My writing group told me to cut my favorite character and they were right.

For a year I worked on a fantasy story with a talking cat named Malkin. I loved him, gave him all the best lines. My group in Seattle read the third draft and said, flat out, 'He adds nothing. The plot moves fine without him.' I was mad for a week. But I tried a version without Malkin, just to see. The story got tighter, the main character's journey became clearer. It hurt, but they were correct. It was a good lesson in killing your darlings, even the furry ones. Has a writing group ever told you to cut something you really loved, and did you listen?

2 comments

2 Comments

alice_reed471mo ago

Man that's such a tough spot to be in. Had a sidekick character in a sci-fi thing I wrote, a little maintenance robot with a ton of personality. My group pointed out it was basically just repeating what the setting already showed. Took me a solid month to even consider cutting it, but the story did get better without that crutch. It feels like losing a friend, but sometimes the story just needs that space to breathe.

wade5581mo ago

But is it really a "crutch" or just a fun character? Sometimes a story needs those little moments that don't push the plot. Cutting everything for pure efficiency can make a story feel cold.