Fighting and writing workshop, Day 1: fighting, your characters, and your world

As I mentioned, two weeks ago I said I was going to host an online forum workshop in writing fight scenes -- it was loosely based on one of my own blog posts. It just spun out of control.  Karina Fabian had managed to draft me ... or I volunteered, I'm not entirely certain.  Either way, it was an interesting little experience.



Since most of you folks have been with me for a while, I'm going to give it to you.



Don't worry, I wasn't paid for this, so giving this away for free will hurt no one. And, few to no people wanted to show up and play with my workshop, even though there were over 25 viewers for each post.  But, I've been told few people showed up anyway for the forums, something to do with schedule confusion.



So, since this workshop screwed over my blog posts last week, I figure that I should get some use out of it.



This was the first day.

***

Day One:
Fighting, Your Characters, and Your World.

Before one even gets to writing a fight
scene, you have to answer multiple questions, not only about you
character, but about the world s/he inhabits.

For example: if your main character is
a civilian in the modern world, not only do you have laws to contend
with, but a question of training.

Start with a situation. Your character
is mugged. Some strung-out druggie who needs a fix wants your
character's money. This character has a feeling that things are going
to end badly no matter what s/he does. It is time to resist.

But then you have a problem before you
even get to the technical aspects of writing a fight. Why would your
character know how to fight?

Family – is fighting in the family
business? Mercenary, samurai, knight, military family?

Culture – does your world resemble
Sparta 2.0? Are there laws against fighting? For fighting? Is
dueling outlawed or celebrated?

Profession – is your character a
SEAL? An enthusiastic reservist?

Sports: Does your character like MMA?
Wrestling? Target shooting? Hockey? Soccer? Any of these can be
adapted to create the realities of a fight scene.

Hobbies: Your character may be nothing
more than a smart, reasonable person who believes in self defense.
S/he may also be a ballerina who can launch a nasty spin kick because
that's what s/he did in Swan Lake – don't laugh, it works
for actresses Jennifer Gardner and Summer Glau. S/he may have taken
capoeira because s/he thought it was only a dance class. If
s/he likes to fire off a hundred rounds a week at the local shooting
range, why not? Even the basics of handling a gun can be useful.

As an example, you can check outseveral characters from one of my books.

Now, fight scenes do not necessarily
require fisticuffs. Running away is a good, reliable tactical
maneuver. Your character can always run.

Why does this matter? Establishing your
character's own style of fighting is perfectly reasonable, otherwise,
you have fight scenes that you've stolen from action movies … Yes,
I've done that. Then I took a real self defense system, and I'vesince rewritten every last one scene.

Assignment
#1

1) What are the cultural
rules/legalities of your world when it comes to fighting? In modern
settings, these laws vary by country, and even by state. In New
York, if you defend yourself against an armed mugger, laws can be
used to prosecute you. In Texas, if you defend yourself, you get a
medal.

2) If your character had to fight, how
would they do it? What is the style of fighting your character uses?
It can be straight up punching and kicking, or furious punching and
gouging, or something more informal like Krav Maga, or much more
formal, like Tae Kwan Do. Does your character fight with improvised
weapons, or instead use traps and trickery to dispose of the
adversary? Or (also acceptable) do they run away until they can find
a solid position to fight from?

3) Why does your character know that
system of fighting? If you're writing the character of a Navy SEAL,
that's one thing. If it's the civilian offspring of a military
family, that's another. Does a family member teach the fight system?
Was it something they thought was cool when they were twelve? Did
they read too many thrillers growing up? Did they take ballet, or
soccer, or football – something with a lot of kicking?

Fighting and writing workshop, from the Catholic Writer's Conference: Introduction

Two weeks ago, I had mentioned that I was going to be hosting an online forum workshop in writing fight scenes, for the Catholic writer's guild.  Karina Fabian had managed to draft me ... or I volunteered, I'm not entirely certain.  Either way, it was an interesting little experience.



Since most of you folks have been with me for a while, I'm going to give it to you.



Don't worry, I wasn't paid for this, so giving this away for free will hurt no one. And, few to no people wanted to show up and play with my workshop, even though there were over 25 viewers for each post.  But, I've been told few people showed up anyway for the forums, something to do with schedule confusion.



So, since this workshop screwed over my blog posts last week, I figure that I should get some use out of it.



This is how I began.

*****

Introduction: Writing a fight scene –
Who or what is a “John Konecsni,” and why does he get to tell me
about fighting?

