The example from Golding'sLord of the Fliesabove illustrates important elements of action scenes: rising and falling action. In a nail-biting action scene, intensity rises and falls from moment to moment. After the boys come across the piglet, there's an uncomfortable, unsettling moment where i...
In practice, writing a realistic fight scene for your novel is one of the hardest things you’ll ever do. That’s because fight scenes can be boring to read. A movie allows the audience to take a passive stance and have the action wash over them. In contrast, reading a fight scene re...
The "Secret" to Writing Award Winning Novels? Followers0 Start new topic Sort By Writing Hot Sex Scenes - Saints Preserve Us! February 9, 2021byChief Editor 5replies 4.8kviews Like Kara, I also don’t write sex scenes. I tried once and failed spectacularly. After listening to Jenna Moreci...
Action scenes are the stock-in-trade of Hollywood’s summer blockbuster. But if the likes ofKung Fu Panda(orThe MatrixorStar Wars) were novels, they wouldn’t be able to use the same extravagant visuals to wow readers on the page. Describing, in detail, the flying fists and impressive f...
I'm always looking for suggestions-- especially for books you like! Please write to me atmeredithsuewillis@gmail.com. I would happily publish your reviews of books! The picture above is of MSW with Bethany Nutter, who was the Top Honors winner for the high school section of the West Virg...
This brings in a new perspective for my action and romance scenes. I definitely will keep this in mind. I never thought that there would be so many parallels between lovers and enemies. Very interesting. I can't wait to put this into practice. ...
***Scenes are bit-by-bit action and/or dialogue. The reader experiences what happens second by second, there is no summary in a scene*** Dilemma Once she has reacted to the disaster, she must face a dilemma. In our example, her dilemma may be that she doesn’t know the attractive ...
In her October 2006 obituary for British romance novelist and former wartime nurse Lucilla Andrews, journalist Julia Langdon noted that Andrews’ ‘personal experiences of war-time nursing provided the backcloth for the hospital scenes in Ian McEwan’s novel Atonement (2006a, para. 1). Langdon ret...
Want to Go Deeper in Scene Design? Check out my new book How to Write a Dynamite Scene Using the Snowflake Method. The book will take you on a deep dive into Scenes and Sequels, with examples from three best-selling novels. See how the masters of the craft have designed dynamite scen...
later in the story. We concur. NOTE: "Plot Point" is defined here as a major occurrence that emphatically changes the course of the story. In the genre novel as a whole, we see three to five major plot points depending on various factors: a first PP that begin...