The Ink-Pot and the Palette

Fair warning: I'm going to plagiarize the hell out of your opening salvo there. That's fantastic. I promise I'll reword it in my own voice.

I didn't really plan on sending just the bald comments without a lead-in, but I was wavering because it felt like an exercise in softening the blow. What you've said here reminds me that I need to make explicit to this beginning novelist that I do believe in her story (or I wouldn't have done this).

And God knows, I remember the fantasy of that pure, beautiful first draft, untarnished by actual logic and effort. I still have darlings that I love (and sometimes one does write a beautiful, perfect phrase that never needs any more work--but only a phrase, never a whole paragraph. Ever.)

Thank you for weighing in. This is great.