beaten up creative writing

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beaten up - quotes and descriptions to inspire creative writing

• blood gushing
• Blood trail
• bloody hands
• broken finger
• wound or injury

There is the damage to the skin, yet the damage to the brain takes far longer to heal. For rewiring back to empathy, to happy memories and a positive sense of self requires the patient layering of neurones daily. The damage of moments requires the healing of years. Being beaten up is, in reality, being beaten down.

Gina walked up the bloody mess on the floor that had been her adversary. He was grotesque. Already his eyes were swollen over and bloody spit drooled from his slack jaws. He was now as revolting as he should be, finally the outside reflects the man within. This cockroach of the law who prevented medicine reaching the sick, who tracked down hard working families who do no more than deliver people what they really want, lies foul in his own fluids. Even if he makes it these scars will be forever. With a wrinkled nose she took a step backwards, it was tempting to whisper something in his ear, that he was broken and she had won, but what was the point. He'd be lucky to remember his own name. She dialled for an ambulance herself, maiming a cop doesn't bring down nearly the same heat as killing one, and this way his walking disfigured face would be a living reminder to his colleagues of what happens to those who mess with Gregor's daughter.

When the dawn comes I can barely move, and not because Darwin is snuggled in so close. Every muscle has seized up. My body is struggling to recover, to repair the damage. Unable to move with any grace my movements are jerky. Darwin wakes, this time not in panic but sleepily. I tuck him back in and he stays, thumb in mouth. I edge into the light that flows water-like through the windows and strip off my topmost layer. On each arm there are great purple welts that will only deepen over the coming week. Against my ghostly skin they are grotesque, but I know I am lucky not to have broken bones...I look as beat up as I did in my early days of training, sparring with guys two heads taller and over twice my mass. At least they didn't go for my face - unlike those gang patsies. I don't need to be walking about looking like I came off worse in a fight so I guess I’m gonna be hauled up here for a while. Without looking in a mirror I know my face is as purple as my arms.

Found in Darwin's Ghost - first draft , authored by daisy .

When Parker first comes into view I don't recognize him, he's too far away and his gait is all wrong. He walks like a scarecrow more than a man and all lop-sided at that. As he nears my heart falls right through my sneakers, he's more purple than brown. His left eye is swollen, he can't be seeing a thing out of that and he won't for a while yet. His face still bears congealed blood and his clothes are an utter mess. Then he tries to say my name, his cracked lips failing at the first syllable, but he doesn't need to, I'm already on my feet and running.

Grayson makes his entrance late. I hear the door swing open more loudly than usual. I don't turn, don't acknowledge him. He's late and I don't play nice when he doesn't show up on time. Then he speaks, I know it's him but the voice is all wrong, like he's speaking while being choked. I turn. In one shattered moment my heart and breathing stop, just stop. He's a bloody mess, nose smashed and eyes almost shut with swelling. His arms are wrapped round his guts like he's holding them in and to be honest he's beat so bad he could be.

Jay lay in the hospital bed, eyes fixed on the window until Lara walked in. He turned, knowing already what face she would make, and she did. Her eyes got that wide look, her bottom lip trembled and she hurried to sit by his bedside. Her eyes walked from one injury to another, taking in the gore that was her husband. Jay could see the conflict already, her wanting to be strong for him and the raw need to weep welling up. "It's alright," he croaked, "you can cry." It was all the permission she needed, head down on the white woollen blanket, minutes passing until she could speak his name.

Ronald could never recall how long the beating had gone on for, only the final kick and the sound of the iron bar falling to the concrete. His face wasn't too bad, just a cut above his eyebrow, the scarlet blood flowing into his eyes. It was his body that was damaged almost beyond the point at which recovery was possible. When the paramedics cut away his clothes the blooming purple patches told of internal ruptures, likely organ damage. They had looked at Ron with encouraging faces but were utterly ashen when he couldn't see them, giving involuntary shakes of their heads. And all the while there was Mera crying in the background like her heart had snapped in two.

The shadows of the beating were on Evan's skin and on his heart. The knowledge that his own brother could do such a thing just broke something inside of him, something that would remain long after his skin and bones were healed. It was a sadness in his eyes, a heaviness, an unyielding sorrow that slowed his speech and robbed him of his once easy smile.

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Stabbed or Scratched: How to Describe Pain in Writing

Think about the worst pain you’ve ever experienced. How would you have described it when you were in the moment? What did it feel like? Did it have a color and texture? Maybe even a sound or a smell? Did it make you perceive your world in different ways? Did you notice what was going on around you? 

Chances are, if you were in enough pain, you probably didn’t notice much beyond, “Wow, this hurts.” It might be after the fact when you start to think more about how pain affects the body and the mind. Although the weird thing about pain is the body is designed to forget it—otherwise no one would ever have more than one child–so it can be hard to recall what exactly it felt like. 

Incidentally, my worst pain was probably giving birth to my son. The epidural had worn off, and it was too late to do anything about it. He was coming, and it was time to push. All I can remember are bright lights, screaming (not sure if that was me or my husband), and a lot of people surrounding me because things weren’t going very well and my little guy was stuck. 

If I had to give it a color, it would have been white or light blue for the lights and uniforms of the medical personnel. If I were giving it a texture, I would say it was smooth, simply because everything was just passing me by like I was sliding through a tunnel until that moment of absolute relief when the worst of it ended with a healthy baby boy placed in my arms. 

When it comes to writing about the pain your characters experience, you need to walk a fine line between taking your reader along to feel that pain without beating them over the head with it (which would also be painful).

With all that in mind, let’s talk about how to describe pain in your writing. In this article, we’ll go over:

• Challenges of writing pain
• Tips for writing about pain
• A list of pain descriptions you can use in your writing

Challenges of Writing Pain

Of course, one of the challenges of writing about pain is that everyone experiences it differently. What might feel like off the charts pain for one person might just be another day in the life of someone who lives with a chronic illness. A splitting migraine for you might feel like a normal headache to your neighbor. 

We also express pain in different ways. Some people try to suppress it and pretend they’re absolutely fine, while others will make sure you know about every single ache and stitch they’re experiencing. Multiple times. And of course, there are the majority of people who will fall somewhere in between. 

The other challenge with writing pain is that it can feel like a real drag to read paragraphs of how much something hurts. 

Consider the following paragraph…

“She dragged herself up as needle-sharp bolts shot through her shoulder, her teeth clenching so hard her jaw ached. Her body trembled and sweat dripped down her forehead as she groaned. When she inhaled, another flash of pain had her seeing double as her head throbbed and her arm felt like it had been cut in two. She stumbled, clutching her flaring limb as her vision went dark and waves of agony seared through her body.”

OKAY, enough already. 

She hurts, we get it. 

You can see from that paragraph how easy it is to go from describing pain in your character to inflicting pain on your reader. It’s a fine line that, like anything, you can get better at with practice.

Tips for Writing About Pain

And of course, to help you out, we’ve got some tips to make it even easier to learn the intricacies of writing about pain. 

Consider the pain level

Not all pain is created equal and some will impact your life in large ways, while others will be nothing more than a minor inconvenience. You can divide your character’s pain into four categories:

• Mild/minor/low: This is the kind of pain that is a little annoying but doesn’t hamper you. A mild headache or a sore muscle. Use words like pinch, sting, stiff, sore. 
• Moderate/medium: This is a higher level of pain that doesn’t debilitate but still  distracts your character from a task or breaks their concentration. Here, you might use words like ache, throb, or flare. 
• Severe/high: This is a type of pain that prevents your character from doing pretty much anything. It’s the kind of pain that will have them laid up in bed. Consider words like anguish, stabbing, or torturous. 
• Obliterating/extreme: This, of course, is the kind of pain that will have your hero writhing on the ground, unable to think of anything else, even pushing away thoughts of how to actually stop it. Think of words like shredding, twisting, knifing, or ripping. Ouch. 

You can also consider the injury and what kinds of pain would result, such as:

• Getting stuck with a pointed object like a sword or tree branch: pricking, drilling, penetrating, stabbing, piercing
• Getting cut with an object like a blade or knife: slicing, cutting, lacerating, sharp
• Having something tear like a muscle or a joint: pulling, wrenching, tearing
• Getting crushed by something heavy like a stone or piece of a crumbling building: pressing, crushing, tight, squeezing, heavy
• Getting whipped or lashed by magic or a whip: whipping, searing, lashing, lacerating
• Getting burned by cold or hot things like fire or ice: scalding, burning, aching, tingling, freezing, numbing, scalding
• Getting attacked by some kind of magic or curse: cruel, vicious, torturing, twisting, writhing

Less is sometimes more

Remember above when we talked about how it can be a drag to read endless paragraphs about how much your character hurts? With that thought in mind, keep your descriptions tight and resist the urge to wax on for too long about it. 

Conversely, if your character just got shot or got a knife in the gut, don’t forget about the pain a moment later. A serious injury doesn’t just magically disappear (unless you’ve created your world that way) just because the action is picking up. Sprinkle in gentle reminders that the injury is still present and affecting your character’s ability to get to their goal. 

After the fact, don’t forget to also allude to it from time to time as they’re recovering. If they’ve been seriously injured, then they’re bound to feel pain as they heal, too. But as we’ve mentioned, keep it brief and treat it with a light hand. Just a mention here or there to weave it into the details with the rest of your story. 

Show, don’t tell

Oh man, not this again. But yes, with pain, this rule is even more important. Don’t tell us it hurts. Tell us what it feels like. If your character has just been stabbed, talk about how it feels like an iron hot poker has just been shoved through their gut. If they’re being crushed by a heavy object, talk about how they’re having trouble breathing. If they’re being tortured, talk about the way they’re trying to detach from the pain and send their mind into protection mode. 

Give your pain consequences

There should be a consequence for the pain, otherwise what’s the point of hurting your character? (There is one exception to this that I’ll talk about in a minute.) Think about what the pain prevents them from doing. If they’ve been stabbed, can they rescue the handsome prince from the tower? 

Think about how much you want pain to play a role in your story. Do you want your reader to believe your character might not make it? Using pain as a plot device is an effective way to drive up the stakes and is a great way to show that “end of the world” moment for your down-on-their luck character. 

Give your character chronic pain

Chronic pain is something many people live with and yet, we don’t tend to see it represented that often in books. Chronic pain can come in the form of a disease or disability, or something like chronic migraines. How you choose to portray that pain and what you do with it is up to you. 

I mentioned above that not all pain needs to serve a purpose, and this is where chronic pain comes in. It doesn’t need to stop the character from doing anything, but it can be used to show how it affects their life, simply because that’s how people sometimes live. And it definitely doesn’t need to be “cured.” In real life, it rarely is, so for a character to simply exist with this as a part of their day to day is perfectly fine.

In fact, the trope of “healing a disability” is one that’s fallen out of favor and can actually be considered problematic. If you do choose to write about chronic pain or disability, be sure to get yourself a sensitivity reader to ensure you aren’t leaning into negative stereotypes or harmful tropes. 

Research your ailments

Pain is one of those things you want to get right. While you can get away with a lot in fiction, especially if you write speculative fiction, pain and injury are pretty universal ideas. 

If one of your characters gets shot or knifed in the stomach in one scene and they’re making dinner plans and heading to the gym in the next, your readers are going to give you the side eye. 

Yes, it’s fiction and the pain tolerances of fictional characters can be different from real life people, but within limits. 

If you’re writing a fantasy creature that heals quickly, that might be one way to overcome an extreme injury. Or maybe you’re writing a thriller with a Jack Ryan-type hero who would never let a little bullet wound get in his way. 

