rest of the text. Otherwise, the tense gets confusing.

The author uses "to be" forms a lot here, and "The worst was" follows "the worst of it". This is a candidate for restructuring.

Look at the data:

• Swollen legs
• Excruciating physical pain
• Diseased body
• Has known and loved (some of?) these children
• Children taunted and ridiculed her
• Emotional pain worse than physical

I question the use of "taunted and ridiculed" here, because none of the children are actually taunting or ridiculing her. Maybe "contempt" or "disdain"? And at any rate, I can probably use one word instead of two.

The restructured sentence needs to be sensitive to the existing flow: hurtful looks from the children, then the If I were evil thought.

Cut:

If I were evil, I would make you experience what I feel every day. She had loved these children for their entire lives, and their taunts hurt her more than the excruciating pain from her disease-distorted legs.

37 words from 54, 31%.

---

Original:

She held the schoolhouse door open, and the students exited like rocks released from a slingshot. She recalled the words of her physics professor as he'd released the ball he'd held high above his head, 'And thus we see potential energy converted to kinetic energy.' Did any of those bouncing, skipping children even know what 'kinetic' meant? Kate turned away from the bright heat of the outdoors to the oppressive dark heat of the small schoolhouse.

Minor cuts here, triggered by seeing "of her physics professor", "of those bouncing...", and "from the bright heat of the outdoors to the oppressive dark heat of the small schoolhouse."

I think I can eliminate "any of" from "any of those bouncing, skipping children" if I really want to, but I decided to leave it. It's the difference between making a general complaint (as a group, do they?) and a specific one (I don't think any child here does).

I like the balance of outside-bright heat and oppressive-dark heat. I almost trimmed "of the small schoolhouse", but I think it characterizes the setting enough that I'd keep it.

Cut:

She held the schoolhouse door open, and the students exited like rocks released from a slingshot. She recalled her physics professor releasing a ball from high above his head and saying, 'And thus we see potential energy converted to kinetic energy.' Did any of those bouncing, skipping children know what 'kinetic' meant? Kate turned from the bright outdoor heat to the oppressive dark heat of the small schoolhouse.

68 words from 76, 11%.

---

Original:

Her eyes had not yet adjusted to the dark, so she almost walked right into David Leland.

"Pardon me, Miss DeLong." David looked down at his hands in rueful embarrassment. His voice came out slightly stilted as he continued. "I wanted to say that the bellicose behavior of the medieval church resulted in heinous acts of depravity."

First, leaving the minor cuts aside, note that 425 original words have passed from the beginning until this event. 324 words, or 3/4 of the total so far, have passed since we've been introduced to David. In other words, 75% or the story so far is waiting for something to happen with David after he was introduced. (In the cut version, it's 343 words and 275 words, or 80%.)

The author has given us a lot of data -- characterization, setting, emotion -- so I don't want to say that she should cut everything that has come between our introduction to David and now; but it's reasonable to ask, "Is some of this information extraneous? Can I get to this point faster without sacrficing emotional impact?"

I don't know the answer. It might be "no". :) I'm just pointing out the question.

That's a structural issue. This text itself seems fine, needing only minor cuts. We might trim "yet" from "not yet adjusted", "right" from "walked right into", either "down" or "at his hands", "rueful" from "rueful embarrassment" -- rather than cut every possible thing, I played with those ideas and came up with a version I like. "His voice came out slightly stilted" seems a touch long, and could be replaced with a more active verb.

I like David's sentence: a little nerdy, a little shy, an apple for the teacher.

Cut:

Her eyes had not adjusted to the dark, so she almost walked into David Leland.

"Pardon me, Miss DeLong." David looked down at his hands in embarrassment. He stammered slightly as he continued. "I wanted to say that the bellicose behavior of the medieval church resulted in heinous acts of depravity."

51 words from 57, 11%.

---

Original:

Kate stood still for a moment, stunned. "Why David Leland Heywood, thank you. And may I say that you used each one of those vocabulary words perfectly correctly." A smile began to creep onto her face, reflecting her inner transformation from jaded spinster-schoolmarm to joyous teacher. David looked into her face at that moment. Her joy in the magnitude of his achievement mingled with her awareness of how much her approval meant to him. The smile slid from her face.

So Kate, will you foil David yet again?

"Began to creep" or "crept"?

"At that moment" isn't needed because we've been proceeding chronologically. (Stood still, smile began to creep, David looked.)

Do we really need "the magnitude of"? Is the use of vocabulary words really an achievement of an extremely high magnitude? If so, keep it; I cut it.

