Unlock the Secrets Behind Writing Fight Scenes That Leap Off the Page
The long answer is going to take a bit of work. Let’s look at each of the rules and see how our horrible fight scene violates each one.
Show, Don’t Tell
Our example scene violates this rule almost continuously. Look at the first sentence:
After taking six or eight or maybe even ten punches and kicks to all parts of his body — such as the solar plexus and shins and head…
The reason this is “telling” is because those punches are all lumped together into one big glop, making it impossible to say with any certainty how many punches there actually were. That’s not showing your reader a movie, it’s just bean-counting.