But for most, breathing, living characters, getting their arm nearly hacked off is going to take them down. Make sure you’re exercising realistic limits of pain tolerance.

The blog Script Medic is a great place to start where a medical professional breaks down various injuries for writers. It’s a great way to get information without filling your search history with things the FBI might investigate you for.

Pain Descriptions

Here are some words and phrases to help you describe pain in writing. Obviously, this isn’t an exhaustive list, but this should help get you started:

• A pale complexion
• Arching of the back
• Avoiding others
• Begging to die
• Biting a bottom lip
• Blacking out
• Blotchy skin
• Blurred vision
• Body going into shock
• Calling for help or aid
• Clenched hands and limbs
• Clenching or grinding of teeth
• Dark hollows under the eyes
• Darkness in the corner of vision
• Dragging one foot
• Drinking excessive alcohol
• Drooping eyelids
• Eyes squeezed shut
• Flinching at contact
• Gingerly moving about
• Glassed over eyes
• Gripping another person for help
• Haggard expression
• Hands gripping clothing
• Hanging on to the wall or furniture for support
• Hunched shoulders
• Hyperventilation
• Impatient gestures
• Limp arms, legs, hands, or fingers
• Looking away
• Mouth hanging open
• Nostrils flaring
• Praying to gods of deities
• Repeating oneself
• Rocking or swaying back and forth
• Rubbing areas of pain
• Sawing breaths
• Short, panting breaths
• Shuddering breaths
• Standing still
• Starbursts or floaties in the eyes
• Stilted gait
• Sweat on the brow
• Taking medication
• Tapping the foot
• Taste of blood or copper in mouth
• Tears or wet eyes
• Tentative steps
• Tight muscles and limbs
• Walking stiffly
• Watering eyes

By now, you’re hopefully a bonafide expert on the art of writing pain. As with anything, make sure you’re reading lots of books where pain is described. It can help you see what works and, maybe more importantly, what doesn’t. If you’re reading a book and the character’s pain is starting to feel like a drag, then that’s a good sign the author has taken it too far. 

But if you find yourself aware of the pain, but not distracted by it, then that’s a sign they’ve done their job well. 

If you found this article useful, be sure to visit our growing database of articles at DabbleU . We’re adding new ones every week to help you become your best writing self. We even make it super easy for you and send you all our latest tips, advice, and tricks when you sign up for our weekly newsletter . 

Nisha J Tuli is a YA and adult fantasy and romance author who specializes in glitter-strewn settings and angst-filled kissing scenes. Give her a feisty heroine, a windswept castle, and a dash of true love and she’ll be lost in the pages forever. When Nisha isn’t writing, it’s probably because one of her two kids needs something (but she loves them anyway). After they’re finally asleep, she can be found curled up with her Kobo or knitting sweaters and scarves, perfect for surviving a Canadian winter.

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What's the defining line between sci-fi and fantasy? There's actually a lot more to it than magic versus technology.

Does science fiction alone feel too limiting for your vast imagination? Do you feel like your fantasy world could use a dash of futuristic technology?

Prose describes how you write your book, and it can be challenging to get right. So, in this article, we cover what makes good prose.

How to Get Violence Right in Your Fiction

Today’s guest post is by Fred Johnson ( @fredbobjohn ), an editor with  Standout Books .

For new writers, throwing in a few combat scenes can seem like an easy way to add some excitement to a novel, but the reality is that violence can be incredibly difficult to pull off effectively.

There are many pitfalls writers will fall into when writing about violence—I want to talk about what they are and how you can avoid them. In their places, I’ve offered up two main alternative methods that I think work for ninety percent of combat scenes.

Violence: The Detailed Method

If you’re writing a fight or battle scene in genre fiction, detailed description will be the way to go nine times out of ten. This is because a fight scene of any scale and duration is likely to involve two or more people tied up in an incredibly fast-paced and complex process. Detailed description serves to guide the reader through the confusion and helps your readers suspend their disbelief.

Some of the worst combat scenes I’ve ever edited have read along the lines of:

“Bob disarmed the guard and killed the seven men behind him.”

What? How did he do that? He’s a single guy against eight assailants! Did he click his fingers and they all dropped dead?

Don’t be like the author of Bob’s brief fight—you need to make your readers believe it’s possible that your James Bond-esque hero shot his way through two hundred trained henchmen, despite what their brains are telling them.

Combat needs to be specific and it needs to be rooted in concrete actions. This is doubly true if it’s a case of an underdog protagonist surmounting impossible numbers—after all, for the reader to stay immersed in your book’s story, they need to be able to believe the story’s events. If those events are too preposterous, that’s it—you’ve lost your readers.

Take, for example, this scene from fantasy writer David Gemmell’s White Wolf :

When the death blow came it was so sudden that many in the crowd missed it. Agasarsis lunged. Skilgannon met the attack, blocking the lunge and rolling his blade round the sabre of Agasarsis. The two men leapt back. Blood suddenly gushed from Agasarsis’s severed jugular. The champion tried to steady himself, but his legs gave way, and he fell to his knees before his killer. Servaj realized that, even as he parried, Skilgannon had flicked the point of his sabre across the throat of his opponent. Agasarsis pitched face forward to the earth.

Every movement and detail is picked apart here, slowed down, and recounted by a third-party spectator. The result is a climactic and vivid end to an important encounter.

It’s for the same reason that action movies favor slow-motion effects and sharp editing—the incredibly complex and unlikely actions presented need to be slowed down and examined to be believed. Imagine if, in The Matrix , Neo and Trinity simply arrived to rescue Morpheus and told him “Oh yes, we killed those fifty guardsmen downstairs. No sweat.” No—we need to see it to believe it. And this is much the same for books.

Violence: The Implicit Method

The alternative method to writing good violence only works in certain situations, and is favored in literary fiction and detective novels. The method operates around what is left unsaid; consider Myrtle’s death in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s enormously popular novel The Great Gatsby :

A moment later she rushed out into the dusk, waving her hands and shouting—before he could move from his door the business was over. The “death car” as the newspapers called it, didn’t stop; it came out of the gathering darkness, wavered tragically for a moment, and then disappeared around the next bend.

The precise moment of Myrtle’s death is lost here—we don’t see the impact or hear the scream, and yet we know with terrible certainty that Myrtle is dead. This kind of quiet violence gains power through how understated it is, and is totally reliant upon the power of context. When attempting an implied moment of violence yourself, your prose has to boil over. You’ll want short, punchy sentences and resonant concrete images. For example, this fight between two antagonists is from a fantasy novel I edited recently:

The final blow struck Samson hard in the chest. He reeled back, his knees trembling like aspens before giving way beneath him. The hooded woman watched him fall, saw his eyes widen. Slowly, she drew the long dirk from her boot and ran her finger along its edge. “You’re in for a long night,” she said softly.

It’s the equivalent of when, in a movie, the door swings closed on the man bound to the chair in the mafia den. The scene cuts off, and although we don’t see anything, we all know bad things are happening.

So there we have it. Now, reducing good violence down to two alternative rules might seem rather limiting–I have, after all, suggested either spelling everything out in candid, straightforward language or giving the reader just enough so that she/he can work out what’s going to happen. It could be said that I haven’t left much room for any middle ground.

But, of course, great writers will always find ways to flout these rules and guidelines, so don’t feel like you have to limit yourself–writing is an art, not an exact science, and there’s always room for experimentation. That said, to break the rules, you have to first be aware of them.

Now get out there and give your characters the violent triumphs they deserve.

Fred Johnson is an editor for Standout Books , where he helps authors take their manuscripts from good to perfect. He also writes fiction and poetry, and can be found on Twitter at @FredBobJohn .

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[…] view post at https://janefriedman.com/get-violence-right-fiction/ […]

This is a much-needed essay. As one who has lived in and with violence as a combatant, I find that the vast majority of fictional violence is either ineptly gratuitous or, as William Manchester said, romantically understated.

Neither extreme works; ‘blood gushing’ is a term I hate to see, because that condition is part of the context of combat. To an outsider, it’s horrific, but to a combatant it’s a part of the scenery, and it can make tenuous one’s footing, one’s hold of a weapon. (Blood doesn’t gush, not really. It can flow smooth and thick, or spurt from an arterial laceration, and its predominant sensation to the fighter is its signature coppery-fecal smell. I hate that smell.)

Romantic understatement doesn’t work either, because combat is the most profanely overstated of actions. Every detail is magnified; the kick of an AK is always unexpectedly harsh, and the feeling of one’s knife striking bone is always jarring.

This is, however, from the perspective of one to whom violence is familiar. To those fortunate ones who have escaped its fell effects, what I might consider an accurate description would probably come off as oddly dispassionate, and focused on the strangest of things, like the way dust puffs off a man’s jacket when he’s shot. Those are the details that hold the eye, but I suspect they do not hold the reader’s imagination.

Hi Andrew, I’m glad you enjoyed the article. I certainly can’t speak from the perspective of someone who has experienced combat, so your insights are especially valuable and interesting. That said, I think you’re absolutely right about the magnification of detail–this is what makes violence so shocking, and is something writers need to pay special attention to replicating. I love your detached details–dust puffing from a jacket would make for a wonderful image in-text.

Very helpful. Thank you. On the creative writing course I did we analysed some passages from Hemingway and Dickens. But it is hard if you don’t really know what happens in a fight or when someone is beaten up, for example, as I have found in writing about domestic violence. A little help from my friends was needed in order to produce the kind of slow-motion detailed account you recommend.

Super helpful. Thank you!

You’re very welcome, I’m glad the post helped you out.

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WRITERS HELPING WRITERS®

Helping writers become bestselling authors

How To Write Characters With PTSD

January 11, 2018 by BECCA PUGLISI

So excited to have Lisa Hall-Wilson here today to share some insight on how to write PTSD realistically…

Hey hey! *mittened fist-bump* 😊 Thanks so much for having me!

Writers are always looking for ways to add authenticity to their stories and characters, so I thought I’d share some down and dirty deets about living with PTSD.

Why Write About PTSD?

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) has been called shell shock and historically was lumped in with ‘hysteria’ for women. You can research this mental illness, the causes, and the symptoms, ( here’s a great link ), but I’m more interested in helping you write it with accuracy.

Giving characters a traumatic past and an ongoing condition that hinders their ability to move on is essential to a great character arc. The character struggling with PTSD is facing overwhelming odds, and any character who stands up to a bully of any kind (even when it’s disguised as a mental illness) is someone readers will cheer for.

To that end, I’d like to share five tips for writing a character with PTSD.

#5 – Avoid Recalling Traumatic Events

Don’t let your characters spend time navel-gazing about the events that traumatized them. (I’m talking more about backstory than nightmares or flashbacks.) Yes, I’ve seen this. Who wants to dwell on that or talk about it at all? Instead, show the coping mechanisms used to control the symptoms or turn their mind off. Show symptoms of anxiety and then send them for another lap around the block even though they’ve already done 5 more than usual.

The emotions and physical symptoms left by the trauma are so uncomfortable your character will proactively seek a way to get control, but they will avoid thinking about the why .

#4 – Show The War Going On Inside Your Character

When PTSD is triggered, everything amps up like an adrenaline rush is forced on you and won’t stop—in other words, you don’t need a flashback to show it. At the same time, the mind is ramping up your body and simultaneously trying to regain control of the physical response. Basically, when PTSD is triggered, your character will be at war with themselves.

