Great series of exerts, Scott! Thanks for sharing.

Faith that there is a big S underneath the huge pile of little s's in front of me? That's what keeps me going. I know it's there, it's just a matter of me finding it. So I keep looking, and distilling, trying to get down to the heart of it all. And hopefully I end up with a big S, full of twist, heart, and sparkly, lean and fun, and effortlessly graceful (like Astaire dancing, or better yet Rogers dancing backwards in heels).

Right, by going into the story, just as you keep suggesting! :-)

When you really stick with a script long enough, those textures really do "enter into the material". And you find the pieces begin to harmonize -- a certain elegance, interrelation, integration occurs. Then you know you've got something good. Something with weight, with "heft". That weight is the time you put into it, the time you spent with it, the work you've expended -- it doesn't go nowhere, all that work! It becomes the mass that invests your story!