For that matter, do we need "in his achievement"? We've already seen an Kate's "inner transformation...to joyous teacher", and "in his achievement" forces the reader to put her joy in that context. But there are probably a lot of things resonating around in Kate right now: David's achievement, the fact that he actually tries, a validation of her identity as a teacher, the justification of all of the hours spent in the dark heat. Maybe we should just show her joy, and let the reader feel all of those joyful resonances -- only implied but still present -- instead of just his achievement.

"her awareness of how much her approval meant to him" -- "of / to" triggered me to look at this. We can handle it a few ways.

• We can say, "her awareness of how much he loved her approval", which is stronger and gets the words "loved her" in it.
• We could also use something like, "her awareness that he longed for her approval."
• We could combine it with the next line, in which her joy is clouded and the smile slides from her face. (This might also eliminate the repetition of "joyous" and "joy", and of "David looked into her face" and "smile slid from her face"; although I didn't notice them at first, a very sensitive reader might have.) "Her joy faded as she thought of how much her approval meant to him."

Cut:

Kate stood still for a moment, stunned. "Why David Leland Heywood, thank you. And may I say that you used each one of those vocabulary words perfectly." A smile crept onto her face, reflecting her inner transformation from jaded spinster-schoolmarm to joyous teacher. David looked into her face. Her joy faded as she thought of how much her approval meant to him.

So Kate, will you foil David yet again?

70 words from 88: 20%.

---

Original:

She thought of that first day she had understood his intent. She had fled outside to the back of the chapel, unwilling to watch as Joseph and his young bride, Margaret Henrie, returned home to Panguitch. David had found her in tears. Silently he had gathered her in his strong arms and rocked her back and forth. It was the first time any man had touched her since the disease caused her ankles to swell like mutated gourds. Clothing concealed the details of how the deformity thickened her legs and arms.

By the time she discovered the disease affected her breasts and privates, she'd almost not cared. After all, what man would ever know?

"she had understood his intent" confused me a little bit, so I'd like to cut and be more explicit at the same time. Because I introduced Joseph's name in the first sentence, I replaced it with a pronoun in the second.

There are some other cuts I could make -- should make, really, and then let Meg decide if she wants to keep them -- but I dislike the results enough that I'm dismissing them out of hand. I'm leaving these paragraphs mostly alone.

Cut:

She thought of Joseph's wedding. She had fled outside to the back of the chapel, unwilling to watch him and his young bride, Margaret Henrie, return home to Panguitch. David, finding her in tears, had silently gathered her in his strong arms and rocked her back and forth. It was the first time any man had touched her since the disease caused her ankles to swell like mutated gourds. Clothing concealed the details of how the deformity thickened her legs and arms.

By the time she discovered the disease affected her breasts and privates, she'd almost not cared. After all, what man would ever know?

105 from 114, 8%.

---

Original:

But that day, with David's arms around her and the reality of him filling her senses, she'd realized that her body didn't know it was horrific, that no man could desire a woman trapped in such a prison. Her body felt the same heady delight that had coursed through her when Joseph had first held her and kissed her for the first time. But she was no teenager. She'd gently but firmly extracted herself from David's embrace, thankful for the serendipity of a prior appointment to make her excuse real.

We probably don't need both David's arms around her (we already know they are) and the reality of him filling her senses. Maybe we can combine them, or maybe just keep one.

We probably don't need both "first held her" and "kissed her for the first time". At the least, the two "first"s are redundant.

I feel like the doubled mental activity -- "she'd realized" and "body didn't know" -- should be collapsed into one thing. I can't think of a good way to do it, though. If anyone wants to plug one into the comments, I'd be interested in your solutions.

"it was horrific" and "she was no teenager" are both appropriate uses of "to be". They're not passive, really, because there's no reasonable active counterpart.

"FOR the serendipity OF a prior appointment" led me to cut the first prepositional phrase, which led me to make the infinitive "to make" into a past tense "made" form and other related changes.

Cut:

But that day, with the reality of David filling her senses, she'd realized that her body didn't know it was horrific, that no man could desire a woman trapped in such a prison. Her body felt the same heady delight that had coursed through her when Joseph had first kissed her. But she was no teenager. She'd gently but firmly extracted herself from David's embrace, thankful that a prior appointment made her excuse real.

74 from 90: 18%.

---

Original:

Ever since she had been careful to never encourage David. But he had not waivered in his quiet kindness. He never joined the discussion of whether her scourge was due to her own sin or the sin of another. David simply accepted her.

The prepositional phrase "in his quiet kindness" can be collapsed. "was due" can be turned around: "whether her own sin or the sin of another had caused". "joined the discussion" can be collapsed to "joined discussions", and "joined discussions of whether" can be further collapsed to "discussed whether". I think "discussed whether" loses the sense that there are discussions about it already going on, so I'm sticking with "joined discussions".

