I’m writing this big space battle action sequence in The Currency of War. In my head it lays out like a film — quick cuts between the four view point characters reacting to the changing situation. So I decided to try to write it as if it were a screenplay. Which means minimal description and rapid fire dialogue in each cut. Sort of a Aaron Sorkin meets Hitchcock in the shower scene in Psycho mashup that will (hopefully) weave together into a coherent whole.
Each of these individual scenes is running at just under a page and the entire sequence kicks off with a call from a character who is well away from the battle in contact with one of my captains. If this were actually a movie I would have them echo the same line, but I decided to vary it slightly for prose. They are both two word lines, same syllable length, same emotional content being conveyed. That then carries me into a scene where I’m down to the three characters who are actually all present and engaged in this battle.
I love writing. I love trying new tricks and I love seeing if the skills I learned and honed in Hollywood can translate onto a page of prose. Every day I thank the universe that I got to pursue this career that sustains me both mentally and emotionally.
I mean really, I get paid to make sh*t up. How cool is that?
