Carrie Ryan
I’ve always been fascinated by the changes a draft goes through on its way to becoming a book (or a story or a poem). With my first book, still unpublished on a floppy disk somewhere in the attic, my sole revision consisted of reading the pages out loud to my cat, changing a typo or a missed word here or there. With The Forest of Hands and Teeth, my first published book, revision consisted of ripping out entire sections, re-conceiving the plot, drafting new chapters from scratch. Between the first and final drafts, I rewrote over a third of the book. My cut files for subsequent books are almost always larger than the books themselves.
Even when I cut things, however, I’m loath to let them go. I stuff them into files, tuck them away here and there in case I decide to cannibalize them for later. Usually they sit forgotten, but sometimes I sift through them for parts, repurposing them for other scenes. Lines once spoken by one person given to someone else, descriptions shifted to new points of view. Even then, however, there’s no guarantee it will make the final draft. My cut files are full of lines and scenes that have been rewritten again and again only to be cut just as many times.