It's a good question, and one that
needs to be answered before many of you begin this workshop. I have
been writing fight scenes since I was sixteen. I've written many
novels, most of which fester on my home computer, and that I
constantly revise the more I learn about life, the universe, and how
to better destroy both. I grew up wanting to write thrillers and
science fiction military novels, and I originally thought the best
way to go about having a fast-moving novel was to have as many fight
scenes as often as possible. Then I read them, and spiked more fights
than I can recall.

In short, I'm a person who has studied
many a fight scene, and has learned from his own mistakes. I mention
this because there will be instances where you will read some of this
and wonder, “Why is he telling me this? Does he think I'm stupid?”

The answer is no, but these were
mistakes that I have made repeatedly over time, and sometimes still
make when I don't think.

One of the documents that you will need
can be found at this link here. It is a collection of “how to” articles for self defense and
fighting. It is a compilation of a lot of basic fighting techniques,
as well as things related to fighting. In short, you don't need any
previous knowledge of any fighting technique, martial art, or even
the basics of street fighting for this workshop. I will, however,
recommend right now that you check out the link, and at least give
each article mentioned a passing glance. They will be used over the
course of the workshop.

References for certain techniques:
http://shar.es/giQgA

References for Non-lethal weapons:
http://www.zarc.com/english/non-lethal_weapons/nlt-usaf.html

References for guns:
http://world.guns.ru/main-e.htm

References for army technology:
http://www.army-technology.com/

Recommended reading:

Bernard Cornwell's Sharpe series
(for fight scenes on both small and large scale)

Lee Child's Jack Reacher novels (for
hand to hand combat)

David Weber's Honor Harrington series
(for navel warfare)

John Ringo's Posleen War, Ghost
and Princess of Wands
series (mostly for hand-to-hand, infantry, and special warfare)

Music Blog: Lindsey Stirling and the Phantom Cellist

Just when you thought I couldn't find anything stranger online, you guessed wrong.

A brief search for Lindsey Stirling on this site will find you a very awesome and talented young lady who dances, prances, and moonwalks, all while playing the violin.

This is a cute video, and it comes from a lot of playing with Shadows.  You'll note that the light is on her face, almost head on with her, broadcasting a shadow on the wall to the left side of the screen .... yet the shadows at her feet are going to the right.  Even if you don't like the music, like the camera work.






Next .... this is just very strange.  Pretty much every bit of star wars music in one clip.  With some funny bits in between.

The best comics of the web

Recently, I've done a run of book blogs -- John Ringo, David Weber, Thrillers, Romance, etc, etc.  Now for something strange: Webcomics.

Don't be fooled. There are some excellently written works out there, that if they were written in prose format, would probably be up for major awards in science fiction and fantasy.  However, since there is a bias against comics, these are generally overlooked. If you don't believe me, asked Neil Gaiman -- when his story for Sandman won the World Fantasy Award for short fiction, they changed the rules so no other comic could win in that category.

Some of my suggestions.

Dominic Deegan: Oracle for Hire: It starts out as a small-town "seer" working for the local population, filled with puns, and a punchline a comic strip .... it ends with major character development, a cast of dozens, and a story arc that makes Lord of the Rings look simple and straight forward.

Day By Day: a political cartoon for those who are generally fed up with politics as usual.  God for those of either side of the aisle, really, but basically right-leaning.

Questionable Content: Basically Left-leaning, but filled with humor about practically every subgenre of the culture, and music, complete with strange anthropomorphic robots .... just go with it, it's fun.

C+A+D on Spartans

Girl Genius: Another epic fantasy story.  If you've ever heard of steampunk, you have the idea .... oh, and there's plenty of basic politics (of the fantasy world, not of this one), and death rays galore.

Ctrl+Atl+Del: This is another unexpected one.  While it is centered around video games and the gamers who play them, there are some unexpected plotlines that are quite stellar .... just keep your eye on the penguin.



Order of the Stick: A very strange comic, drawn in ... stick figure format?  Believe it or not, the artwork aside, it's very standard "bring everyone together to stop the end of the world" fantasy storyline, with a lot of side stories, unexpected character development, and .... oh, yeah, it's within a world completely ruled by the rules for role playing games.

The Gutters on the

new Venom

PhD Comics: for anyone who's ever been to graduate school. Just trust me on this one.

The Gutters:  A relatively new webcomic, dedicated to making fun of the comic book industry, and all of the stupid things they do.

Crimson Dark: If David Weber was a web comic, it would be Crimson dark ... with a few touches of Firefly thrown in.

And, while it is not a web comic..

Masks: a free, online, serialized novel about superheroes.

Whew, got this done in the nick of time.

See you all tomorrow.