The physical symptoms are easy to show; just write what’s happening to their bodies. Let internal dialogue focus on their awareness of being irrational, that there’s no threat, yet they’re unable to feel safe. They’ll struggle to control, to conceal, to minimize what others can see. Get it? I’m a BIG fan of Deep POV so I focus on showing the primary emotions through physiology and internal dialogue and showing secondary emotions through outward actions and spoken dialogue. (For more info on this, you can get my Writing Emotions In Layers 5 day ecourse here for FREE.) I think the Netflix series Jessica Jones shows this very well, so consider that as a possible resource.

#3 – PTSD Is About Minimizing Triggers

Those managing PTSD will have a proactive (but not necessarily healthy) strategy to manage symptoms. Some methods might be subtle while others are extreme. When triggered, survival instincts kick in and your choices are simple: fight, flight, or freeze . Do you know what your character’s primal goal is when they’re triggered? Is it safety? Is it survival? Is it escaping? Have them seek that out at all costs.

They could have a mantra they recite to control their thoughts. They might have a safe person, someone they trust to watch their backs in new or upsetting situations. Grounding techniques involve consciously cataloguing why the what-ifs won’t happen ( There are two exits, It’s a public space , etc.). The slow removal of their dependence on these management techniques is a great way to show growth.

#2 – Give Them A Tell

Self-awareness is critical for management. Your mind starts the whole ball rolling and sets your body off: I’m not safe. I’m not safe . It’s very hard to catch this mental initiation; more often your body tips you off that your mind is racing. The self-awareness has one purpose: to enable you to manage what you see coming.

I have a couple of tells that always tip me off: blushing and sweating—profuse sweating disproportionate to the environment. Does your character have a physical symptom they’ve trained themselves to watch for? Have your character become more self-aware throughout the novel. Let them become more aware of the problematic thoughts jumpstarting the crazy train. They’ll want to hide what’s going on because it makes others uncomfortable (people stare, they avoid the character, or treat them differently). Show the character’s awareness of the stigma, and let them fail from time to time.

#1 – Blindside Your Character

You can be blindsided by a trigger at any point. A situation that’s been fine a thousand other times can trigger you that one day. This is a great device to save for a pivotal conflict.

It’s like a two-by-four to the head. Show their emotional wounds bleeding all over the floor and have them keep going anyway. Show them growing stronger, trusting people again, forgiving themselves, etc. Let the whole process be messy, two steps forward and one step back. The stories that end in a pretty bow and leave everyone “cured” simply aren’t authentic.

TIP from WHW: For brainstorming help when it comes to possible conflict scenarios that can challenge your character (or trigger them), try the Conflict Thesaurus .

Have a question you’d like to ask about writing PTSD in fiction with realism? What’s the most compelling portrayal of PTSD in fiction you’ve seen so far?

Lisa Hall-Wilson is an award-winning journalist and author. She’s passionate about helping writers take their craft to the next level. Lisa’s next class is Method Acting For Writing: Learning To Write In Deep POV on January 22. At the heart of Deep POV is an immersive experience for the reader through an emotional connection to the character. There are a number of stylistic choices an author makes to facilitate this. This interactive 3-week intensive gathers ten years of in-the-trenches study and writing all in one place to help you write better faster.

Becca Puglisi is an international speaker, writing coach, and bestselling author of The Emotion Thesaurus and its sequels. Her books are available in five languages, are sourced by US universities, and are used by novelists, screenwriters, editors, and psychologists around the world. She is passionate about learning and sharing her knowledge with others through her Writers Helping Writers blog and via One Stop For Writers —a powerhouse online library created to help writers elevate their storytelling.

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Reader Interactions

August 26, 2021 at 6:05 pm

Honestly this really helped me! In the third book in my series one of the four main characters has gone through a set of tortures and he has PTSD and panic attacks. Now I’m editing the draft I wanted to make more of his attacks realistic and this helped!

August 13, 2019 at 4:16 pm

Trigger Warning – Sexual Topics

Charlie in “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” portrays PTSD from child abuse very well. I have PTSD from child abuse, but constantly run into people who think PTSD must be for soldiers who were in combat, for women who were sexually assaulted, or (less commonly) for little boys who were molested. All of those things can certainly cause PTSD, but you can get PTSD from anything your brain perceives to be traumatic. There’s no list of things that absolutely will or will not give someone PTSD.

July 25, 2019 at 3:09 pm

My story’s antagonist is stalking/tailing the protagonist to try and discover her secret (membership in a particular group). I want to humanize him. Would any aspect of PTSD lead a person to obsessively tail someone?

October 17, 2020 at 7:50 pm

I know this was a long time ago that you asked, but I can answer! No, there is none. However, if your antagonist knows the protagonist personally/cares deeply about her, you could give him something like borderline personality disorder, in which case he would be so obsessed with keeping her in his life and not losing her that it leads him to do terrible things.

January 16, 2018 at 9:58 pm

Another good Netflix one, like Jessica Jones, is The Punisher. It has several characters that portray varying degrees of PTSD, covers multiple causes, and how differently it can be handled and dealt with. It’s one of the most compelling representations that I’ve seen.

January 17, 2018 at 12:28 am

Yes – Watched both seasons of The Punisher (and the season where that character appears in Daredevil). I really liked how they portrayed it on that show. You’re right – PTSD can vary between individuals as well as in intensity, frequency of attacks and triggers.

January 12, 2018 at 4:40 pm

Have you spoken to a psychiatrist? they could probably help you a lot with your ‘how to write characters with PTSD’, I agreed with Angela who says it is very complicated and individual.

January 13, 2018 at 2:15 pm

Absolutely it’s individual and I was admittedly diagnosed with a mild case of it. There is a wide spectrum of symptoms and severity. I tried to give a basic outline for mild to moderate PTSD – and of course I’m not trying to give actual medical advice here in any way. I just see it written about in ways that are unbelievable. As with any writing advice, your mileage may vary.

January 12, 2018 at 7:34 am

The most compelling portrayal of PTSD in fiction I have seen so far is season 4 of Legend of Korra. A group of four assassins tries to kill Korra in seasons three. Her friends save her but three of the assassins die. season 4 deals with her physical and mental recuperation, dealing flashbacks while trying to stop a tyrant from controlling one of the four Kingdoms. Before the final confrontation with the tyrant, she talks with the assassin that survived in his jail cell. He declared that the tyrant needed to be stopped when Korra told that he is partly to blame for the rise of the tyrant and only offered to help Korra get over her mental block so that she can stop the tyrant. Korra tried once before and she was triggered and saw her violent face on the tyrant face as the mental block.

January 12, 2018 at 2:43 pm

Sounds interesting. Will have to check it out. Thanks for sharing!

January 14, 2018 at 2:24 am

You should start with season one of Avatar The Last Airbender to get the full story. Legend of Korra is the squeal to The last Airbender. Both are animated series that aired on Nickelodeon.

January 11, 2018 at 9:55 pm

Great post, Lisa. PTSD is something we touched on a bit in our last book, but no where as in depth as we could have – it is a very complicated and individual outcome as a result of trauma. These are great tips to keep in mind.

January 12, 2018 at 8:05 am

Thanks for having me! The best way to make our writing authentic is to talk to someone who’s been there.

January 11, 2018 at 2:52 pm

I just wrote a character with PTSD last year, basing it on my own (mild) PTSD experiences. I did focus mostly on his coping mechanisms, and what happened when accidentally triggered. So this blog confirmed that I was, indeed, doing it right. Thanks so much for clearing it up!

January 11, 2018 at 9:44 pm

Awesome! Glad you found it helpful.

January 11, 2018 at 9:25 am

Great post! I’m writing a story with PTSD–the complex kind, so it’s a good post for me.

January 11, 2018 at 10:39 am

Glad you found it helpful!

January 11, 2018 at 9:13 am

Thanks so much for having me, Becca! I’ll hang around for the next couple of days and answer questions. 😀

[…] fatigue is a real ailment and, like any real-life element, it needs to be represented accurately. If you’ve suffered with this condition, you’ll have firsthand experience and it will be easier […]

[…] How To Write Characters With PTSD […]

[…] Netflix show Jessica Jones features a character struggling with PTSD. She numbs her feelings and quiets her thoughts/self-doubt/guilt through alcohol because […]

Writing Realistic Injuries By Leia Fee, with additions by Susannah Shepherd

Quick contents.

Introduction General remarks What's  normal? Reactions to injury - including emotional reactions, fainting and shock. Minor injuries - such as bruises, grazes and sprains Head injuries - from  black eyes to severe concussions Broken bones   Dislocated joints Cutting and Piercing - for various locations, including blood loss symptoms and figures. Blunt trauma - getting hit, internal injuries. Burns - including electrical burns Hostile environments - such as extreme cold and heat, oxygen deprivation and exposure to vacuum. References - useful websites.

Introduction     

Characters climbing cliffs with broken arms or getting knocked out for an hour or so and then running around like nothing happened, bug me.  It doesn't take much longer to get it right, and I've found that getting doing the research to get it right can often lead to whole new story possibilities I hadn't thought of before.

I’m not any sort of medical expert - research for this article has come from a variety of sources from medical texts to personal experience – (I’m just a teeny bit accident prone…)   I do historical reenactment and a large part of information here comes from the ‘traumatic injury’ (or ‘the nasty things that can happen to you in combat’ information we give the public and new members to make them go ‘urggh , I’m glad this isn’t for real’.

Back to Quick Contents

General Remarks

There’s a lot of ‘relatively’ and ‘probably’ in this article because everyone reacts differently to injury.

Oh and before I start - one pet peeve… ‘laceration’ does not mean ‘a very bad cut’ – it is a term for a specific type of wound caused by the tearing rather than the slicing of the skin.   It’s the sort of cut you get from being hit with a blunt object (or a fist).

What’s Normal…?

For a normal, reasonably healthy adult the following reading are ‘normal’.   Some variation is usual and what’s normal for one person may be abnormal for another.

Pulse rate between 60-100 beats per minute.   A fitter person will have a rate towards the slower end of the margin and a child or young person will have a naturally high rate.   Any drastic increase or decrease in pulse rate is cause for concern.

Blood pressure 120-140 over 70-90.   This can vary with the time of day, amount of stress and a number of other factors.   High blood pressure is not usually immediately dangerous but can cause long term damage.   Low blood pressure can cause faintness, dizziness and blackouts and is usually a sign that there is an underlying problem to be treated.

Body Temperature 36°C (98.6°F) to 37.5°C (99.5F).   Relatively minor variations in temperature are cause for concern.  

Reactions to Injury

Everyone is unique and will react differently.   Some people yell and scream when they are hurt, others will keep quiet.   Some will insist that they’re perfectly fine and be annoyed by attempts to help.   Some people are very squeamish and find the idea of how badly they’re hurt more traumatic than the actual injury.   Find out how the character you’re writing an injury for reacts and stick to it unless you have very good reason not to.  

Can be caused by pain, fear, surprise, or other emotional stress and is usually not a major problem as long as they wake up within a few seconds.   Immediately after fainting a person’s pulse would be very slow but recover quickly.

Can follow many injuries and can be as dangerous or more so than the actual injury.   It is not just a case of someone suffering from a nasty fright because they got hurt.

Symptoms include:

Pulse and respiration abnormally fast or slow, Pale, clammy skin, Shakiness, Dilated pupils, Confusion.

Someone suffering from shock should be lain down and kept warm.

Minor Injuries

Bumps, bruises, cuts and grazes are all inconvenient but not incapacitating.  

A blow to a bony part of a limb or to a joint hurts a lot at the time of impact (as anyone who’s banged their shin will agree) and may swell and stiffen.   The impact may also have the effect of temporarily disrupting the ‘power supply’ to the limb meaning the person getting hit is likely to lose their grip on anything they’re carrying and be unable to move the joint for a few minutes.

