A character has to make sense.

When I revise fiction, I come back to a practical question: does this make sense for the person in the scene?

That means looking at what they know, how they address someone, and whether their actions follow from what has already happened. A scene can read smoothly and still need another pass at those details.

Listen to how they speak.

Changing the way two characters refer to each other can change the feeling between them. I pay attention to those choices because the relationship has to live in the language, as well as in the events.

Continuity is part of that work. I want to be able to follow a character from one scene to the next without having to explain away a choice that does not fit.

A draft gives me something to look at closely. Revising it is where I can start to hear what belongs.