Cut:

She had never encouraged David, but his quiet kindness had not wavered. He never joined discussions of whether her own sin or that of another had caused her scourge. David simply accepted her.

33 from 43, 23%.

---

Original:

The dark years at the Academy had scarred her soul. The darker reality of being pariah in her own hometown was worse. But her barriers were washed away in his steady, unflinching devotion. Melted in his regard as the ice on the mountains evaporated in the heat of early summer. His faithfulness had freed her.

"was worse" might be cut. This is really something for Meg to decide, because it changes the sentence structure and the feel somewhat. I really wanted to do something with "OF being pariah IN her hometown" (should that be a pariah? I've never seen that usage before), but couldn't think of a good way to do it.

"barriers were washed away in his...devotion" can be flipped around to remove the passivity, and I think you only need one of "steady" and "unflinching". I chose "steady" because it reminds me of raindrops, and there's a washing and melting theme going on. I also eliminated the fragment.

Cut:

The dark years at the Academy, and the darker reality of being pariah in her hometown, had scarred her soul. But his steady devotion had washed away her barriers. They had melted in his regard as the ice on the mountains evaporated in the heat of early summer. His faithfulness had freed her.

53 from 55: 4%.

Original:

She never knew what it was that he saw in that moment. But his face lit up like the sun at high noon. Perhaps her smile crossed the invisible line she'd maintained between them since that January afternoon. He closed the distance between them, gathering her in a kiss.

"it was that" is a waste phrase. "at high noon" and "afternoon" repeat just a little bit, and I think we can cut "since that January afternoon" anyway.

Cut:

She never knew what he saw in that moment. But his face lit up like the sun at high noon. Perhaps her smile crossed the invisible line she'd maintained between them. He closed the distance between them, gathering her in a kiss.

42 from 49: 14%.

---

Original:

When they broke for breath, he gently stroked her hair away from her forehead.

"Marry me, Miss Delong." As the silence stretched, he added, "Please?"

She couldn't help it. She laughed. The first laugh she'd uttered in five years.

"I will. I will.”

I think this bit stays as is.

So here's the new version:

---

The air lay stagnant on Kate's exposed skin, and she couldn't even bare her legs to let evaporation cool them. Only a few children even pretended to listen to her history of the Crusades. The rest slept, spittle pooling on their desks.

How can information infiltrate sleeping minds?

But David Leland watched avidly. He always seemed to hunger for anything she taught that reached beyond his small-town world.

She looked away, reminded again of Joseph, constant companion of her youth, David’s brother. Joseph, voracious for her company, jealous of any sign that she had interests that did not include him. When Brigham Young Academy had accepted her, he had discovered a zeal for higher education and began planning to follow her to Provo. She had presumed he stopped short of proposing merely because he was only seventeen to her sixteen. But she’d been patient. They had plenty of time.

A pen clanked onto the floor, bringing Kate back to the present.

"Ah hem." She slapped the ruler on the desk, rousing the drowsiest children from their afternoon slumbers.

"Are there any questions about the Cathar Crusade or the Episcopalian Inquisition of the Waldensians?" She waited. No hands went up. "Good. There will be an exam on the subject tomorrow morning. And I will visit each of your parents this weekend to share your progress." The children looked at her as though she were the world's most nefarious witch.

If I were evil, I would make you experience what I feel every day. She had loved these children for their entire lives, and their taunts hurt her more than the excruciating pain from her disease-distorted legs.

She held the schoolhouse door open, and the students exited like rocks released from a slingshot. She recalled her physics professor releasing a ball from high above his head and saying, 'And thus we see potential energy converted to kinetic energy.' Did any of those bouncing, skipping children know what 'kinetic' meant? Kate turned from the bright outdoor heat to the oppressive dark heat of the small schoolhouse.

Her eyes had not adjusted to the dark, so she almost walked into David Leland.

"Pardon me, Miss DeLong." David looked down at his hands in embarrassment. He stammered slightly as he continued. "I wanted to say that the bellicose behavior of the medieval church resulted in heinous acts of depravity."

Kate stood still for a moment, stunned. "Why David Leland Heywood, thank you. And may I say that you used each one of those vocabulary words perfectly." A smile crept onto her face, reflecting her inner transformation from jaded spinster-schoolmarm to joyous teacher. David looked into her face. Her joy faded as she thought of how much her approval meant to him.

So Kate, will you foil David yet again?

She thought of Joseph's wedding. She had fled outside to the back of the chapel, unwilling to watch him and his young bride, Margaret Henrie, return home to Panguitch. David, finding her in tears, had silently gathered her in his strong arms and rocked her back and forth. It was the first time any man had touched her since the disease caused her ankles to swell like mutated gourds. Clothing concealed the details of how the deformity thickened her legs and arms.