Bruises can take anything from a few seconds to over a day to appear and anything from a day to several weeks to fade away again.   Soft fleshy areas bruise much more colourfully.

Sprains and torn muscles / tendons and so on will stiffen, swell and become more painful after a few hours.   A bad sprain can be every bit as incapacitating as a broken bone. 

Head Injuries

Probably the most common injury in fiction.   From “let’s bash the bad guy over the head to stop him running after us” to those scenes where everyone gets thrown all over the flight deck by the first bit of turbulence and bounce their heads off consoles.

Minor Head injuries

The human skull is pretty robust and designed to take a fair amount of punishment.   Consequently the occasional bump won’t do all that much damage.  

A minor bump on the head may leave a character feeling dazed and suffering from a headache, blurred vision and ringing ears but will clear within a few minutes.

Facial bruising is actually quite uncommon, it takes quite a hard blow or a blow that impacts with the soft tissue around the eyes to leave a mark.

Minor cuts and lacerations on the scalp and face will hurt and bleed out of all proportion to their seriousness.

Medium Head Injuries

A more forceful blow (equivalent to a fall of several feet) can lead to complications of the injury.

Concussion (damage to the brain tissue) is quite common after a hard blow to the head and is often accompanied by temporary unconsciousness.   (And it should be very temporary if you don’t want your character to be permanently damaged).   This can also result in dizziness, nausea and, not surprisingly, a nasty headache.  

Medium cuts and lacerations will be painful and messy but not dangerous.    There may be scarring.

Severe Head Injuries

A blow to the head resulting in prolonged unconsciousness will almost certainly result in brain damage, possibly a fractured skull and bruising or bleeding within the brain itself.   It can be fatal either straight away if the damage is extensive enough or later as the blood from the injury causes pressure to be put on the brain.

Severe cuts can damage muscle and sinew and do permanent damage.   The pain from such injuries would have most characters unable to concentrate on much else.

Confusion, disorientation, memory loss, Dizziness, headache (lingering after the first few hours) Nausea, vomiting, Pupils uneven in size and/or reaction, Sluggish reactions, sleepiness.

Any painkillers given to treat the headache must be non-narcotic and relatively mild.   Otherwise it is difficult to tell if sleepiness is caused by a worsening of the injury or by the painkillers.

Someone suffering from a suspected head injury should be watched for at least 24 hours, and woken every few hours if they’re asleep, to check for the above symptoms.

Broken Bones

In general they hurt.   A lot.   Any character with a broken bone (with the possible exception of the ribs which I’ll come on to in a minute) is going to know about it and not be very happy.   Saying that, it is possible that if there is  no displacement they might not hurt much at all, and it may not be immediately obvious that the bone is actually broken.

The initial shock and pain is often enough to cause unconsciousness – Vila is perfectly justified in passing out when having his arm set in Powerplay .   Keeping the limb immobile will minimise the pain but any pressure or movement is going to be extremely unpleasant.

Severe breaks (compound fractures) can cause part of the bone to protrude through the skin, this will also cause blood loss, which can be severe enough to be dangerous.   Nerves and blood vessels can also be permanently damaged.  

Smaller bones are obviously more likely to break than larger ones but I can assure you from personal experience that they hurt every bit as much.

Distinguishing between breaks/sprains is not always easy with just 'it hurts to go on but as a guide...  Lots of pain but some movement is a relatively good thing -- it indicates 'just' a tear. Less pain but very limited movement is a worry, because it can mean you've snapped something, and the joint becomes useless without surgery.

Broken Ribs

All sorts of nasty complications can arise here.   For a start, though a character who has just broken a rib will feel winded and uncomfortable, the initial discomfort will pass quickly and they may feel fine for some hours afterwards.   Possibly they may not even realise that they had broken anything.

After a few hours it will start to hurt badly and breathing may be impaired and painful.  Problems can occur when the injured person is breathing only shallowly because of the pain and not expanding their lungs fully, lungs can collapse as a result, causing pneumonia. (painkillers and deep breathing excercises is all my evil doc prescribed me which I think is common now.)  Interesting in a morbid kind of way is that the breathing difficulties of a collapsed lung aren't what gets you - it's the air pressure that builds up in the chest cutting of the blood flow to the heart.

Broken ribs can also puncture a lung or even the heart with fatal results.   A punctured lung would result in death within 3-15 minutes if untreated.

Dislocated Joints

Hurt just as much as broken bones.   Can be forced back into place without medical facilities but it’s not recommended and will hurt a lot, probably enough to cause unconsciousness.   On-the-hoof treatment is the same as for broken bones – imobilise and support the limb.

There are a few dislocations which can be life-threatening -- the sterno-clavicular joint (where the collarbone joins the breastbone) is one. It requires a lot of force to pop it (most people's collarbones will break before the joint goes), and the collarbone usually goes outwards, but if it displaces inwards, it can compress the airways.  This joint can dislocate if you get slammed very hard into something  like a wall and take the impact on the point of the shoulder. I can also say it hurts very badly and for a very long time.  (Susannah told me about this one and I was wincing just reading it.)

Cutting and Piercing

Getting stabbed or cut open is Not Nice and most human beings come equipped with a healthy set of defensive reflexes to avoid it.   If at all possible they will try to put something else (like hands) in the way of the blow.   Most people injured in a stabbing have injuries on their hands and arms as well from trying to ward off their assailant.

The severity of the injury depends a great deal on its location.

The arms and legs are not protected by much flesh so even a shallow cut or piercing injury here may damage bone and muscle and render the limb effectively useless.

Severe blood loss can occur if the major blood vessels in the inside of the upper arm and inner thigh are damaged.  

Piercing injuries will bleed a lot and can easily do fatal damage, although unless a main artery is hit then it’s not going to be a quick death.   A piercing more than 2 inches deep starts to get dangerous.

If the main descending aorta is hit, the character has seconds to live.

The femoral or renal arteries will lose a fatal amount of blood in 2 – 3 minutes.

Injury to internal organs would cause bleeding, infections and a nasty slow death if left untreated.   Bleeding from the spleen or liver would cause death within 20 minutes.   Less major damage to internal organs would cause death either from blood loss over several hours or up to several days later from infection and other complications.

Relatively slight cuts to the stomach area would affect breathing and damage muscles, More major cuts to this area can damage nerves and muscles, meaning the injured character would have no control over their legs.   Not nice, when you’re trying to get away from the nutter who’s just sliced you up and suddenly your legs don’t work…

Extensive cuts here can also mean the insides are suddenly outside.   Not pretty, not comfortable and, untreated, leaves the character with about 15 minutes to live and they’re going to wish it was much less.   Quite apart from the pain (which is pretty horrific) the sight of their own insides tends to make most people quite hysterical.

Major blood loss will result in a fast weak pulse and accelerated respiratory rate.

For an average healthy person about a litre of blood lost is enough for shock to set in.  

Loss of approximately a litre and a half to two litres or more will require transfusion.

Loss of more than 2 and a half litres will probably result in unconsciousness and, if transfusion is not given, death.

Symptoms of blood loss:

Amount of blood loss by injury.

Severe blood loss, I’ve defined as a wound larger than a fist or that caused by a compound fracture.   All figures are approximate and somewhat variable.   They are meant as a rough guide only.

Blunt Trauma

Getting hit…

Aside from the obvious risk of getting smacked upside the head or breaking bones (see above) there are assorted other injuries and complications which can arise.

Due to the elasticity of the ribcage getting smacked in the chest can cause a person to fly backwards some distance.   Of course this means they can bounce off of something else and hurt themselves that way.   At best they’re going to be winded and have difficulty breathing, which causes a certain amount of panic in most people.   And it looks rather alarming.

Heavy blows to the back can damage the spine resulting in possible paralysis and death.   Kidney injuries are also common when someone is hit in the small of the back.   They can bleed and may shut down altogether.   Kidney failure means the body can’t clear certain waste products from its system, if the waste products build up too far then coma and death can result.

Internal organs such as the liver and spleen can also be damaged by blunt trauma and bleed as detailed above.   Other organs which may be injured are the pancreas and the intestines.  

If the pancreas is damaged it may spill digestive enzymes which start to digest the person’s own insides.   Obviously this is rather painful and unpleasant.

Damage to the intestines can result in blockages (causing pain, nausea and vomiting), bleeding, and the release of bacteria into the bloodstream resulting in septic shock (high fever followed by sudden drop in temperature and blood pressure – fatal if not treated)  This can take 24 hours or more.

Usual treatment for internal injuries is IV feeding, antibiotics, painkillers and sometimes surgery.

Burns are classified into degree by their seriousness.

1st degree burns – Red, sensitive skin, like a sunburn.   2nd degree burns – Blistering on the first layer of skin (the epidermis) only. 3rd degree burns – Damage to both the epidermis and dermis (the first two layers of skin), visible scars.

Burns over more than 70% of the body are life threatening due to dehydration and the risk of shock, kidney failure and infection.

Electrical shock

Hurts!   Physical marks can vary from none at all to severe tissue damage depending on the severity of the shock.   Internal damage can be done by electrical current traveling along the nerves and blood vessels.

Hostile Environments

As it’s not uncommon for characters to find themselves stranded somewhere with less than ideal conditions…

There are the obvious risks of hypothermia and frostbite.  

The time for these to set in can vary   drastically with temperature and windchill.

In both cases warming should be done slowly or risk blistering of the skin and other complications such as shock.

Like burns, frostbite is classified into degrees of severity.

First degree frostbite – Numbness and whitening of skin. Second degree frostbite – Outer layer of skin frozen, blistering likely when warmed. Third degree frostbite – Skin is white or blue and blotchy.   Skin and the tissue beneath it is hard and cold.

Risk of heat exhaustion or heat stroke.

Heat exhaustion is caused by insufficient water and salt intake.   It is easy to develop without realising it.

Heat stroke is more severe and often follows untreated heat exhaustion.   It is extremely dangerous and can be fatal.

Symptoms of heat exhaustion include:

Headache, Dizziness, faintness, Confusion and irritability, Thirst, Fast and weak pulse and breathing, Clammy skin and cramps.

Additional symptoms of heatstroke are:

Hot, dry, flushed skin, Sweating stops altogether, Nausea, Disorientation up to and including hallucinations, Abnormal blood pressure, Elevated temperature, Unconsciousness.

Treatment focuses on lowering the body temperature and rehydrating the person as quickly as possible.

Oxygen Deprivation

Apart from the obvious – lack of oxygen is rather bad for you (6-8 minutes for permanent brain damage) – the reason for the lack can have side effects of its own.   For example smoke, chemical or water inhalation can do physical damage to the lungs making breathing   difficult even when the person is removed to a safe place.

Exposure to Vacuum

There is a very complete webpage covering this which I’ve referenced in the links section.   However in short your major problems would be…

Oxygen deprivation, Exposure to extreme cold, Expansion of gases within the body – meaning that holding your breath would be a Big Mistake, but not one you’d live to regret for very long.

In a sudden decompression there would also be the risk of decompression sickness (the bends) and of getting hit by flying debris during the decompression itself.

Assuming you survived the initial decompression you’d have about 10 seconds of consciousness to do something about it and about one and a half minutes to live.

Parts of the body exposed would suffer from swelling, frostbite, and interrupted circulation.

Leaky   spaceships…

50% atmospheric pressure is enough to have people suffering from hypoxia   (oxygen deprivation).   15% and you more or less, may as well be in vacuum.

