Revising Fiction II

I got feedback from my Creative Writing II class for my second installment of the book I am writing a while ago.  I just finished updating my piece. 

I knew when I posted it what was going to be the biggest problem and my peers pointed it out.  Too much back story and exposition.  Another big point my peers made  was "Who wants to go to a club to celebrate their birthday and sob about how messed up their life has been?"  Yep, that is what I did!  I went all emo and stuff.

Telling myself a joke:

-Brooke, would you like an emo cheese cake?

-Why would I want an emo cheese cake, Brooke?

-Because it is self cutting just like emo grass.

When I was writing my second submission to the class, I made a big mistake.  I forgot that if I wanted to write a happy scene I had to be in a positive mood.  I used to know this rule about myself, but forgot when I took a break from writing.  I can always write sob stories, but happy stories, I need to be in the right mind set.

So with that in mind, I re-wrote when I was feeling positive and spread my heroine's back history throughout the book.

I added more detail to the bar because it did lack description as my peers pointed out.  I also added a smell of typical club funk when the protagonist walks into the club.  I also make sure that the conversations stayed on point for the most part and did not jump around as much.

People said there was a lot of blushing, so I did a word find, and guess what?  There was a lot of blushing going on.  So with the word finder I found where all the blushing was and changed more than half of them and kept a few.

As to my main character being sweet and innocent.  I never meant to portray her like that, but I want people to take the characters as they will and form their own opinions.  Yes, I want to try and portray her as a nice person who can be considerate and responsible.  When I envisioned her, I envisioned her as an average American.  I thought some of her positive qualities could come from the fact she is a normal person who has made mistakes and has had experience in life.

How many people did you know who got arrested, especially in high school and for dumb stuff?

How many girls in high school got called a slut whether they deserved it or not?

I am keeping her back story as is right now, but I overhauled the chapter that had all of her back story in it.  Hopefully it will not feel as a much as shock with the re-write.

Thank you for the feedback everyone!  It was a help!