By the time she discovered the disease affected her breasts and privates, she'd almost not cared. After all, what man would ever know?

But that day, with the reality of David filling her senses, she'd realized that her body didn't know it was horrific, that no man could desire a woman trapped in such a prison. Her body felt the same heady delight that had coursed through her when Joseph had first kissed her. But she was no teenager. She'd gently but firmly extracted herself from David's embrace, thankful that a prior appointment made her excuse real.

She had never encouraged David, but his quiet kindness had not wavered. He never joined discussions of whether her own sin or that of another had caused her scourge. David simply accepted her.

The dark years at the Academy, and the darker reality of being pariah in her hometown, had scarred her soul. But his steady devotion had washed away her barriers. They had melted in his regard as the ice on the mountains evaporated in the heat of early summer. His faithfulness had freed her.

She never knew what he saw in that moment. But his face lit up like the sun at high noon. Perhaps her smile crossed the invisible line she'd maintained between them. He closed the distance between them, gathering her in a kiss.

When they broke for breath, he gently stroked her hair away from her forehead.

"Marry me, Miss Delong." As the silence stretched, he added, "Please?"

She couldn't help it. She laughed. The first laugh she'd uttered in five years.

"I will. I will.”

814 from 964: about 16%.

What do you think?

I reserve the right to modify this post a little bit. I'm in a hurry right now. :)

This is the opening of a novel by Jeanne. The original, below, is 728 words.

A scream echoed through the valley. Jessup stood in the copse of trees, barely breathing. Below the camp of the Faragund army teemed with movement. He pressed back against the tree behind him knowing that in the shadows of the dense trees he would be impossible to spot from below. The scene showed him what a bad idea being captured would be.

The wind brought the sound of the mages chanting. One of the scouts from Ilkasar hung bound by his hands from a tall stake, feet not dangling a handspan above the ground. The muscles of Jessup's jaw knotted, but saving the man wasn't even a possibility in the middle of an army that stretched nearly to the horizon. Jessup felt fairly sure it was the Faragund King who stood before the prisoner. Five mages stood, covered from head to foot in flowing black robes.

The king was of no great height, but massively muscled with a vast chest and arms. His biceps bulged from his gold brocade vest catching the bright sunlight. The man's blond hair flowed in a mass of braids to below his shoulders. On each of his cheeks, scars ran from mouth to hairline. Long strands of a blond mustache drooped from corners of his mouth.

He raised a long ceremonial dagger and plunged it into the scout's arm. The man gave a hoarse scream. Blood gushed and one of the mages rushed forward to catch the liquid in a bowl that glinted golden in the sunlight.

For the entire day Jessup had watched the scout being bled. The ground around him was black with it. At first they had simply let the blood drip into the dirt while the prisoner had refused to scream. Now his head drooped, and he hardly seemed alive. With each slash, they poured blood onto the stone altar standing nearby.

Jessup stared past the camp into the thick forest of oak to the east where giant trees reached toward the sky and a gentle dark settled between their columns of their trunks. He sucked in a deep breath to slow the pounding of his heart. He had seen horrors in his days, from the day his own people were slaughtered, but watching this was a twist to the guts.

Jessup forced his eyes back to the Faragund camp. The altar he recognized as one to the god Kanandra, but he wasn't sure what magic they were powering with this. He wasn't sure he wanted to know. Khyle would want word of their movements though. Jessup doubted that any of Khyle's scouts had escaped.

He had told Jessup that he feared the Faragund had gained enough power to attack the Ilkasar Empire again. It had been twenty years since their last attack had failed, and the Faragund army was wiped out by the Ilkasar's Sharenta mages and the Ilkasar Imperial army. The hatred between the Faragund god Kanandra and his twin the goddess Urthus, whom the Ilkasar worshiped, mirrored the hatred between their followers. Stories still circulated about the fierceness of the fighting. Few families hadn't lost someone to the Faragund.

One of the mages near the king motioned to him and seemed to speak. The sound of the chanting changed, becoming softer but more insistent. Jessup shuddered. He had no magic but even he could feel the surge of power as the chants grew demanding. He sucked in his breath as the King plunged the dagger to the hilt into the scout's chest. Jessup gritted his teeth.

The mages' chanting again changed cadence, growing faster and faster. Smoke swirled around the altar.

The King ripped the dagger up the dead scout's chest. He jerked and sawed and then pulled out the dripping heart. Jessup thought he removed other parts, but with the king blocking his way to see exactly what was happening. He raised both arms over his head. Blood ran down his arms in rivulets as the mages chanted on and on, getting louder with every heartbeat. A roar from out of the smoke ripped the air.