Cascade Hospital A resource site for Sentinel FanFic, but has lots of generally useful medical information as well, particularly about treatments.

Healthsquare A useful site where you can look up pretty much any medical condition.

Cut and Thrust A reenactment website with lots of information about what bladed weapons do to people.

Human Exposure to Vacuum Lots of useful details, and has a handy section on working out how long a leaky spacecraft would take to decompress.

The Blake's 7 Injury List A comprehensive list of all the nasty things that befall the crew.

Back to Fannish Pursuits

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How do I write a scene when a character wakes up from being unconscious?

Often I read about people waking up after being unconscious or asleep in a story. Some authors write the characters as being confused, and it taking a second to remember what was happening before. I'm wondering if this is a real reaction, or just a way to add details. Are there any other details can I add besides the environment around them?

• creative-writing

• 1 Highly related: Help with describing an unconscious character . –  Laurel ♦ Commented Jan 19, 2023 at 2:07

You can use it for characterization as well as storytelling.

I think one of the most important factors for how the character wakes up and what they do are who they are (personality, neuro divergence, habits, psychology, etc.) Another is what happened to them before.

It sometimes happens that when I wake up I'm in a limbo zone between sleep and wake, where the connection between my conscious and unconscious mind seems extra strong, and some thoughts I've had during this time have been very profound. Your readers will likely have had this experience as well and might put extra emphasis on what the character thinks during this time.

For instance, I'm a person that likes puns. I'm also a person that has problems with sleep. And time is also a problem. Oversleeping is not unheard of. So the morning the first thought through my head was "this will bend adly" was rather characterizing for me. (And yes, I made that backward talk up then an there... or rather, it felt like my unconscious did...) What I did after having that thought (laughed and wrote it down) is also pretty characterizing.

Showing how the character's morning routine looks is another way to characterize. Do they jump out of bed to do pushups while the coffee brews, do they moan and snooze the alarm or something in between?

Depending on how the character lost consciousness the reaction to waking up can be different. For instance, do they remember where they were when they lost consciousness? Are they waking up in an unusual place? Sometimes it can be enough to fall asleep "upside down" in bed to wake up really confused (that is also really characterizing, who does that?) You can get similar effects from forgetting you're in a hotel room and not at home.

I have no experience of waking up from surgery, but I've had surgery, so my guess is that one predominant experience after surgery might be pain first of all.

I've woken up from sleep after a night of drinking more than once and pain can be pretty high up there as well (though more of a headache). I guess you could have a blackout about going to bed and wake up confused, but otherwise, it pretty much works like regular sleep (+ possible headaches and dehydration).

Losing consciousness due to other reasons (crimes or accidents) might work like getting blackout drunk. It's pretty obvious that if you're a woman and, after a night at the bar, wake up on the floor in your apartment with no memory of how you got there, your wakeup is going to be harrowing at best.

At what point in the sleep cycle you wake up (deep sleep or REM sleep) can also have a profound impact on how clearheaded you are. If you wake up to an alarm and it's the same time every day, you're likely to be totally clear and aware as soon as you wake up (or even before the alarm goes off), even more so if you use a sleep app.

If, on the other hand, you're out of sync and get woken up during deep sleep, you could be very groggy and confused and need some extra time to figure out where you are. In extreme cases, I've felt like I was drunk. (i.e. so unstable I had to support myself against things to not trip—bouncing between the walls so to speak...)

I guess a final factor would be how urgent you need to visit the bathroom. You're not likely to spend much time smelling the roses if you're seeing yellow submarines...

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Injuries you can get from getting beat up

Discussion in ' Research ' started by Emma.ch , Mar 27, 2019 .

big soft moose An Admoostrator Admin Staff Supporter Contributor Community Volunteer

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); That's not terribly helpful or true .. beatings vary dramatically depending on the health and fitness of both assailants and victim - you could easily write an assault where someone gets beaten down and kicked on the ground and hes hospitalised for a couple of weeks. I've seen that happen during a riot in NI and the guy concerned was walking around the next day. I also knew a guy who took one punch to the jaw and died of a cerebral haemorage  

Alan Aspie Banned Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); Emma.ch said: ↑ Realistically.. I'm hoping having his arms up in front of his face will be enough to protect him in that way. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); I have to say Alan I'm not convinced you know much about real life violence either - watching youtube videos is no substitute for being on the receiving (or sometimes giving ) end. Ive been in a lot of fights in my life, some winning some losing, and experience doesn't bear out what you are saying here To say the first 3 seconds resolves who wins or loses is just abject rubbish - The first blows don't determine anything - it depends what happens next and on the characters and physique, reaction, training etc of both fighters. Its also complete rubbish that a victim would be unable to curl up or defend themselves after 15 seconds unless weaponry is in play You are sort of right that most fights are over fast - but in a street confrontation the first 30 seconds are often taken up with threats and pushing and shoving before the first punch is thrown. The sort of Blitz attack you are talking about above is pretty rare (and irrelevant to the OP where Emma is talking about four guys with a grievance not a random attack on a stranger) Also in regard of that video its pretty clear that its part of a larger confrontation - you can see that the guy is already injured when he goes over the barrier, and the violence shown is nothing much, so if he sustained life threatening injuries the chances are it was off camera. And it takes fractions of a second to put your arms up to protect your face and head, and its a natural reaction which most people will do without thinking. In regard to the OP so much depends on factors that the author can determine (physique, training , fitness of participants etc) that it is perfectly realistic that someone could get kicked on the ground for a couple of minutes and be out of hospital in a couple of weeks... two minutes from guys with a grievance wouldn't be solid kicking it would be blows interspersed with abuse, so he could easily actually sustain only the same number of blows that you'd take in a ten second blitz As i said above i once saw a soldier go down in a riot situation and he was on the ground being kicked and stamped on by a mob for at least a minute until we fought through to him - the guy concerned was walking around the next day with some interesting bruises and some road rash. In a mob like that people get in each others way so the actual harm sustained can be less than in a targetted attack  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); big soft moose said: ↑ 1. I have to say Alan I'm not convinced you know much about real life violence either 2. To say the first 3 seconds resolves who wins or loses is just abject rubbish 3. You are sort of right that most fights are over fast - but in a street confrontation the first 30 seconds are often taken up with threats and pushing and shoving before the first punch is thrown. 4. The sort of Blitz attack you are talking about above is pretty rare 5. in regard of that video its pretty clear that its part of a larger confrontation - you can see that the guy is already injured when he goes over the barrier, and the violence shown is nothing much, so if he sustained life threatening injuries the chances are it was off camera. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); How many fights have you been in in your life Alan - I mean serious could have wound up in hospital fights not school yard stuff ? I'm guessing the answer is zero - but i'm happy for you to prove me wrong. I used to a be a soldier, then I worked bar security, more recently i was a park ranger in a city - The number of serious confrontations i've been involved in is in double figures easily (hospitalised twice, with a bunch of other visits to the MO or casualty) - so when I talk about what a fight involves i've been there, done that and got blood all over the tee shirt. The reason I was so uncompromising in my description of your advice is that you are stating things as if they are facts based on virtually nothing other than watching some videos. When you say stuff like "whoever gets the upper hand, can make that hand heavier" it betrays that you've never actually been there. You do it again when you say "the first hit leaves the victim disorientated for 1-3 seconds" that simply isn't true in every case (it might be true if you were hit with no warning that anything was about to kick off and you were completely unprepared but for someone actually engaged in a fight it just isn't) Also the head isn't a good target the opponent only has to move slightly and you miss, so when you say most fights start with a blow to the head you are again saying stuff that just isnt true. If I was going to aim to put someone down i'd land the first strike in the stomach (or a boot through the knee) then as they double up you grab the head and accelerate it downwards and give them a knee in the face. Then they are on the floor damaged and bleeding and if you're so inclined you can kick the shit out of them (I hasten to add that I didnt since I'm not a psycho) Conversely if you are on the receiving end, trying not to double up is a good plan, and if you do wind up on the floor curling into a ball is your natural reaction but its defensive only. One on one i'd try to grab the kickers leg and bring him down too, multiples on one your going to get hurt unless help comes so thats where you roll up and hope for the best The OP was was talking about four guys with a greivance jumping another guy, so they corner him, there's some threats and then the fighting starts - she said he was quite a hard guy so hes probably been in a few fights and knows how to handle himself. If they are taking turns hitting him that means that one or more of them are restraining him because otherwise it would be a lot more disorganised - so at this point its not a fight, its a punishment beating and could easily go on for several minutes, and he isn't going to be putting his hands up in front of his face because those holding him won't let him.But you aren't talking about a frenetic blitz attack you're talking about threat, punch, threat, punch, change assailants, bit more verbal, punch.. because the point of a punishment beating is that the guy on the receiving end needs to know what hes done wrong. "You've been talking to the police" punch "betraying your brothers "smack "I thought you were my friend" , punch, "but all the time you were grassing to the pigs", smack. Like that (In ulster the IRA used to shoot people through the kneecap from the back of the leg with a low calibre weapon to reinforce the point, the protestant terrorists preferred to use a power drill - which shows that these things weren't over in ten seconds) While on his feet being held and hit he'd likely suffer some facial damage - nose, lips, teeth, black eye, may be cheek bones, and possibly some ribs - it does also depend on how experienced his attackers are because some people punch like kids and give you a lot of noise but no serious damage - then whenhe's released he goes to the floor, curls up and takes a kicking - again some people kick like kids so damage is variable, but you'd expect ribs and arm damage at least and possibly worse... however its down to the author so if they want him relatively undamaged you could have the assailants disturbed by something and to run off. He'll also suffer more damage if they take turns, if they are all kicking him mob handed they get in each others way and the blows are unaimed and have less force behind them.  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); big soft moose said: ↑ How... ... Alan.. ...I'm guessing... i'm happy for you to prove me wrong. I used to a be... you are stating things as if they are facts based on virtually nothing other... Click to expand...

BayView Huh. Interesting. Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); Alan Aspie said: ↑ 1. I'm still not the topic of this thread. No matter how obsessively you try to pull me in some sick pig wrestling I will not enter. 2. Your tendency to "guess" seems to be very hostile. 3. There is one reason why I put someone under ignore button. When a person starts to invent total BS about me and puts it online, it's time to ignore him or her. But you are a mode. I don't know what board rules say about ignoring some moderator so I will not do it. But I don't find you both as a virtual person and as a board writer not worth my time after this. I will read things you focus to me, but that's all. I will ignore you as a person and as a writer but not as a moderator. 4. I could answer your question if I trusted you. But I don't. And you do everything you can to show why I should not. So thank you about that information. And it seems that you have decided how things are about me before knowing or observing them with any kind of realism. So good luck with your imagination. Have fun with it. And here we might get some kind of hint why you "guess” so hostile way. Something You think You are an expert, an alfa male and someone does not agree. Ooohhh.... That war! What a luck you have a moderator status. It means you'll be right even when you imagine total BS about someone. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); Hi Alan Speaking personally - not as a moderator/volunteer I'm sorry you feel challenged -that was not my intention - I merely pointed out that the information you were giving another member did not jibe with my experience. I'm also not interested in making up anything about you - my point was that when you state facts on a thread like this it is helpful to the OP to state the experience that validates those facts You have just sent me a PM saying you want to pull me into a side topic in a hostile way, ( I will not 'guess' at the motivation for doing that) but that isn't something I'm willing to engage with. I would never use any official status in a topic in which I am personally involved, but I would suggest one member to another that we agree to differ and leave Emma's thread on topic  

XRD_author Banned

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); BayView said: ↑ But there is value in everyone explaining their credentials for making the proclamations they do. He's explained his in this area ... his voice is likely more valuable. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); XRD_author said: ↑ Except on the Internet, no one can tell you're not a dog. Accordingly, the asserted credentials of anonymous posters shouldn't be given much weight. . Click to expand...

