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RE: https://eldritch.cafe/@sfwrtr/117579135175007251
#ScribesAndMakers 2026.11.09 1/2 — -Share a snippet or image of what you've been working on this week .
I worked on two things this week. One would be spoilers for two novels.† The other was revising the WIP. There is tremendous detail in this two-toot thread. I think you'll find persevering well worth the trouble! Excoriate me, please, if you disagree.
Rarely have I captured a before and after text of the work that goes into revising a passage. The revision on these three paragraphs took 2½ hours. Since it's what I worked on this week, I am going to walk you through my process and rationale.
The AFTER version was originally posted Nov 9th to #WordWeavers, and I've quoted the toot. The screen capture (in the second toot) is of a difference document (diff) showing strikeouts and inserts. The BEFORE version is a first draft. Annotations discussing the work I did follow the AFTER version. If you like analyzing, you might want to compare the passages side by side.
ABOUT the Passage
It's best to not to read modern Abrahamic mythology into the words used to describe the people (all human). Take it as that so-and-so has wings and a different culture than the other person who has horns and no wings. Bolt, a day angel, is narrating. Imagine her watching surreptitiously off to the side at a rooftop food court in modern East Los Angeles, in sight of distant skyscrapers.
BEFORE Revisions
I watched the daemon breakfasting on fried kippers piled on a heap of glistening translucent white onions, about as lowbrow, commonplace, and low priced and comforting a breakfast as one could imagine a working angel buying, together a bottle of fizzy that by it's golden color was likely caramel vanilla, which brought back more lost memories of my upper school cafeteria. No other daemons or saints ate up here today, understandable because most non-day angels were vegetarian. Both saints and daemons worked the grills behind the angelic chefs, the daemons providing the fire or coals to cook with.
A pescatarian daemon? That had to be a fascinating story. She took her time, the small weathered book floating as she ate. The hardbound couldn't be light reading. When she started swaying happily side to side as she ate, I found my hand in my camera kit satchel.
I so wanted to take that photo of that unselfconsciously happy daemon eating fish, reading a levitated book, dancing in her seat. Perfect. I took deep breaths. I looked away. Dark had descended fully by the time she finished. She had lit a dozen yellowish sprites, two nestled on her horns on either side of her head, and stuck to the tassels hanging from the edge of the chef's tent who made what she said were "best fish crisps" she'd had in ages when she return the licked plate. She even imitated day angel wing-shrug gestures made when thanking another with her shoulders, patting her belly the proper three times. The patrons didn't know what to make of it, but the chef happily gave her a sideways wing hug, showing her a schedule of the buildings she setup on over the next week, inviting her back.
Maybe the daemon's mother had been a day angel?
CONTINUED…
#AltText: Sorry. Underline and strikeout markdown is very time consuming. Please read the BEFORE and AFTER text. The annotations will help you get the gist.
#PennedPossibilities and #WritersCoffeeClub: I know revision questions have been asked in prior prompts to these hashtags; I hope my revision process might interest you folk. Forgive me for I have sinned… 😇
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† I also wrote a merged plot line spreadsheet that shows what events happen in the original novel that also show up in the current WIP, which is a different story taking place in-parallel, but is narrated in the POV on a supporting character in the original novel (Bolt). The original novel is in the POV of the devil-girl, the SC in this passage.[Author retains copyright (c)2026 R.S.]
#gender #fiction #writer #author
#cozy #mystery #sf #sff #sciencefiction
#writing #writingcommunity #writersOfMastodon #Bookstodon #writers #revision #draft #editting #writingAdvice
#RSdiscussion
#RSstory #RSReluctanceStory -
How To Identify And Fix All The Places Where Telling - Or Exposition - Rears Up In Your Writing #writingadvice #writinglife #amwriting #writingcommunity #writerscommunity www.amazon.com/dp/194887234X
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Build a Better Bio (It Matters More Than You Think)
Jane Friedman shows you how to think about your bio as a strategic tool rather than an afterthought, plus more from Writer's Digest!
The post Build a Better Bio (It Matters More Than You Think) appeared first on Writer's Digest.
https://www.writersdigest.com/build-a-better-bio-it-matters-more-than-you-think#Resources #authorbio #writingadvice #WritingCourses #WritingTipsAndTricks
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Short, skillful exercises that allow you to build a novel #amwriting #writingcommunity #writingadvice #writer www.amazon.com/Minutes-Your-B...
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"November Novel" - It is a fallacy of a sort, this whole writer’s block thing.
Check it out: https://8clicks.8r4d.com/2026/07/november-novel/
#BlocksAndResistance #WritingAdvice #Procrastination #Nanowrimo