The chanting stopped. Smoke from the altar drifted on the breeze. The king stood motionless watching. Then he turned and struck one of the mages a blow across the face, knocking the man to the ground. The conjuration, whatever it was supposed to do, hadn't made the King happy.

My first thought is that we might be able to start slightly later, when the king stabs the scout; but I tried that, and it wasn't easy, so first I'll try a more straightforward cut of the introductory scene.

---

Original:

A scream echoed through the valley. Jessup stood in the copse of trees, barely breathing. Below the camp of the Faragund army teemed with movement. He pressed back against the tree behind him knowing that in the shadows of the dense trees he would be impossible to spot from below. The scene showed him what a bad idea being captured would be.

The wind brought the sound of the mages chanting. One of the scouts from Ilkasar hung bound by his hands from a tall stake, feet not dangling a handspan above the ground. The muscles of Jessup's jaw knotted, but saving the man wasn't even a possibility in the middle of an army that stretched nearly to the horizon. Jessup felt fairly sure it was the Faragund King who stood before the prisoner. Five mages stood, covered from head to foot in flowing black robes.

The king was of no great height, but massively muscled with a vast chest and arms. His biceps bulged from his gold brocade vest catching the bright sunlight. The man's blond hair flowed in a mass of braids to below his shoulders. On each of his cheeks, scars ran from mouth to hairline. Long strands of a blond mustache drooped from corners of his mouth.

Look at the critical data from the first several paragraphs:

• The main character is Jessup
• The Faragund is the enemy
• They are cruel
• The Faragund king (Jessup thinks) is bleeding a captured scout to invoke a spell
• Jessup is hiding in the woods from the Faragund army
• The Faragund army is assembled below him, where the king is bleeding the scout
• The player list is fairly long: Faragund, the Faragund god Kanandra and his twin sister Urthus, Khyle, the Ilkasar Empire, the Ilkasar Empire's Sharenta mages

We may not need all of that detail; even if we need it, we might not need it just yet. I'd like to get to the action, the knife thrust, earlier. (I actually tried to rewrite the scene starting with the knife thrust, but found it hard to do.)

The passage has one structural problem: every paragraph has some information about every person in the scene. That makes Jeanne have to identify everyone in every sentence. I've broken that up, so the paragraph structure now looks like this:

• Scream
• Setting / POV establishment
• Scout description
• Jessup interlude
• King description
• Description of mages

Descriptions should be easier -- note below that I can abridge "The man's blond hair flowed in a mass of braids..." to "Thick blond braids flowed...".

"A scream echoed through the valley" isn't a particularly strong way of opening this scene, for several reasons. It doesn't introduce the POV character; the POV character knows who is screaming and why, but the sentence doesn't give us any of this compelling detail; and the latest stabbing hasn't happened yet, as far as I can tell, so it feels funny -- as if I'm getting a preview of the stab that's about to come. Let's cut it, painting the setting first.

Little things tip me off to what else can be cut. For instance, "stood in the copse of trees" and "pressed his back against the tree" and "the dense trees" indicated that we might be able to incorporate all of the tree description into a smaller space. The concepts I need are "shelter", "copse", and "individual tree".

It seems to me that the writing shows too much of the thinking vs. what's being thought: "knowing that", "showed him", "the wind brought the sound", "felt fairly sure". Since I know that anything in the description is in Jessup's POV -- not always true in every story, but Jeanne has done a good job with third-person limited POV here -- I shouldn't have to think about how Jessup experiences or knows what he does. The only one that might be needed is "felt fairly sure", since saying "the Faramund King" wouldn't show Jessup's lack of certainty. If we just show the experience without the self-consciousness, we should get a more direct prose style (most important) and fewer words (a byproduct of the direct style).

Lots of prepositional phrases: for example, "in the copse of trees", "against the tree behind him" "in the shadows of the dense trees". These aren't always a problem, but the indicate something about sentence structure to me. Even if I don't cut them directly, I generally look for things to cut or ways to restructure in the paragraphs that contain them.

Lots of forms of "to be": for example, "The scene showed him what a bad idea being captured would be." (Although I think that sentence doesn't add a lot of value anyway -- if the scene shows what a bad idea being captured would be, and you're about to show the scene, why tell us ahead of time?)

There are little things that I noticed, too, that aren't strictly related to cutting.

