Of Blood and Moor - Update 1#

Editing ‘Of Blood and Moor’ has been going well, though it's turned out to be much slower than I expected. I'm not just reading through and fixing awkward sentences anymore. Half the time now I'm just sitting with a single paragraph, trying to work out exactly how much the reader should know at that point in the story.

At its heart, it's a dark, atmospheric mystery set around an isolated pub on the edge of the moor, where a violent storm forces a group of strangers to take shelter together. What starts as a disruption to a place where little usually changes turns into something else once the night wears on and old debts start coming due, and by the time the storm clears, almost everyone left in the room is carrying something that goes back further than one night. I still haven't worked out how to describe the ending without giving too much away.

A lot of my recent work has focused on the opening sections, strengthening the sense of isolation around the pub so that the moor feels like a constant presence rather than just a backdrop. I want the reader to feel the weather pressing against the windows and the dark gathering beyond the road. There's something about being indoors while all that waits outside that I still haven't quite nailed, if I'm honest.

I've also been refining the character introductions. A couple of people only need a small detail or a single gesture, and that's enough for the reader to fill in the rest. Other characters take longer, and I used to rush them, explaining too much too soon. Cutting a sentence I like just because the scene works better without it is still the hardest part of this whole process. There were whole chapters I ended up cutting entirely because they weren't earning their place. And others I discovered became much more coherent when combined.

A dramatic view of Beardown Man, the ancient standing stone on Dartmoor, silhouetted against a moody sky as rays of sunlight break through the clouds.

There are also places where the story originally moved too fast, where I'd been so eager to reach certain moments that I hadn't left enough room for the unease to build first. Conversations get more room to breathe now. Pauses get to sit there a beat longer than feels comfortable. A door opening at the wrong moment carries more tension than a paragraph of explanation.

At the same time, I'm cutting sections that linger too long in the other direction. The aim is for it to feel slow-burning, not slow. If a scene isn't doing something, and I'm ruthless about what counts now, it's probably getting cut, no matter how much I like the writing in it.

Overall, the story is getting darker and tighter. It's starting to feel much closer to the version I had in my head originally. Bleak without being empty. Grounded in people who are carrying more than they're willing to say out loud.

For now, I'm just working through it chapter by chapter. Trying not to give anything away before the story's ready to. Slower than I'd like, but that's fine.