This is K.M. Wyland and you are listening to the Helping Writers

Become Authors Podcast.

I hope you enjoy this week's episode,

six questions to help you avoid repetitive scenes.

It takes a lot of scenes to make a novel. Not only do we need enough scenes to progress the

plot and get the characters from point A to point B, we also need to reach a certain word count so the book can be a novel or the

movie can be a movie, you know.

How can you make sure you're not just filling out that word count with repetitive scenes.

At a certain point, most writers well receive critiques or edits in which whole scenes are

circled in red with notes that read nothing happens or they already had

this conversation or this doesn't advance the plot or it feels like you're

padding the word count,

all of which are code for repetitive scenes.

Recognizing repetitive scenes can be tricky for authors,

hence the big red circles from critique partners and editors.

Our deep immersion in our own stories inevitably causes a certain lack of objectivity.

We may think a scene is full of new info when really the characters

have already been there done that. Readers may not think too much about one or two repetitive scenes but at a certain point they will grow

increasingly restless and frustrated with the story's lack of progress. A while back

I received an email from Word Player Sarah Kay with an insightful question.

She wrote, I'm working on a novel that seems to be lending itself to a lot of talky scenes,

scenes in the scene structure sense,

...