My Writing Goes Green

A month or two ago, I was beta-reading for a local author.  Beta-reads provide thoughts from a typical reader (somehow, I qualify) on areas that need attention before they are immortalized in a published work.  While the feedback might not be pleasant for the author, it’s better at this stage than later in those 1-star reviews.

Several of my comments on this piece had to do with unfulfilled expectations.  For example, after Scene A had led me to expect a ‘fight to the death’ in scene B, I found little beyond some verbal sparring when I got there.  What happened?  I was at a loss.  A few days later, however, it all became clear.  The author sent me a note that said, in effect, ‘thanks for helping me lose those words that I had fallen in love with.’ 

We all do it.  It’s that clever turn of a phrase (at least in our minds) that keeps words in a manuscript long after their reason for existence has disappeared.  It’s tough to drag them, kicking and screaming to the little trash can in the corner of the screen.  So, I don’t.  Instead, I save them in files I invariably call ‘HOLD.’  The problem was, however, that I had no plan, no idea how to use those words…until today.  Today, my writing goes green.  Today, I start recycling those words I can’t use in a book – in blog posts.

Today’s installment is from a near-future mystery in work, Killer in the Retroscape (http://brucemperrin.blogspot.com/p/killer-in-retroscape.html).  Originally, it had a scene that dealt with ‘smart clothes,’ those garments that contain technology for everything from monitoring your UV exposure to paying for your latte.  In this case, the clothes were a complete wardrobe for analyzing a golfer’s game called (drum roll) The Wearable Golf Pro.  The problem, of course, is that as future technology goes, it’s not.  Most of it is here today, so the words had to go.  But in the spirit of reducing, reusing, and recycling, here’s a few of them from a dialog in that deleted section.

“So, you have to wear the whole nine yards for this to work?"

"No, but there’s six sensors that are required, if you’re going to get any benefit.  Fortunately, they can go in a lot of different pieces of clothing.  But if you’re into nude golfing…well, your swing’s going to suffer.”

OK, it seemed funnier in context.  But the good news for me is that I now have lots of fodder for posts.  Given the size of this snippet and the cumulative size of the ‘HOLD’ files I’ve generated to date, I can write 664 posts from recycled material.

Now, is that green or what?