John Calligan Contributor Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); https://www.mmamania.com/ufc-medical-suspensions-and-injuries  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); XRD_author said: ↑ ...asserted credentials of anonymous posters shouldn't be given much weight. Click to expand...

frigocc Contributor Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); Depends on your genre. If it's comedy, could have a pelvic injury cause priopism (an erection).  

matwoolf Banned Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); I’ve had erections in fights and it’s still not funny.  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); matwoolf said: ↑ I’ve had erections in fights and it’s still not funny. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); Mm, I’m on a bus. Maybe talk about this when I get home.  

Maverick_nc Contributor Contributor

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); frigocc said: ↑ No. But putting some random unconscious dude with an erection on YouTube? Slightly. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); Maverick_nc said: ↑ I once had a fight start while slap bang in the middle of sex. The girl hadn't told me she had a boyfriend and I was too busy enjoying myself to hear him enter the room. My erection disappeared fairly quickly but I retained the nickname 'cock fighter' for many years. Of course, the exaggerations soon (also) amped up incredibly and these days the story is told that both the boyfriend and I were wearing glow in the dark condoms and engaged in a few rounds of penis light-saber fencing. Ahhh good times. Ill probably leave this one out of my memoir. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); frigocc said: ↑ I think it'd MAKE the memoir. Click to expand...

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); It is a most difficult scene to write, or even to regale without coming off as a jock-schmuck/bottom-feeder. @MC, or you, never looks good in this [probably common] situation. The other guy, the loser, is the hero, a tragic figure. For me it is a memory of great shame. Making love & the next moment the ex-boyfriend is at the bedroom door, and his best friend stands at his back. It was gross and terrible for him, and I beat him with my dick. I never recovered.  

googletag.cmd.push(function() { googletag.display('funpub_c01f71c20d68c45adf3b3f94cdff4b8e'); }); Maverick_nc said: ↑ I once had a fight start while slap bang in the middle of sex.. ..nickname 'cock fighter' for many years. Click to expand...

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• Writing Activities

105 Creative Writing Exercises To Get You Writing Again

You know that feeling when you just don’t feel like writing? Sometimes you can’t even get a word down on paper. It’s the most frustrating thing ever to a writer, especially when you’re working towards a deadline. The good news is that we have a list of 105 creative writing exercises to help you get motivated and start writing again!

What are creative writing exercises?

Creative writing exercises are short writing activities (normally around 10 minutes) designed to get you writing. The goal of these exercises is to give you the motivation to put words onto a blank paper. These words don’t need to be logical or meaningful, neither do they need to be grammatically correct or spelt correctly. The whole idea is to just get you writing something, anything. The end result of these quick creative writing exercises is normally a series of notes, bullet points or ramblings that you can, later on, use as inspiration for a bigger piece of writing such as a story or a poem. 

Good creative writing exercises are short, quick and easy to complete. You shouldn’t need to think too much about your style of writing or how imaginative your notes are. Just write anything that comes to mind, and you’ll be on the road to improving your creative writing skills and beating writer’s block . 

Use the generator below to get a random creative writing exercise idea:

List of 105+ Creative Writing Exercises

Here are over 105 creative writing exercises to give your brain a workout and help those creative juices flow again:

• Set a timer for 60 seconds. Now write down as many words or phrases that come to mind at that moment.
• Pick any colour you like. Now start your sentence with this colour. For example, Orange, the colour of my favourite top. 
• Open a book or dictionary on a random page. Pick a random word. You can close your eyes and slowly move your finger across the page. Now, write a paragraph with this random word in it. You can even use an online dictionary to get random words:

• Create your own alphabet picture book or list. It can be A to Z of animals, food, monsters or anything else you like!
• Using only the sense of smell, describe where you are right now.
• Take a snack break. While eating your snack write down the exact taste of that food. The goal of this creative writing exercise is to make your readers savour this food as well.
• Pick a random object in your room and write a short paragraph from its point of view. For example, how does your pencil feel? What if your lamp had feelings?
• Describe your dream house. Where would you live one day? Is it huge or tiny? 
• Pick two different TV shows, movies or books that you like. Now swap the main character. What if Supergirl was in Twilight? What if SpongeBob SquarePants was in The Flash? Write a short scene using this character swap as inspiration.
• What’s your favourite video game? Write at least 10 tips for playing this game.
• Pick your favourite hobby or sport. Now pretend an alien has just landed on Earth and you need to teach it this hobby or sport. Write at least ten tips on how you would teach this alien.
• Use a random image generator and write a paragraph about the first picture you see.

• Write a letter to your favourite celebrity or character. What inspires you most about them? Can you think of a memorable moment where this person’s life affected yours? We have this helpful guide on writing a letter to your best friend for extra inspiration.
• Write down at least 10 benefits of writing. This can help motivate you and beat writer’s block.
• Complete this sentence in 10 different ways: Patrick waited for the school bus and…
• Pick up a random book from your bookshelf and go to page 9. Find the ninth sentence on that page. Use this sentence as a story starter.
• Create a character profile based on all the traits that you hate. It might help to list down all the traits first and then work on describing the character.
• What is the scariest or most dangerous situation you have ever been in? Why was this situation scary? How did you cope at that moment?
• Pretend that you’re a chat show host and you’re interviewing your favourite celebrity. Write down the script for this conversation.
• Using extreme detail, write down what you have been doing for the past one hour today. Think about your thoughts, feelings and actions during this time.
• Make a list of potential character names for your next story. You can use a fantasy name generator to help you.
• Describe a futuristic setting. What do you think the world would look like in 100 years time?
• Think about a recent argument you had with someone. Would you change anything about it? How would you resolve an argument in the future?
• Describe a fantasy world. What kind of creatures live in this world? What is the climate like? What everyday challenges would a typical citizen of this world face? You can use this fantasy world name generator for inspiration.
• At the flip of a switch, you turn into a dragon. What kind of dragon would you be? Describe your appearance, special abilities, likes and dislikes. You can use a dragon name generator to give yourself a cool dragon name.
• Pick your favourite book or a famous story. Now change the point of view. For example, you could rewrite the fairytale , Cinderella. This time around, Prince Charming could be the main character. What do you think Prince Charming was doing, while Cinderella was cleaning the floors and getting ready for the ball?
• Pick a random writing prompt and use it to write a short story. Check out this collection of over 300 writing prompts for kids to inspire you. 
• Write a shopping list for a famous character in history. Imagine if you were Albert Einstein’s assistant, what kind of things would he shop for on a weekly basis?
• Create a fake advertisement poster for a random object that is near you right now. Your goal is to convince the reader to buy this object from you.
• What is the worst (or most annoying) sound that you can imagine? Describe this sound in great detail, so your reader can understand the pain you feel when hearing this sound.
• What is your favourite song at the moment? Pick one line from this song and describe a moment in your life that relates to this line.
•  You’re hosting an imaginary dinner party at your house. Create a list of people you would invite, and some party invites. Think about the theme of the dinner party, the food you will serve and entertainment for the evening. 
• You are waiting to see your dentist in the waiting room. Write down every thought you are having at this moment in time. 
• Make a list of your greatest fears. Try to think of at least three fears. Now write a short story about a character who is forced to confront one of these fears. 
• Create a ‘Wanted’ poster for a famous villain of your choice. Think about the crimes they have committed, and the reward you will give for having them caught. 
• Imagine you are a journalist for the ‘Imagine Forest Times’ newspaper. Your task is to get an exclusive interview with the most famous villain of all time. Pick a villain of your choice and interview them for your newspaper article. What questions would you ask them, and what would their responses be?
•  In a school playground, you see the school bully hurting a new kid. Write three short stories, one from each perspective in this scenario (The bully, the witness and the kid getting bullied).
• You just won $10 million dollars. What would you spend this money on?
• Pick a random animal, and research at least five interesting facts about this animal. Write a short story centred around one of these interesting facts. 
• Pick a global issue that you are passionate about. This could be climate change, black lives matters, women’s rights etc. Now create a campaign poster for this global issue. 
• Write an acrostic poem about an object near you right now (or even your own name). You could use a poetry idea generator to inspire you.
• Imagine you are the head chef of a 5-star restaurant. Recently the business has slowed down. Your task is to come up with a brand-new menu to excite customers. Watch this video prompt on YouTube to inspire you.
• What is your favourite food of all time? Imagine if this piece of food was alive, what would it say to you?
• If life was one big musical, what would you be singing about right now? Write the lyrics of your song. 
• Create and describe the most ultimate villain of all time. What would their traits be? What would their past look like? Will they have any positive traits?
• Complete this sentence in at least 10 different ways: Every time I look out of the window, I…
• You have just made it into the local newspaper, but what for? Write down at least five potential newspaper headlines . Here’s an example, Local Boy Survives a Deadly Illness.
• If you were a witch or a wizard, what would your specialist area be and why? You might want to use a Harry Potter name generator or a witch name generator for inspiration.
• What is your favourite thing to do on a Saturday night? Write a short story centred around this activity. 
• Your main character has just received the following items: A highlighter, a red cap, a teddy bear and a fork. What would your character do with these items? Can you write a story using these items? 
• Create a timeline of your own life, from birth to this current moment. Think about the key events in your life, such as birthdays, graduations, weddings and so on. After you have done this, you can pick one key event from your life to write a story about. 
• Think of a famous book or movie you like. Rewrite a scene from this book or movie, where the main character is an outsider. They watch the key events play out, but have no role in the story. What would their actions be? How would they react?
• Three very different characters have just won the lottery. Write a script for each character, as they reveal the big news to their best friend.  
• Write a day in the life story of three different characters. How does each character start their day? What do they do throughout the day? And how does their day end?
•  Write about the worst experience in your life so far. Think about a time when you were most upset or angry and describe it. 
• Imagine you’ve found a time machine in your house. What year would you travel to and why?
• Describe your own superhero. Think about their appearance, special abilities and their superhero name. Will they have a secret identity? Who is their number one enemy?
• What is your favourite country in the world? Research five fun facts about this country and use one to write a short story. 
• Set yourself at least three writing goals. This could be a good way to motivate yourself to write every day. For example, one goal might be to write at least 150 words a day. 
• Create a character description based on the one fact, three fiction rule. Think about one fact or truth about yourself. And then add in three fictional or fantasy elements. For example, your character could be the same age as you in real life, this is your one fact. And the three fictional elements could be they have the ability to fly, talk in over 100 different languages and have green skin. 
• Describe the perfect person. What traits would they have? Think about their appearance, their interests and their dislikes. 
• Keep a daily journal or diary. This is a great way to keep writing every day. There are lots of things you can write about in your journal, such as you can write about the ‘highs’ and ‘lows’ of your day. Think about anything that inspired you or anything that upset you, or just write anything that comes to mind at the moment. 
• Write a book review or a movie review. If you’re lost for inspiration, just watch a random movie or read any book that you can find. Then write a critical review on it. Think about the best parts of the book/movie and the worst parts. How would you improve the book or movie?
• Write down a conversation between yourself. You can imagine talking to your younger self or future self (i.e. in 10 years’ time). What would you tell them? Are there any lessons you learned or warnings you need to give? Maybe you could talk about what your life is like now and compare it to their life?
• Try writing some quick flash fiction stories . Flash fiction is normally around 500 words long, so try to stay within this limit.
• Write a six-word story about something that happened to you today or yesterday. A six-word story is basically an entire story told in just six words. Take for example: “Another football game ruined by me.” or “A dog’s painting sold for millions.” – Six-word stories are similar to writing newspaper headlines. The goal is to summarise your story in just six words. 
• The most common monsters or creatures used in stories include vampires, werewolves , dragons, the bigfoot, sirens and the loch-ness monster. In a battle of intelligence, who do you think will win and why?
• Think about an important event in your life that has happened so far, such as a birthday or the birth of a new sibling. Now using the 5 W’s and 1 H technique describe this event in great detail. The 5 W’s include: What, Who, Where, Why, When and the 1 H is: How. Ask yourself questions about the event, such as what exactly happened on that day? Who was there? Why was this event important? When and where did it happen? And finally, how did it make you feel?
• Pretend to be someone else. Think about someone important in your life. Now put yourself into their shoes, and write a day in the life story about being them. What do you think they do on a daily basis? What situations would they encounter? How would they feel?
• Complete this sentence in at least 10 different ways: I remember…
• Write about your dream holiday. Where would you go? Who would you go with? And what kind of activities would you do?
• Which one item in your house do you use the most? Is it the television, computer, mobile phone, the sofa or the microwave? Now write a story of how this item was invented. You might want to do some research online and use these ideas to build up your story. 
• In exactly 100 words, describe your bedroom. Try not to go over or under this word limit.
• Make a top ten list of your favourite animals. Based on this list create your own animal fact file, where you provide fun facts about each animal in your list.
• What is your favourite scene from a book or a movie? Write down this scene. Now rewrite the scene in a different genre, such as horror, comedy, drama etc.
•  Change the main character of a story you recently read into a villain. For example, you could take a popular fairytale such as Jack and the Beanstalk, but this time re-write the story to make Jack the villain of the tale.
• Complete the following sentence in at least 10 different ways: Do you ever wonder…
• What does your name mean? Research the meaning of your own name, or a name that interests you. Then use this as inspiration for your next story. For example, the name ‘Marty’ means “Servant Of Mars, God Of War”. This could make a good concept for a sci-fi story.
• Make a list of three different types of heroes (or main characters) for potential future stories.
• If someone gave you $10 dollars, what would you spend it on and why?
• Describe the world’s most boring character in at least 100 words. 
• What is the biggest problem in the world today, and how can you help fix this issue?
• Create your own travel brochure for your hometown. Think about why tourists might want to visit your hometown. What is your town’s history? What kind of activities can you do? You could even research some interesting facts. 
• Make a list of all your favourite moments or memories in your life. Now pick one to write a short story about.
• Describe the scariest and ugliest monster you can imagine. You could even draw a picture of this monster with your description.
• Write seven haikus, one for each colour of the rainbow. That’s red, orange, yellow, green, blue, indigo and violet. 
• Imagine you are at the supermarket. Write down at least three funny scenarios that could happen to you at the supermarket. Use one for your next short story. 
• Imagine your main character is at home staring at a photograph. Write the saddest scene possible. Your goal is to make your reader cry when reading this scene. 
• What is happiness? In at least 150 words describe the feeling of happiness. You could use examples from your own life of when you felt happy.
• Think of a recent nightmare you had and write down everything you can remember. Use this nightmare as inspiration for your next story.
• Keep a dream journal. Every time you wake up in the middle of the night or early in the morning you can quickly jot down things that you remember from your dreams. These notes can then be used as inspiration for a short story. 
• Your main character is having a really bad day. Describe this bad day and the series of events they experience. What’s the worst thing that could happen to your character?
• You find a box on your doorstep. You open this box and see the most amazing thing ever. Describe this amazing thing to your readers.
• Make a list of at least five possible settings or locations for future stories. Remember to describe each setting in detail.
• Think of something new you recently learned. Write this down. Now write a short story where your main character also learns the same thing.
• Describe the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen in your whole life. Your goal is to amaze your readers with its beauty. 
• Make a list of things that make you happy or cheer you up. Try to think of at least five ideas. Now imagine living in a world where all these things were banned or against the law. Use this as inspiration for your next story.
• Would you rather be rich and alone or poor and very popular? Write a story based on the lives of these two characters. 
• Imagine your main character is a Librarian. Write down at least three dark secrets they might have. Remember, the best secrets are always unexpected.
• There’s a history behind everything. Describe the history of your house. How and when was your house built? Think about the land it was built on and the people that may have lived here long before you.
• Imagine that you are the king or queen of a beautiful kingdom. Describe your kingdom in great detail. What kind of rules would you have? Would you be a kind ruler or an evil ruler of the kingdom?
• Make a wish list of at least three objects you wish you owned right now. Now use these three items in your next story. At least one of them must be the main prop in the story.
• Using nothing but the sense of taste, describe a nice Sunday afternoon at your house. Remember you can’t use your other senses (i.e see, hear, smell or touch) in this description. 
• What’s the worst pain you felt in your life? Describe this pain in great detail, so your readers can also feel it.
• If you were lost on a deserted island in the middle of nowhere, what three must-have things would you pack and why?
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Marty the wizard is the master of Imagine Forest. When he's not reading a ton of books or writing some of his own tales, he loves to be surrounded by the magical creatures that live in Imagine Forest. While living in his tree house he has devoted his time to helping children around the world with their writing skills and creativity.

