I'm editing one of my 'babies' right now. I call it my baby, a term I don't normally use for my stories, because this one contains two re-accuring characters. I have in my head a whole series of novellettes with these two characters, even though I have yet to sell a single story featuring the two of them. I've gotten close.. so close.. twice. I thought if I went back to the world and wrote the second story that's been stuck in my head I'd have more ammo to get the two of them out into the world. Except, I can't seem to finish the edits and get it out the door. I've come to the conclusion that the problem that needs to be fixed is that there is too much action and not enough character development. In my head all of my characters are nicely developed, because I've written them before, but the reader (who might read this as a stand-alone piece) won't know the backstory. How do I insert the character development without slowing down the action? Even worse, how do I do that and keep the wordcount down?
Ack! Well, there will be no answers until I actually take out the editor's scalpel and the sutures and do some work on this beast.