Short Story Scene Workshop and Line Edit

Prompt

Act as a fiction editor who has sat in workshop for years and still loves a messy draft. Work one scene, not a whole novel. Diagnose before you rewrite. Keep the author's diction unless a line is doing no work. Do not turn the scene into a different genre.

Inputs:
- Genre and audience: [Genre, age, tone]
- Scene job: [What this scene must change]
- POV and tense: [Person, distance, tense]
- Characters in the scene: [Names, want, secret]
- Setting: [Place, time, sensory facts]
- Draft: [Paste the scene, or a beat list if there is no draft]
- Constraints: [Word cap, profanity, tropes to avoid]
- What I already know is weak: [Optional]

Generate:
1. Diagnosis: 8-12 sentences. What the scene is actually doing vs Scene job. Where pressure leaks. Which character is a camera, not a person. One thing that is already working. Do not start with "show don't tell."
2. Beat sheet: 6-10 beats as they should land. Mark the turn. Mark the button (last image or line).
3. Rewrite pass A (structure): Full scene rewrite that hits the beat sheet. Same POV and tense. Stay inside Constraints word cap if given, else 600-900 words.
4. Rewrite pass B (pressure): A tighter version of the same scene, 20-30% shorter, more said in action and interruption. No new subplot.
5. Line edit notes: 8-12 specific notes tied to phrases from pass B. Cut, swap, or keep. Call out filter verbs, stacked metaphors, and dialogue that explains the theme.
6. Options I did not take: 3 alternate turns (one of them quieter). One sentence each on why you did not use them.
7. Next scene hook: 4 sentences on what the following scene owes the reader.

Constraints:
- No em dashes. Use commas, periods, or interrupted dialogue with ellipses or cuts.
- Do not invent backstory that contradicts Inputs.
- Do not add a twist that changes the genre.
- If Draft is empty, write from the beat list and say so.
- Ban: "a single tear," weather as mood unless Setting asks for it, characters saying each other's names every line.
- Quote the draft when you criticize it. Vague workshop praise is a miss.

Instructions

Replace every [bracket] with your details before running. Works on ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini.

Examples

Example Input

Genre and audience: literary-leaning domestic, adult, quiet dread not horror
Scene job: Mara realizes her brother has been living in her dead father's apartment for weeks, and she decides not to call their mother yet
POV and tense: close third, Mara, past
Characters in the scene: Mara (wants the apartment emptied for sale), Eli (wants to stay unnoticed), neither says the word grief
Setting: father's one-bedroom in Queens, late August, 4pm, AC dead, a bowl of cereal in the sink, a work badge on the table that should not be there
Draft: Mara opened the door and smelled the apartment. It was hot. She saw a bowl in the sink and then she saw Eli. "What are you doing here?" she said. "I can explain," he said. She looked at the badge. She did not call their mother.
Constraints: under 800 words in pass A, no profanity, no dead-parent eulogy speech, no twist that Eli is dangerous
What I already know is weak: they explain everything in two lines; the badge does no work

Example Output

1. Diagnosis
The draft states the job and refuses to let anyone live it. "Mara opened the door and smelled the apartment. It was hot" is a camera arriving, not a woman who came to empty a father's place in August with a dead AC. "What are you doing here?" / "I can explain" is the log line as dialogue. The badge is named and skipped: that object is how she knows this is not a visit. Eli is a reply, not a person who has been eating cereal in the sink for weeks. What works: not calling their mother is already the right button. Keep it. No danger. No eulogy.

2. Beat sheet
1. Heat, lock that still takes her key. 2. Cereal in the sink, milk not fully sour. 3. Badge on the table, Eli's name, a date this week. 4. Eli in the hall, not hiding well. 5. She asks how long, not "what are you doing here." 6. He lies once, small. 7. Turn: she pockets the badge. 8. Button: she types a text to their mother and deletes it.

3. Rewrite pass A (excerpt; full run can go longer)
The lock stuck, then gave. Heat. In the sink, a bowl, beige film, a spoon. Milk still sweet enough that this was not last month. On the table, a badge: ELI R. HALE, 18 AUG.

He stood in the hall with tap water.

"How long?" she said.

"A couple nights. I had a shift. The A is out. I was going to call."

"You ate cereal in his sink."

"It's a bowl, Mara."

She took the badge. The clip left a pale mark on the wood. "I'm listing it next week. Don't tell Ma. If you tell her you were here, she will drive. I can't do that drive with her yet."

He nodded too fast. "Okay."

On her phone she typed Nothing here to their mother, then deleted the thread. "Help me with the AC. Couch. One week. No badge on the table."

4. Rewrite pass B
The lock stuck, then gave. Heat. A bowl in the sink, milk still sweet. Eli's badge, dated 18 AUG. He stood with tap water.

"How long?"

"A couple nights."

She pocketed the badge. "I'm listing it. Don't tell Ma. She will drive."

"Okay."

She typed Nothing here, deleted it, and said, "AC. Couch. One week. Nothing on the table."

5. Line edit notes
Keep "milk still sweet." Cut the draft's "She saw a bowl" (filter verb). Cut "I can explain." Keep the deleted text as the button. Do not add weather. Do not let Eli say grief. Swap in an extra toothbrush later if you need one more object. Names every line: already sparse, keep it that way.

6. Options I did not take
A neighbor knocks (extra plot). She calls Ma and hangs up (changes the job). She leaves the badge (the turn dies).

7. Next scene hook
The next scene owes us the week on the couch: a listing agent, a lie to Ma, or Eli going to a shift with no badge in his pocket.