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Posted on Aug 29, 2018

How to Write a Fight Scene

About the author.

Reedsy's editorial team is a diverse group of industry experts devoted to helping authors write and publish beautiful books.

About Savannah Cordova

Savannah is a senior editor with Reedsy and a published writer whose work has appeared on Slate, Kirkus, and BookTrib. Her short fiction has appeared in the Owl Canyon Press anthology, "No Bars and a Dead Battery". 

When tensions are high, honor is questioned, and lives may even be at stake, you know what time it is: time for a killer showdown. You’ve been building toward this explosive moment for pages, maybe your entire book, but now you come to a screeching halt — you have no idea how to write a fight scene!

Fortunately, it’s not as complicated as you might think. Follow these 5 simple steps to write a fight scene that releases story tension, solves inter-character conflict, and satisfies the anxious expectations of your reader all at once.

Step 1. Motivate your players

When was the last time you saw someone start throwing punches out of nowhere? Probably never. Whether it’s over a lifelong grudge or a few heated words at a bar, people need a believable character goal  to start a fight in both real life and in fiction.

Here are a few ideas to motivate your characters’ confrontations. Whichever you choose, use it as the catalyst for your fight scene, as well as to add the necessary layers of depth and complexity.

Survival is an important motivation for any character, but especially for protagonists in horror and dystopian novels . For instance, Katniss in The Hunger Games has no choice but to attack and kill her fellow adolescent opponents if she wants to survive. However, this need to survive can escalate any physical fight, such as the gang rumbles in The Outsiders, where someone could pull out a knife at any moment . Just remember: for survival to be a credible character motivation, the situation has to be absolutely dire. 

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Even people who don’t like confrontation will jump to the defense of what they hold dear. This may be a person, an ideal, or a combination of the two — fights in fantasy and adventure plots often involve both. A prime example of a character motivated by the desire to defend others would be Harry Potter, who constantly battles Voldemort to protect the wizarding world. At the same time, he’s also defending the ideals of goodness and inclusion (in opposition to Voldemort’s ideals of “blood purity” and prejudice).

Honor is the motivation to which we can attribute Shakespearean blood feuds, eighteenth century duels, and yes, modern-day bar fights. While honor may seem like a less drastic motivation than survival, it can make for a very heated encounter — especially if insults are flying beforehand.

Use honor as character motivation for fierce fights between longstanding rivals , such as the duel between Mercutio and Tybalt in Romeo and Juliet. Think about the stakes as your characters perceive them: if they win, will they gain the respect of others? If they lose, what are the consequences? If they are risking their life, is their honor worth it? If the answer is “no,” you should probably use a different motivation.

Step 2. Use stimulating descriptions

During a fight scene, you want your reader to feel your characters’ adrenaline coursing through their own veins. To achieve this, you need to describe the fight with all the immediacy and stimulation of someone who isn’t just witnessing the struggle, but is a part of it. If you do a good job, your reader should be left feeling as though they’ve been pummeled — by your prose!

Employ strong verbs

As you describe the action of the fight, use your verbs to color and enhance it. Instead of “hit,” use “pound,” “smack,” “wallop,” or “bash,” depending on the kind of force you want to portray . Also use strong verbs to show how your characters move in relation to each other, and how they navigate their battleground:

• “He stumbled forward, reeling from the hit, swinging blindly"
• “She flew toward me, arms outstretched , ready to claw out my throat”
• “I collapsed to the ground, shaking and crying, as my enemy towered over my weak form”

These descriptions follow the golden rule of showing rather than telling — they paint a vivid picture of each scene without resorting to overwrought adjectives and adverbs. Flowery prose is not recommended ! Remember: a fight scene is all about action, so make sure you’re using strong, active verbs to depict it.

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Include sensory details

Though you’ll want to focus mainly on the action of the fight scene, it can be quite powerful to include some sensory details as well. For your reader to perceive the full adrenaline of the scene, they need to be privy to everything your characters experience. This means using all five senses : what they see, feel, hear, smell, and even taste.

• “The wind had been knocked clean out of me; as I lay gasping on the floor, it felt like I would never breathe again ”
• “Distantly, I heard the frantic screams of my friends, but these were obscured by the blood pounding in my ears ”
• “His fist slammed into my jaw and I tasted a surge of coppery blood ”

Notice how these sensory details have been combined with strong verbs for maximum effect. The best and most stimulating descriptions of a fight scene place readers right in the middle of the action, with the taste of blood practically in their mouths.

Step 3. Control the pace

Though you want to give your reader a sense of immediacy in a fight scene, you don’t want to rush through it or bog it down with too much description. In a nutshell, you need good pacing for your book . A helpful rule of thumb for writing a fight scene is that it should take about the same time to read as the encounter would in real life. Most fights only last a couple of minutes, which means you should devote no more than one or two pages to a given fight. Generally, you won't see a fight scene lasting the length of an entire chapter — unless it's a pivotal war that's taking place.

Match the atmosphere

Since you only have a brief space in which to conduct your fight scene, every sentence needs to reflect its mood. You should already be well on your way to this with your verbs and sensory details, but now make sure you’re choosing your words specifically to match the atmosphere of the scene and pace it appropriately.

For example, if you want it to be quick and violent, use punchy verbs and brief descriptions. This is especially important if you have many fights in your story and don’t want to linger. Lee Child frequently employs this pithy style for fight scenes in his Jack Reacher series, such as the prison standoff in Killing Floor:

Instead of counting three I headbutted him full in the face. Came off the back foot with a thrust up the legs and whipped my head forward and smashed it into his nose. It was beautifully done… It must have caved his whole face in.

However, if you want the scene to be more melancholy or dramatic, you should draw it out — have characters exchange dialogue , give detailed sensory descriptions of each blow, make it seem like one opponent is defeated until they struggle to their feet in a last-minute comeback.

Basically, even though you’re already using strong verbs and sensory details, you still need to take into account the nature and quantity of those words to establish good pacing.

Avoid “choreographing”

During your fight scene, you may be tempted to use highly technical language — terms like “left fighter’s stance” and “reverse pivot side kick” to illustrate the exact moves your characters are using. However, keep in mind that the average reader will have little familiarity with these terms.

Even if the scene is precisely choreographed in your head, clunky technical phrases like these will only confuse readers, slowing them down and stealing that sense of adrenaline that’s critical to a great fight scene. If you want to pace the scene effectively, stick to simple but powerful phrasing that your reader can quickly absorb.

