Keep It Moving

I was privileged to know the late, great Southern writer, Walker Percy ("The Movie Goer," "Love in the Ruins," etc.). (https://www.nytimes.com/1990/05/11/obituaries/walker-percy-is-dead-at-74-a-novelist-of-the-new-south.html)

He read my first novel and although he enjoyed several parts, his main criticism was that many included elements, while entertaining in their own right, did nothing to "move" the novel or the story.

I've used this advice ever since to discard sections that didn't really contribute to the novel as a novel or the story standing on its own. The advice: get rid of the stuff that doesn't move the story. It's amazing how much there is that can be discarded for the betterment of the work. And if the stuff that's junked is good, keep it and use it somewhere else. To this day, I have several "orphans" of writing that are waiting patiently for a home in which to land.