But jeez, Neal, 3,000 pages? Newton invented calculus in less time than it’ll take to read about it.
Hot authors get more influence over their editors because they’ve got an established fan base, so they don’t have the discipline needed to cut, delete, tighten, a novel into something readable.
My writing teachers used to say that the one great lesson of good editing is “murder your darlings,” which means you should cut a sentence, paragraph, chapter if it doesn’t fit, even if you love it. It’s not the whole, it’s not the end product. Be especially harsh on the parts you love best: the more you like it, the more likely you are to leave it in, even if it needs to go.
Secretly Ironic 