• Alliteration is chief among them: "barely breathing" (which would be mundane enough to go unnoticed if it weren't for the rest of it), "felt fairly sure it was the Faragund King", "five mages...head to foot in flowing...", "massively muscled", "biceps bulged...brocade vest...bright sunlight", "blond hair...braids...below his shoulders". (In the next paragraph, "blood gushed...bowl that glinted golden".) A little alliteration isn't likely to get noticed, but sometimes we write as though we're creating Anglo-Saxon poetry. So we'll look for this, and even if we don't eliminate it all, we'll especially avoid having the alliterative letters fall on accented syllables close together, as in "BARE-ly BREATH-ing" and "BI-ceps BULGED".
• The narrator describes the scout, but doesn't mention the blood that must cover him if he has been bled all day.

Let's cut deeply, maybe more than we're comfortable with. We can always put stuff back.

Cut:

Jessup pressed his back against a tree, using the copse's shadows to hide from the teeming Faragund army encamped below.

An Ilkasar scout hung bound by his hands from a tall stake, feet dangling a handspan above the ground. Blond braids flowed down below his shoulders, and long strands of a blond mustache drooped from the corners of his mouth. On each cheek, scars ran from mouth to hairline.

Jessup's jaw muscles knotted, but the army stretched nearly to the horizon -- he couldn't save him.

A man -- Jessup thought it was the Faragund King -- stood before the prisoner. Though of no great height, he was massively muscled; gold brocade covered his vast chest and arms, glinting in the sunlight.

Five mages stood chanting nearby, covered from head to foot in flowing black robes.

211 words to 135, or about 36%. Not bad as far as it goes. The picture is still static -- we're setting up for the knife thrust rather than starting with it -- but the reader has 76 fewer words to get through to get there.

---

Original:

The king raised a long ceremonial dagger and plunged it into the scout's arm. The man gave a hoarse scream. Blood gushed and one of the mages rushed forward to catch the liquid in a bowl that glinted golden in the sunlight.

"raised...and plunged" is cinematic and draws out the tension, so though I could cut it to just "The king plunged a long..." I don't want to do that.

I don't love "The man gave a hoarse scream", but I'm not sure what to do about it.

• "Gave a scream" doesn't seem as strong (or as short) as "screamed", but I don't really want to say "screamed hoarsely", either.
• Cutting "hoarse" eliminates the sense that the man has been screaming a lot. Now, we're about to hear how the king has been bleeding the scout all day, so maybe we don't need "hoarse" -- but in original, that explanation occurred in the next paragraph, making it less immediate.
• Maybe we could attach it to the previous sentence: "into the scout's arm, evoking a hoarse scream."
• Maybe we use the stronger verb, which would normally also reduce the word count, but expound a little bit instead: "The man screamed, his voice hoarse..."
• Maybe we bring some of Jessup's attitude to the description, getting deeper into his POV and characterizing him a little bit more.

I think I'll do the latter. To do so, I need to steal some of the text (which I will also trim, of course) from the next few paragraphs:

Original:

For the entire day Jessup had watched the scout being bled. The ground around him was black with it. At first they had simply let the blood drip into the dirt while the prisoner had refused to scream. Now his head drooped, and he hardly seemed alive. With each slash, they poured blood onto the stone altar standing nearby.

Jessup stared past the camp into the thick forest of oak to the east where giant trees reached toward the sky and a gentle dark settled between their columns of their trunks. He sucked in a deep breath to slow the pounding of his heart. He had seen horrors in his days, from the day his own people were slaughtered, but watching this was a twist to the guts.

Cut:

The king raised a long ceremonial dagger and plunged it into the scout's arm.

Jessup winced at his hoarse scream and sucked in a deep breath, trying to slow the pounding of his heart. He had seen horrors in his days, even his own people slaughtered, but this twisted his guts.

They had bled the scout for the entire day. At first he had refused to scream, and they let his blood drip into the dirt. The ground was black with it. Finally, as now, a mage would rush forward to catch it in a golden bowl and pour it onto the stone altar nearby.

105 words from 170: 38%. I lost some data, though: "thick oak forest" (not just a copse of trees) "to the east" (orientation) "gentle dark" (characterization of Jessup and the forest). I can fit that in later, as he starts to leave. [In the event, I didn't -- Jeanne will have to decide whether she misses it.]

I also lost "his head drooped, and he hardly seemed alive", but I don't know that that's necessary at this point.

Notice that I had to slice the paragraphs up carefully to make sure the pronouns work.

• The first paragraph is the king's action.
• The second is Jessup's reaction. This was needed to make sure the references to "he" and "his" were unambiguous. The only one that doesn't refer to Jessup is the first one, "his hoarse scream", and I don't think that will cause any problems.
• The third is about the scout. "He" and "his" refer only to him.

Maybe I didn't need to do that; the original had the same kind of problem.

For the entire day Jessup had watched the scout being bled. The ground around him was black with it. At first they had simply let the blood drip into the dirt while the prisoner had refused to scream. Now his head drooped, and he hardly seemed alive.

