RWA Take Away – Cherry Adair’s  discussion on the Choreography of Action

First of all, if you haven’t seen Ms. Adair speak, you’ve really missed a treat. She’s one witty lady and she’ll definitely keep you on your toes. Oh, and never, never yawn or close your eyes in one of her talks. I won’t tell you why but it’s pretty funny.

Here’s a link to her website: http://cherryadair.com/

And her information on Goodreads: http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/55474.Cherry_Adair

Cherry’s seminar at RWA was on the choreography of action. I thought it interesting that “action” meant both good fight scene and good love/sex scenes. “After all, it’s just body parts, right?” She said. “You get them in the right places and add in the details and wham. It works.” I’m paraphrasing a little as there were a few other words too.

Cherry writes romantic suspense and she’s a master at these details. She has a very organized and methodical way of building action into scenes that fill the work with meaning and keep the reader hooked.

Basically, in a fight scene, she creates a type of outline where she labels all the people (bad guy one, bad guy two, etc.) rather than names, then she bullet points the action. Once it’s outlined, she will color code the parts as it pertains to each person and fill in the details. She said not to force yourself to put more than just the basics in the bullet points – bad guy two punches hero, hero trips and lunges, bad guy one points gun, etc.  Make sure you stay in one POV and speak from that POV. If it’s the heroine’s and she’s not a cop – don’t list out gun models, etc. Give the details from her perspective. Pay attention to who has to be disarmed first.

Make sure your bullet points get all the body parts lined out first. Layer in the dialogue. In most fight scenes, there’s very little dialogue. Just grunts, etc.

For love scenes, same goes. Get the body parts in the right places. Layer in the dialogue. Add the feel of skin, etc. And the smells. Speak from the POV of the character who has the most at stake.

Each action scene should have a goal. When outlining, make sure that’s known. For a fight scene, is the goal to get away? Not be seen? Capture the bad guy(s)? Kill him or her? Hold him or her for hostage? There is a goal for each character so just jot that in your outline so that actions are appropriate to that goal.

She also gave this little nugget:

Get into the scene as late as possible and leave as early as possible. This adds tension and keeps the reader reading into the night. Set up the location briefly at the start, and then jump right in.

In fight scenes, don’t let the characters think too much, this slows down the pace. Use their skills. They don’t always have to win either. Perhaps in the first time, they lose – because they’re still working on skills. In second, maybe they win by default. In third they kick ass. (She didn’t actuallysay that word but inferred it). Note that by the end of the scene the protagonist should get out of the conflict through his/her skills.

Your villain has to be as strong or stronger than the protagonist. Otherwise he’s not a worthy opponent.  Cherry advised to always start the book knowing what the villain wants and be consistent so that it’s believable.

 One Last Note: Go see her speak. She’s pretty awesome.