The Chopping Block

Literary agent Donald Maass says “setup” always drags and should be left out. “Generally speaking,” he says, “it is best to start with action, cut backstory, avoid aftermath, limit description, and use foreshadowing rarely.”

Why should we do so much chopping? Perhaps it’s because most people don’t think they have time to drag through a lot of words to find the action. For many, a two-hour movie is much better than a book finished in two weeks. They might take time to read a blog, but only if it’s short. When it’s more than a few paragraphs, there’s a good chance they’ll set it aside to read later—and never get back to it.

We can include lots of the great stuff we love and have few people finish our stories. Or we can cut everything but the bare essentials, hold reader attention, and keep the pages turning.

Readers spend their time on what interests them. Isn’t that what we writers do? They have no appreciation for the extensive research and countless writing hours that have made our words so valuable to us. If they don’t immediately identify with a character’s desperate need in the face of great obstacles, they’ll start looking for the remote.