Yeah, Write

I've recently joined a writing site: The Next Big Writer. It's devoted to writers submitting work-in-progress and exchanging reviews with an eye toward improvement. It's exactly what I've been looking for since I completed June Betrayals and I joined with high hopes. I haven't had other writers critiquing my work in a long time and I'm sure it will turbo-charge my writing. "This is your writing... this is your writing on Red Bull."

Only one problem. Criticism is enough to make you bi-polar.

I've received two kinds of reviews so far: "fanboy" and "where to begin?"

Fanboy reviews taste great: they're full of unabashed prose about what a wonderful job you're doing and how they'd probably buy it as-is if they ran across it in the bookstore. They can give you confidence that you've struck gold, but are useless when it comes to boosting the quality of the work, which is why I signed up.

Receiving a fanboy review is a Sally Fields Moment: "You like me! You really, really like me!" Once you've had a chance to cool off, doubt creeps in. Maybe they're kissing up to get a good rating and don't care about helping you improve. Maybe they like everything they read, which means their accolades don't mean much. Do I sound neurotic? Guilty as charged.

"Where to begin" posts usually butter you up a bit at the beginning, like a doctor saying "this will only hurt a little." Then they crack their knuckles and start pummeling you. Are you unaware passive voice is evil? Did you mean to imply that character X has inappropriate urges toward farm equipment? Is character Y dead (because they're lifeless as an old stump)? Can't your character just say things instead of having to "growl" and "chirp" and "bark" everything? Are we at the zoo?

These posts suck. No matter how politely they're phrased, how carefully they avoid making it personal, every line stings because it's something you could have noticed yourself if you weren't the lamest writer ever to violate a word-processing program with your dreck. You suck, your words suck, your computer and internet connection probably suck, too.

Just because these reviews hurt doesn't mean they aren't exactly what I need. Criticism isn't comfort food, it's medicine. Comfort food tastes good, finishes bad. I can't count how many slices of pizza I've eaten while saying, "I'm going to regret this later."

Criticism is medicine. Medicine tastes terrible going down, but it gives your body what it needs to get stronger and beat back what ails you. There's nothing noble about walking around hacking up phlegm and saying "I'm going to whip this thing on my own." You're just wasting your time and making the ones around you miserable.

The reason criticism works so well is that a different perspective is worth 50 IQ points. Just coming at something from a different angle with a different set of preconceptions and knowledge makes subtle things obvious. If two people of equal ability and experience exchange critiques, they each come off looking like geniuses because they see things in your blind spot with perfect clarity and vice-versa.

Healthy criticism makes healthy stories. But this is going to hurt a little.

What's wrong with this scene?

Sheryl tossed her rich, luxurious mane of raven-black hair over her shoulder, the late-afternoon sunlight filling it with highlights. "Kiss me," she said.

Rico took a long, leisurely sip of his Sumatran double-expresso, the half-and-half and two packets of raw cane sugar helping it slide down his throat like liquid gold. He set it back on the saucer and moved it slightly to make room for his elbow on the tiny, black powder-coated cafe table. "What if I don't want to?" he asked, flicking a crumb of his long-finished scone from the crease of his copper-colored silk trousers.

She laughed, long and low, her voice surprisingly deep for a slender, toned woman with a dancer's physique. A hank of her hair fell across one side of her face, casting it into shadow and making her look even more mysterious than she did already. "Oh, you want to," she said.

His gaze burned into her, his longing to kiss her visible on his face like a neon sign. People driving by the front windows of the cafe could tell how much he wanted to kiss her. Astronauts orbiting overhead could tell. He was terrible at hiding it. "There's no faulting your confidence," he chuckled, even though he really, really, really wanted to kiss her. She was so beautiful he couldn't think of anything else.

Need a hint? Here it is again.

"Kiss me," Sheryl said.

Rico flicked a crumb from the crease of his trousers. "What if I don't want to?"

"Oh, you want to." She let her hair fall across her face.

He chuckled. "There's no faulting your confidence."

What's the main difference between those two versions? Length, obviously. The first is most of a page: 223 words. The second is only 36. But why the difference in length? How to decide what to chop and what to leave?

The second version is 100% story. The only things left either advance the scene, express emotions in the characters or evoke them in the reader, preferably more than one.

The first version is drowning in detail. A laundry list of irrelevancies that don't do any of the above. What does it tell us that he drinks Sumatran coffee? Would he be a different person in any significant way if it were Brazilian? Do we care that the crumb is from a scone? Are muffin crumbs symbolically inferior? What about the color of the table?

Much of it is repetitive, as well. Her body is slender and toned and a dancer's physique. Commuters, astronauts and Rico know he wants to kiss her. Really, really, really wants to, in case you weren't paying attention.

It's noise. Static on the radio. Glare on the television screen. It feels like story when you're writing it, but it's actually interfering with our ability to read the parts that really matter.

So how to differentiate noise from story? The question to ask is always the same:

What is the purpose of this scene?

This is a flirting scene. Flirting is about the tension between desire and denial. Anything that contributes to the flirting should be kept. Anything that doesn't advance it is detracting from it.

What we leave are significant details. There are exactly seven:

• She tells him to kiss her. Not many women do that. What does that tell us about her?
• Instead of doing what he's told - as most men would - he plays it cool, flicking a crumb from his trousers. Again, that makes him unusual. Why isn't he responding? Is he not interested? Playing hard to get? Scared? Gay?
• He deflects her with a flippant question, taking control of the situation while teasing her, increasing the tension.
• Her reply further demonstrates her confidence. She isn't the sort of woman to be put off easily. More tension.
• The hair in her face ups the seduction. She's trying to break his resolve, and likely enjoying herself in the bargain.
• He acknowledges her ploys and charms with a chuckle, complimenting her without words.
• He finishes with a backhanded compliment, encouraging her while reiterating that things will progress on his schedule, not hers.

Easier to read, more powerful, and we've freed up 187 words that we can use to ratchet up the tension instead of wasting them on copper-colored pants and raw cane sugar.

So take a hard look at a scene that's been frustrating you. Ask yourself "what is the purpose of this scene?" Then take out your machete and start hacking, because I'd be willing to bet that in the center is a powerful, emotionally-charged story that only needs a bit of noise-reduction to really shine.