Elswyk returns to her new home after a long day. She does a little work before getting something to eat and going to bed. She gets up in the morning, and then she goes to work. (She works in a book store.) She deals with customers all morning until her friend comes by to visit. They talk. Then the friend suggests that they go out to lunch. They do. Over lunch, they have a nice, long conversation.
I spent pages on this. I went into detail.
A couple important things do happen in the chapter. I do want to give a sense of what Elswyk's typical day is like. But I can imply a lot of it. I don’t have to go into painstaking detail about everything, such as…
I had a large pile of papers on my desk—about what I’d expected. I didn't look up until I had gotten through the pile. Tomorrow Basalt had meetings and other business matters that would take him out of the building, so I wasn't going to get to spend much time in the back office. An empty desk meant that I wouldn't have to stay here too late tomorrow night catching up on things.
I can cut that entire paragraph and much of the page it appeared on and the story will still make sense. A quick conversation between Basalt and Elswyk when she gets to work (which is already in the chapter) is enough.
Remember how I said the novel was 77,000 words? With chapters like these, I’m going to be down to 50,000 words in next to no time.