Technically, it's ambiguous whether the ground was black around the scout or around Jessup. Also, Jeanne couldn't easily replace "the prisoner" with "he" in the phrase "the prisoner had refused to scream" -- for just a fraction of an instant, the brain has to figure out whether "he" refers to Jessup or to the scout. To me, it just sounds wrong. If you found the original to be fine, then you might not care as much about the disambiguation I undertook here. As always, it's the author's call.

---

Original:

Jessup forced his eyes back to the Faragund camp. The altar he recognized as one to the god Kanandra, but he wasn't sure what magic they were powering with this. He wasn't sure he wanted to know. Khyle would want word of their movements though. Jessup doubted that any of Khyle's scouts had escaped.

He had told Jessup that he feared the Faragund had gained enough power to attack the Ilkasar Empire again. It had been twenty years since their last attack had failed, and the Faragund army was wiped out by the Ilkasar's Sharenta mages and the Ilkasar Imperial army. The hatred between the Faragund god Kanandra and his twin the goddess Urthus, whom the Ilkasar worshiped, mirrored the hatred between their followers. Stories still circulated about the fierceness of the fighting. Few families hadn't lost someone to the Faragund.

I ended the last paragraph with a reference to the stone altar. Let's pick up there, and, since he was thinking (it's a flashback), we can continue the same paragraph with additional thoughts.

I don't have to force his eyes back to the Faragund camp, because I never made them leave it.

Since "the altar" is the last thing I mentioned, I can refer to it more simply. That also lets me avoid the object-subject-verb structure currently in place ("The altar he recognized').

Cut:

[...and pour it onto the stone altar nearby.] He could see that it was for the Faragund god Kanandra, twin of the Ilkasar goddess Urthus -- their hatred for each other mirrored the hatred between their followers -- but he couldn't tell what magic they were attempting.

He wasn't sure he wanted to know.

Khyle would, though. He had told Jessup that the Faragund might attack the Ilkasar Empire again, for the first time in twenty years. Back then, Ilkasar's Sharenta mages and Imperial army had wiped out the Faragund army. Stories still circulated about the fierceness of the fighting. Few families hadn't lost someone to the Faragund.

Jessup doubted that any of Khyle's scouts had escaped.

141 words becomes 109: 23%.

---

Original:

One of the mages near the king motioned to him and seemed to speak. The sound of the chanting changed, becoming softer but more insistent. Jessup shuddered. He had no magic but even he could feel the surge of power as the chants grew demanding. He sucked in his breath as the King plunged the dagger to the hilt into the scout's chest. Jessup gritted his teeth.

Little cuts: "One of the mages near the king motioned to him" seems a bit long. "near the king" and "to him" are prepositional phrases with the same object, but one uses a pronoun, so they can probably be condensed. Make it "One of the mages motioned to the king". (They're already near him; it doesn't matter exactly how near they are; we just need to show change related to the king, since the mages will explicitly change their chanting in a moment anyway.)

"He sucked in his breath" serves the same function as "Jessup gritted his teeth" -- characterizing Jessup and keeping us in his POV. I'd cut one of them.

"as the chants grew demanding" is redundant with "but more insistent", so we should cut one (and I think the former is the obvious choice here). Note that we have to change "the surge of power" to "a surge of power" to make that work.

Cut:

One of the mages motioned to the king and seemed to speak. The chanting became softer but more insistent. Jessup shuddered. He had no magic but even he could feel a surge of power. He sucked in his breath as the King plunged the dagger to the hilt into the scout's chest.

52 words from 67: 22%.

---

Original:

The mages' chanting again changed cadence, growing faster and faster. Smoke swirled around the altar.

"again changed cadence" and "and faster" both serve to draw out the sentence. Jeanne might like the way this adds tension. Personally, I don't, so I'm cutting them. This is just a matter of taste, and Jeanne will have to decide what she prefers.

Cut:

The mages' chanting grew faster. Smoke swirled around the altar.

---

Original:

The King ripped the dagger up the dead scout's chest. He jerked and sawed and then pulled out the dripping heart. Jessup thought he removed other parts, but with the king blocking his way to see exactly what was happening. He raised both arms over his head. Blood ran down his arms in rivulets as the mages chanted on and on, getting louder with every heartbeat. A roar from out of the smoke ripped the air.

The only individual sentence that feels problematic here is "Jessup thought he removed other parts, but with the king blocking his way to see exactly what was happening." It's a fragment, for one thing, and I think we can tighten it even so.

The paragraph itself has one deviant among the pronouns. "He jerked" and "he removed" refers to the King; "his way" refers to Jessup; "He raised" and subsequent pronouns refer to the king again. I don't think it's really critical, but I'd like to use something like "He seemed to..." because that way all male pronouns in the paragraph refer to the king.

