Action Heroine Fans discussion

Here's an excerpt from my book. In this scene, Sarah (the main protagonist) will be taught Close Quarters Battle by the British SAS, but first she has to give a demonstration.


Sarah sees that the door handle is on the right side and the hinges are hidden from view, meaning that the door opens inwards. After she enters, she’ll have to sweep left while clearing all of the X-Rays inside the room. Al said that there was only one X-Ray, but he could easily be lying. She’s used to these kinds of tricks during CQB training and even likes to do the same to her men. After all the X-Rays have been dispatched, she can finally handle the HVT.
Sarah first checks that the door is really unlocked, which it is. She stacks up by herself on the left side of the door while preparing her flashbang. She holds the lever with her right to prevent it from detonating and pulls out the pin with her left hand. As per SOP, she keeps the pin in one of the pockets of her black kit. She opens the door with her left hand and rolls the flashbang inside. She immediately closes the door and reaches with her right hand for the Sig Sauer, holstered on her right thigh.
After hearing the flashbang explode, Sarah makes her entry. She ensures the right-front area is clear before sweeping left. SCAN. She sees a target on the right-back side of the room. ACQUIRE. Sarah aims her Sig Sauer towards the centre mass of the target. SHOOT. SHOOT. Sarah fires twice with a shooting method called hammer pairs. ACQUIRE. Sarah makes sure her two shots hit the target. BREATHE. Sarah forces herself to exhale, inhale, and then let out half a breath. SCAN. Sarah keeps sweeping left. She sees that the HVT is stunned by the flashbang but since he’s not holding a weapon, she ignores him for the moment and keeps sweeping left. There’s another target to the left of the HVT, which she also shoots with hammer pairs. Sarah keeps sweeping left to clear the left-front side of the room, but sees no more targets. She does all of this while moving forward towards the HVT, who is already starting to react. All of this happened in only four seconds, from the time Sarah pulled out the pin of her flashbang to this very moment.
Sarah sees the HVT start to reach for his pistol. Quick as lightning, Sarah gives him a left hook to his jaw, flooring him down on his arse. With her pistol pointed at his face, she pulls on his hair with her left hand until he’s facedown on the floor. She holsters her pistol and handcuffs him with the plasticuffs. She frisks him thoroughly and takes the pistol in his waist, a small pistol by his groin, and another on his right ankle. She has to secure all the weapons she finds before storing them in her black kit. Then she pulls on his hair with her right hand and his arms with her left and drags him outside. She throws him face-first on the ground in front of Al and B Squadron.
“Two Tangos… I mean, two X-Rays down, HVT in custody,” says Sarah, securing her pistol and removing her respirator. “All clear and mission accomplished!”


What do you think?

Justin

That's pretty good. Comments are:

1) She doesn't seem to be concealing herself or doing anything to interfere with the enemy's vision.

2) Explaining the term "Hammer pairs" in mid action slows things down too much.

3) That well armed nothing goes wrong, which weakens the tension. Consider slipping in a malfunction.

Personally I tend to explain the weapon in a lighter weight scene,

‘No, he bloody well doesn't.’ Jane had unclipped her energy weapon and was pointing it at Arthur. ‘Not if he wants to live. All right, I get the message. This has been set up by you and the NTSP to grab an Arcturian officer. It hasn't worked. Door! Open! Now! Or I fire.’ She thumbed the safety ring, the double click as the emitter set itself live echoing in the bleak hallway.

then it gets serious.

The door opened, and Duncan Kelso stepped into the room, right hand in a pocket. Jane lined him up in the sights. ‘You are under arrest for kidnapping and attempted murder. Take that hand out of your pocket. Then turn around slowly, keeping your hands where I can see them.’ She flicked the safety ring. The emitter clicked twice as it set itself live.
Kelso's face curled into a sneer as he turned. ‘Little girl, you couldn't do it, you couldn't pull that trigger. Now, you're going to put that toy down, and I'm going to walk out of here.’ His right hand was suddenly holding a revolver.
Jane snapped into the routine. ‘This is your only warning under the rules of engagement, stop what you're doing and surrender, or you may be stopped by deadly force!’
‘Silly little girl, you couldn't-’ he began to raise the revolver to aim at her.
There was a blinding blue flash and a stinging crack from Jane's energy weapon.
Duncan Kelso began to say, ‘What...?’ but he was dead before he finished falling.
‘Oh yes I bloody well could,’ she said, turning the safety ring back to OFF. ‘If it's him or me, then I'm sorry, it's him.’

The point is that I have explained how the safety works in the first scene, which is a standoff, nobody in the end fires, then taken it faster in the real battle.

Justin, I've never been a SWAT or Special Forces team member in my life. That was my problem here; precisely because I'm NOT immersed in that world, the wealth of technical detail you include here that would impress professionals with your accuracy goes over my head and detracts from the momentum of the passage. For instance, I don't know what CQB and HTV stand for, and I don't know what the kind of "X-rays" you're talking about here are, or what they do. And detailed explanations aren't always the answer to that problem either; as R. indicated, they can slow the momentum as well. Most readers want an involving story, not a mini-lesson in special weapons and tactics.

If I were you, I'd rewrite the passage with a lot less jargon, and less movement-by-movement description. You can throw in quick short explanations of things where you absolutely have to for the reader to understand what's going on (the "X-rays" call for some explanation, for instance), but don't overdo it. Also, pay attention to varying your sentence beginnings --you've got an awful lot of sentences starting with "she," which can get monotonous. And you might consider double-spacing between paragraphs.to break up the text bloc, so that it looks less intimidating to the reader.

On the plus side, you definitely make Sarah come across as a tough lady who knows what she's doing. And I like the sprinkling of one-word sentences with a verb in capitals; it enhances the momentum, and makes us feel like we're inside her head, in the action with her.

Hope these comments help in some way!

Hi R. & Werner,

Thanks for the feedback!

Yes, Sarah is a really tough lady. There are a couple of femme fatales in this book that are as tough as she is. How tough? Well, can you imagine a tough girl fighting hand-to-hand combat with someone while her guts are hanging out of her?

I love these kinds of femme fatales. Can anyone recommend me similar books like this?

Justin

Justin wrote: "Well, can you imagine a tough girl fighting hand-to-hand combat with someone while her guts are hanging out of her?

I love these kinds of femme fatales. Can anyone recommend me similar books like this?

Hmmm, that's pretty tough! The only two action heroines in novels that I can recommend from my own personal reading who can match that level of determination, and physical endurance and stamina, to keep fighting in the face of comparable massive injuries, are Rose Agen in and Mina in , respectively written by Billy Wong and Clive Lee (both of whom are members of this group). If I recall correctly, Rose actually does fight with her guts hanging out on at least one occasion.

Thanks for your recommendation! I'll check out Iron Blood.

Justin

Hope you like Iron Bloom, Justin! For whatever it's worth, my review is here: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show... .