While I was delighted by the suggestion from THE NEW YORK JOURNAL OF BOOKS that I’d written something with a bit of edge, my publisher pulled out the following quote:
The story is sharp and lean; the writing is tight and focused.
I’m sure that my mentorship with noted author and all-around great guy Gary Blackwood back in 1999 had something to do with this. Here’s a quote from one of his emails to me: “There’s no room for deadwood in a novel. Everything needs to contribute to plot, setting and characterization.”
Any good advice can be taken to an extreme. My current WIP needed to gain just a bit of weight, but I suspect that I’m doing it with tightly focused subplots.
Kristin Wolden Nitz 