"with the king blocking his way to see" is "the king blocked Jessup's view". "To see exactly what was happening" is redundant with "Jessup thought" showing the uncertainty and "blocked his view" to show its cause.

Cut:

The King ripped the dagger up the dead scout's chest. He jerked and sawed and then pulled out the dripping heart. He might have removed other parts, too, but his body blocked Jessup's view. He raised both arms over his head. Blood ran down his arms in rivulets as the mages chanted on and on, getting louder with every heartbeat. A roar from out of the smoke ripped the air.

76 becomes 70: 8%, with one fragment fixed.

---

Original:

The chanting stopped. Smoke from the altar drifted on the breeze. The king stood motionless watching. Then he turned and struck one of the mages a blow across the face, knocking the man to the ground. The conjuration, whatever it was supposed to do, hadn't made the King happy.

After the tension build-up, the short sentences here work very nicely to show an anticipation that goes unfulfilled.

There's no need to show that the king was "watching". (You might even consider it a POV violation, though of the least problematic kind.)

"a blow" is redundant with "struck".

I think we can lose the whole last sentence. "whatever it was supposed to do" characterizes Jessup (because we're in his POV still), but in a way that has already been done; and Jeanne has already shown that the king is unhappy, so there's no need to tell it again.

Cut:

The chanting stopped. Smoke from the altar drifted on the breeze. The king stood motionless. Then he turned and struck one of the mages across the face, knocking the man to the ground.

49 becomes 33: 33%.

---

I'm running out of time. Someone has requested the novel from Jeanne, due this week -- Go Jeanne! I'm really excited for you! -- so let me just finish up and get out of her way.

This version is 515 words, down from 728, for a 29% cut.

Jessup pressed his back against a tree, using the copse's shadows to hide from the teeming Faragund army encamped below.

An Ilkasar scout hung bound by his hands from a tall stake, feet dangling a handspan above the ground. Blond braids flowed down below his shoulders, and long strands of a blond mustache drooped from the corners of his mouth. On each cheek, scars ran from mouth to hairline.

Jessup's jaw muscles knotted, but the army stretched nearly to the horizon -- he couldn't save him.

A man -- Jessup thought it was the Faragund King -- stood before the prisoner. Though of no great height, he was massively muscled; gold brocade covered his vast chest and arms, glinting in the sunlight.

Five mages stood chanting nearby, covered from head to foot in flowing black robes.

The king raised a long ceremonial dagger and plunged it into the scout's arm.

Jessup winced at his hoarse scream and sucked in a deep breath, trying to slow the pounding of his heart. He had seen horrors in his days, even his own people slaughtered, but this twisted his guts.

They had bled the scout for the entire day. At first he had refused to scream, and they let his blood drip into the dirt. The ground was black with it. Finally, as now, a mage would rush forward to catch it in a golden bowl and pour it onto the stone altar nearby. He could see that it was for the Faragund god Kanandra, twin of the Ilkasar goddess Urthus -- their hatred for each other mirrored the hatred between their followers -- but he couldn't tell what magic they were attempting.

He wasn't sure he wanted to know.

Khyle would, though. He had told Jessup that the Faragund might attack the Ilkasar Empire again, for the first time in twenty years. Back then, Ilkasar's Sharenta mages and Imperial army had wiped out the Faragund army. Stories still circulated about the fierceness of the fighting. Few families hadn't lost someone to the Faragund.

Jessup doubted that any of Khyle's scouts had escaped.

One of the mages motioned to the king and seemed to speak. The chanting became softer but more insistent. Jessup shuddered. He had no magic but even he could feel a surge of power. He sucked in his breath as the King plunged the dagger to the hilt into the scout's chest.

The mages' chanting grew faster. Smoke swirled around the altar.

The King ripped the dagger up the dead scout's chest. He jerked and sawed and then pulled out the dripping heart. He might have removed other parts, too, but his body blocked Jessup's view. He raised both arms over his head. Blood ran down his arms in rivulets as the mages chanted on and on, getting louder with every heartbeat. A roar from out of the smoke ripped the air.

The chanting stopped. Smoke from the altar drifted on the breeze. The king stood motionless. Then he turned and struck one of the mages across the face, knocking the man to the ground.

What do you think?

Writer's Digest has just hired a "Grammar Guru" -- a copy editor named Bonnie Trenga -- to write a column called "The Sentence Sleuth". Her inaugural column talks very clearly about "nominalizations", which I often point out when I'm cutting (in vaguer terms than she uses here). Well worth checking out, and I hope she produces many more columns to come!