Creating amazing action scenes

"Never confuse movement with action." ~Ernest Hemingway



There's nothing like a good action scene to get your heart pumping and glue you to the pages. Even if a story doesn't fall into the thriller or adventure genres, it's not unusual for action to pop up from time to time. I've gathered a few tips to help make these sometimes tricky scenes work. 

• Pace: Action scenes work best when they move fast. Too much description and the excitement quickly wanes. Now isn't the time for back-story or scene-setting passages. Keep to the point and incorporate needed details into the action. 
• Setting: While it's never a good idea to spend much time on descriptions in an action scene, it's still important to ground readers in the story by using a few well chosen setting details. In an action scene, it's best to introduce setting details by incorporating them into the action. Have the characters knock over the multimillion dollar sculpture or put a fist through the dirty, paper thin wall.   
• Structure: Use short paragraphs with short or fragmented sentences to give a feeling of urgency.
• Set-up: If a character needs to be an expert at karate or have on him a certain weapon in order to survive the scene, make sure he uses those skills or that weapon throughout the book to make it believable when he pulls it out during the action.
• Stakes: The most powerful action scenes put characters in a real jam. Maybe he's not only fighting for his own life, but also the life of whomever he loves most, or the lives of an entire city or planet. Have the character desperately need to be somewhere, time is running out, or already out, and the action is delaying him. 
• Verbs: We're all familiar with the passive voice woes. Active verbs, while always a good idea, are especially important in action scenes.
• Dialogue: This isn't the place for long-winded conversations. Short powerful dialogue can often be more effective at keeping readers breathless. 

Tomorrow's post: Beautiful beginnings

Special thanks to Arlee Bird for starting the A to Z Challenge! Visit his blog at http://tossingitout.blogspot.com/

New Sun Rising, paperback launch

 The time has finally arrived, this amazing charity anthology containing short stories (including one of mine ;-), poetry and artwork is now available in print. I love holding a book in my hands and turning real pages! Buy it here: http://www.amazon.com/New-Sun-Rising-Stories-Japan/dp/0987138316/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1353568874&sr=1-2&keywords=new+sun+rising+stories+for+japan

In order to gain maximum exposure, we're asking all those interested to purchase the book at Amazon.com on  Saturday, November 24th. This will create a "chart rush" that will push the book to the top of the Amazon lists and cause more people to see it. Of course, it can be purchased at any time. Every cent, excluding Amazon's small fee, goes to the Japanese Red Cross. Read more about the project and the chart rush here: http://storiesforjapan.blogspot.com/2012/11/new-sun-rising-paperback-launch.html

View the book trailer below:

Spiders

Read my story "The Rules of Magic" in this creepy crawly anthology. Both e-book and paperback editions are available.

Taggers: a review

Taggers by Miles Brandt has within its pages a lot to admire. There are a couple twists that actually made me gasp, one near the beginning that sets the entire novel in motion, and one at the end. I can often see twists coming from a long way off, but this one, the one at the end, completely blindsided me. I think because there's so much that kept my mind fully engaged along the way, I never had time to consider how it would all end. It's packed with spiritual and life philosophy, interesting characters and a very engaging love story.

One of the things I admire most about this book is the way it's written. Using the tools of his trade, right down to paragraph and sentence structure, word choice and tense, Mr. Brandt manages to portray the mental state of his characters, who by the way are escaped psychiatric patients.

I also admire the author's willingness, his fearlessness, to go to uncomfortable places and show us a world none of us would ever want to visit outside fiction. He does so with great honesty and skill, making the tough moments bearable by keeping it real and giving readers a glimpse into broken minds.

A worthy book, indeed.

Visit the kickstarter for Taggers HERE.

Now Available! New Sun Rising: Stories for Japan

The kindle edition of the long awaited New Sun Rising is now available. It's been a little over a year since the earthquake and tsunami devastated Japan, but they still need a ton of help. All profits from this anthology, filled with artwork, photography, poetry and stories, will go the the Japanese Red Cross. Please support this cause and help spread the word. Purchase it at Amazon.com

New Sun Rising: stories for Japan book trailer

The New Sun Rising: stories for Japan now has a book trailer! I'm so honored to be part of this. My story "Moon Kisses" will actually be helping people. Check out the contributors and sample some of their work on the blog: http://storiesforjapan.blogspot.com.au/2012/05/huge-thank-you-to-lisa-scullard-of.html

The book trailer was created by Lisa Scullard of akaVoodooSpice. Even the song was made just for this project, gifted to us by Daniel Christian.

Infodumphobia

I read a lot of unpublished manuscripts. It's something I began doing so other writers would read my in-progress works in return. Over the years, I've grown to love reading stories that aren't available to the general public, some of them quite brilliant, and to give my opinions about how to make the pieces stronger or more accessible. I've learned a lot about my craft this way, as well as from other writers' opinions about my work. I've found some very talented friends in the process.

I've also found a lot of writers who seem to have a literal phobia of the dreaded INFO DUMP. Dun da daaa. It's late, I'm thinking in musical terms as my mind heads toward dreams. I'm getting off track... Okay, right. So these info dump phobes often write about something unique to their story, something that  exists nowhere else in the known universe except their imagined tale, which I applaud very loudly and enthusiastically. The problem arises when they are so afraid to create an info dump that they fail to describe these oddities at all. They mention them, but don't explain what they are. It leaves readers lost.

I'm not endorsing info dumping by any means. It's a writer's job to find creative ways to relay information without resorting to clunky paragraphs that read like dull lists, but, especially in certain cases, the information has to be in there somewhere.  One excellent way to get information across is dialogue. Throw in a character who's as unfamiliar with the oddity as readers and have it explained to him. Or describe how it works through action. Show it at work. And, honestly, sometimes a brief paragraph that simply explains what the thing is works best  and is least intrusive.