All
week, struggling to revise an early chapter in my novel-in-progress, I
realized what was wrong: nothing happens. It's what I call a
"traveling chapter." After a plane crash, the character tries to get to
a main road. She walks through a forest at night. She discovers she's
lost an important item from her pack. She can't go back, she panics,
she keeps on.
No matter how I massage the words, the result is
the same. Not enough is going on. It's way too early in the book for a
pause. I decided to ditch the chapter--and everything worked so much
better!