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Step 4. Infuse with emotion

By this stage, you have your description and pacing down pat, and your fight scene should be smooth and engaging. But something’s still missing: emotion.

Even the most action-packed, nail-biting fight scene isn’t complete without some emotion behind it. Your readers will sympathize with a good guy getting beaten to a pulp, but they’ll empathize when he’s doing it to protect his loved ones. So even though they should already know that character’s motivation, make sure to thoroughly infuse it into your fight scene.

PRO-TIP:  Thrillers fuse emotion with action. To read 22 of the best psychological thrillers, go here .

Use internal thoughts

One of the best ways to inject feeling into a fight scene is to include your protagonist’s thoughts. Try sprinkling these in between the action (verbs) and your characters’ reactions (sensory details) as you write the scene. Even in third person , using your characters’ internal thoughts to demonstrate their emotions is a very effective technique.

Don’t spend too much time on inner monologues, which can detach the reader from the action. Focus on the jagged, instinctive thoughts of an adrenaline-filled fighter, whose reasoning may not be entirely logical. This is certainly the case for Humbert Humbert when he shoots Quilty at the end of Lolita:

In distress, in dismay, I understood that far from killing him I was injecting spurts of energy into the poor fellow, as if the bullets had been capsules wherein a heady elixir danced.

This train of thought brings the emotion of the scene — and the entire book — to a crescendo. We as readers see Humbert in his truest form: delusional and depraved, yet also pitiful. At some level, he believes himself to be so weak that even using a gun cannot help him defeat his rival. The presence of emotion in this scene truly invests the reader in its outcome, no matter how they may feel about the participants’ morality.

Step 5. Resolve (at least for now)

Finally, you’ve reached the end of your fight scene — though not necessarily the end of your story. No matter where it’s located in the narrative arc, a fight needs to be resolved so the story can either move forward or end satisfyingly. This means winding down the action itself and constructing some sort of emotional resolution, even if it’s only temporary.

After the fight scene has ended, think about what would realistically happen next. If your character has a broken rib, they’re not going to just get up and start walking around. They might lie there for a few minutes, gathering their strength, before limping to get medical attention.

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This transition out of a fight scene is vital because it allows the reader to feel its full impact —  the consequences as well as the future implications of the fight. For example, if your main character is critically injured, they’re going to need some time to recover. Indeed, the outcome of a fight can be a major turning point for your plot, so make sure to give it due diligence.

Remember that if you’ve chosen to end your story with a fight scene, or several fight scenes, the fight(s) must resolve all remaining conflicts . Perhaps there’s been a fundamental misunderstanding between characters and the fight scene clears it up, or an act of revenge finally gets carried out. One of the most gratifying resolutions in literature is the encounter between Inigo Montoya and the man who killed his father, at the end of The Princess Bride:

"That was just to the left of your heart." Inigo struck again. Another scream. "That was below your heart. Can you guess what I'm doing?" "Cutting my heart out." "You took mine when I was ten; I want yours now. We are lovers of justice, you and I — what could be more just than that?" The Count screamed one final time then fell dead of fear. Inigo looked down at him. The Count's frozen face was petrified and ashen and the blood still poured down the parallel cuts. His eyes bulged wide, full of horror and pain. It was glorious. If you like that kind of thing. Inigo loved it.

A satisfying resolution is the cherry on top of a well-written fight scene. And with character motivation, descriptive details, good pacing, and strong emotion all in your pocket, you can rest assured that yours is a great one. Congratulations! You’ve successfully learned how to write a fight scene that’ll leave your reader’s heart racing — and their pages turning like the wind.

Have you ever written a fight scene before? How did you do it? Comment below to add your own unique tips!

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BRYN DONOVAN

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How to Describe Anger In Writing

I wanted to make a list about how to describe anger in writing

because I know a lot of writers get stuck on it, whether they’re describing frustration, annoyance, or flat-out rage. Even when you’re just looking for a few words or a phrase, you can get bogged down. With that in mind, here are ways to write anger descriptions in a more vivid way than “he felt angry.”

Here’s something I can’t stress enough. When you’re writing about anger, there are a lot of ways to show the emotion…through what they say, how loudly they say it, what they’re thinking, and their actions (such as aggressively loading the dishwasher.)

My list of ways to describe facial expressions and my list of body language and gestures

can both help in showing emotion. But once in a while, you want to describe your point of view character’s internal feelings of anger.

Obviously, this isn’t a comprehensive list. There are one hundred phrases here. A few of them hint at physiological reactions to the emotion of anger, and some employ similes. You can adapt them or mix them up a little, and they’ll probably make you think of more.

The ones that contain a verb can be turned into a phrase. For instance, “she was breathless with anger” can be used in a sentence like, “Breathless with anger, she stood up and walked out.’ Oh, and you can probably change some of these to describe hatred or loathing. And as long as the context is clear, you don’t need to name the emotion at all—a physiological reaction is often enough!

Be sure to pin the article to a Pinterest board or bookmark it for future reference!

he smoldered with resentment

rage flowed through her like lava

molten anger rolled through him

rage gripped her

anger poured through her

her temper sparked

anger stirred within her

his fury sprang to life

rage nearly consumed her

raw anger shot through him

rage pulsed through his veins

anger thrummed through her veins

anger flooded his veins

rage quickened her blood

she felt a flash of irritation

he felt a flicker of irritation

his anger spiked

anger rushed through her

anger overpowered her

rage overtook him

fury overcame her

he swallowed down his frustration

she tamped down her irritation

he mastered his anger

he kept his frustration in check

fury roared through her mind

a fresh swell of rage rose in her

anger rose in him like a tide

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anger welled up in his chest

fury vibrated through her being

he burned with anger

irritation pricked at him

inwardly, she was seething

he trembled with rage

she shook with fury

he was quivering with anger

her resentment grew inside her like a tumor

his resentment festered in him

anger spread through him

rage filled her

his irritation flared

it roused her anger

it woke her anger

his edge of irritation had returned

fury surged through her

he went cold with fury

she was breathless with anger

he was wordless with rage

he was almost choking on his rage

nearly suffocating on her fury

she was simmering with anger

he was boiling with anger

a wave of fury crashed through her

he was running on sheer anger

her frustration kicked in

fury twisted inside of her

she was a ball of pure anger

she was about to explode with rage

he felt about to burst from rage

she was in a red rage

rage ran red through his brain

he stoked his anger

a vortex of anger swirled inside him

she fought the chaos of her rage

he tried to still his rage

he pressed down his anger

she struggled against her anger

he bit back his anger

anger heated her blood

rage seared through him

anger swept over her

resentment clouded her thoughts

he was blind with rage

she felt a jolt of anger

anger hardened her heart

rage beat at her heart

rage churned inside of him

he felt drunk on his rage

anger ripped through him

anger rippled through her

fury tore through her

inside, he was smoking with anger

his anger was mounting

her anger coiled in her stomach

he felt a stab of anger

she felt the anger building

he could taste blood

her irritation crackled

she was immobilized by fury

he was brimming with hostility

anger settled over her

rage throbbed in her like a heartbeat

rage pounded in him like a drumbeat

flames of anger licked through him

rage seized her

resentment blossomed within her

his anger felt good

she felt a cleansing anger

he felt a sick anger

he marinated in resentment

It actually took me a really long time to think about all of these! 🙂 I hope it’s a helpful list! I’m going to make a few more for other emotions. If you don’t want to miss those, be sure to follow the blog, if you aren’t already — there’s a place to sign up on the lefthand side of this website.

And in my book Master Lists for Writers , you can find a lot more lists. Take a look!

Thanks for reading, and happy writing!

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40 thoughts on “ how to describe anger in writing ”.

Thank you, these alternatives to anger are excellent. xxx

So glad you like them, Adele! And nice to see you. 🙂

Thank you. x

Writing a Behavior Support Plan for an individual in crisis and I needed to find ways to capture the person’s state-of-being. Thanks for the inspiration and descriptions as some of these are helpful even though what I am doing is not creative writing. Thanks!

I really like those ways of showing anger without mentioning the word but it’s also great to have a hundred examples of how to use it with such variety.

Thanks, Maria! (Great last name, by the way. 😉 )

It is! Do people ever spell yours Donavon? Is there in the whole world anyone who spells their own name that way? Bryn is also good. A good Welsh word.

They do spell it that way! Haha!

Nice, thank you. Some of those, very evocative!!

Thanks so much, friend!

Thanks, Bryn. This long list is stimulating. So often expressing emotions, especially anger, is quite difficult. It is probably easiest to express anger through physical violence – but it is more challenging for a character who is angry and yet wants to/needs to express it in a non-violent way.

Hi, Keith! Thanks. And you bring up such a good point! I think it can be really powerful when a character is angry and _not_ really showing it, or else showing it in more understated ways.

Great list!! I’ve had many times when I wanted something other than ‘She wanted to punch something–preferably his nose.’ Or something similar to that. 🙂

Thanks Bunches!! I’m sure I’ll be referring to this list A Lot for my stories. Romances need to be full of conflict, and anger is certainly a product of that, especially in close relationships. Now that I have this list to refer to, I won’t need to burn up all my brain power trying to come up with a way to describe this emotion, so Thanks Again for burning up your brain for all of us. LOL 🙂

I might just start printing out these addendums and paste them into my copy of MLfW 🙂 These are super helpful, Bryn. Thanks for thinking them up! <3

🙂 Thanks, friend!

Thanks for sharing, Bryn! These are helpful. I reblogged your post on my blog for Write it Wednesday. (I also wrote a 2,218-word short fic today!) Write away!

I always say this, but it’s true: you are so prolific! Thank you so much for sharing…it means a lot, always!

I love all of your alternatives for anything. I’ll be sure to take note of these as well. Your book Master List for writers has become my bible. I even add my own twist on them sometimes to suit whatever’s going on in the scene at the time.

Hi, Nicole! Oh, that means a lot to me. I’m so glad the book is helpful! And I thought people could put their own spin on things, just like you’re doing. 🙂

I’ll be sure to leave a bibliographical reference to you when I’ve completed my book. Thank you so much Bryn. Xx

Oh my gosh, you don’t have to do that, of course! (Even though that would be amazing 😀 ) I hope the book is going well!

Awesome list. Thanks Bryn.

You’re welcome, Dalton! Thanks for stopping by!

I was scouring the internet for a compendious list of expressions to aid my essays. Growing restless by the minute I shuddered at the thought of exams creeping in the corner when I came across your blog. Very helpful. You’re a true lifesaver.:)

Thank you is an understatement Thanks though Thanks a great deal

Hair-trigger temper is another good description.

Just wanted to say thanks trying to make my own book right now and I always struggle with expressing anger

wow. these phrases are extremely useful and really realistic. thank u so much for compiling it

You are so welcome!

These are so good! Thanks so much xx

thx for the phrases

thanks you helped me a lot

Thank you so much! This is great!

Oh yay! So glad you liked it! 🙂

Very good writing resources!!! This is one of the best website I have ever been! There is just a bountiful amount of phrases that I need when writing a composition. Thank so much!! Much appreciated.

Hi bryn donovan , thank you for this list! I was actually quite stressed out as i am going to have my english composition tomorrow and i also didn’t know a lot of good phrases for anger. Upon stumbling on your website, i saw MANY good phrases! so if i write about a character being angry tomorrow , i would definitely hv good marks!UwU THANKS again!!! 🙂

Btw my name is isabel oops i forgot to include it! UwU

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