What's a filler?

Filler is a scene that doesn't do anything for your story. It doesn't really develop your characters or advance your plot (or subplots). They just add length to the story without adding substance.

You might not know if something is a filler until after your novel is done. Just write your first draft and don't worry about it. Get everything down on paper. You can make cuts later.

HikariDawn said:

I read this.

And reading this. I still don't know what a filler is. Should I write fillers on a draft? How do I know what is a filler and what's not?

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fillers do nothing to your story. Just there to decorate the story.

blueobsidian said:

Filler is a scene that doesn't do anything for your story. It doesn't really develop your characters or advance your plot (or subplots). They just add length to the story without adding substance.

You might not know if something is a filler until after your novel is done. Just write your first draft and don't worry about it. Get everything down on paper. You can make cuts later.

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Filler can also appear within a necessary scene. Like a conversation that wanders off on an uninformative tangent, or rambling internal thoughts that don't reveal anything, or paragraphs of unnecessary description.

A filler can also be a transitional scene... i.e., the main character and his love interest taking a 20-minute cab ride to the airport, then checking their luggage, then waiting in line, all the while chatting about how much they can't wait to get on the plane. You don't need to write those scenes - just skip straight to them getting on the plane.

I like fillers. I understand why they are often cut, because they don't add much to the story, but they can be fairly interesting. In fact, I am intentionally writing what most would consider to be a filler scene, right now, in my WIP. I tell myself that I am writing the scene to develop the romance and give depth to the characters, but I know that in the back of my mind, I am thinking, 'word count'. But...it is a good scene. Will I cut it? Probably.

wannawrite said:

I tell myself that I am writing the scene to develop the romance and give depth to the characters

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If it's really doing those things - I wouldn't consider it a filler. Character and romance development is important. A real filler doesn't do anything.

You shouldn't/can't try to write anything as filler, unless it is part of a scene that you know will come out better after some thought and you just have to go on.. When you are writing, everything is absolutely essential, important, inspired, perfect . But you need to recognize what is filler when editing. Filler is . . . filler. It takes up space, it is nice, but nobody will miss it if you chop it out.

I think filler is common in first drafts, because of the compulsion to "show" everything.

It's okay to gloss over transitional scenes that don't develop the plot or characterization, stuff that would be categorized as filler. I recently cut four chapters of intro/back story down to two in my mss and haven't regretted it. A lot of it was stuff I thought was adding to the story through setting and characterization. But what I gained from taking the relevant parts of those four chapters and condensing them to two was worth it; better pacing and higher tension. Not to mention that I got down to business much sooner, around page 20 instead of 40.

Filler is good for getting the information out of you, but you eventually need to let your "inner editor" off its leash to separate that filler from the precious gems worth keeping.