Writing The Fight
Introduction: Moving Beyond the Move-List
If you are a writer looking to incorporate real, authentic martial arts into your novels and make your action sequences jump off the page, this book is for you.
I grew up on a steady diet of classic Golden Harvest and Shaw Brothers kung fu films. What I always loved about those movies was the clash of identities. It was never just a generic brawl; it was Wu-Tang versus Shaolin, or Lama style versus Shaolin. It was a collision of contrasting traditions, and you could visually see and feel those differences right there on the screen. Each style carried its own physics, rhythm, and attitude.
Now, as I write my own novel series, Savage Chronicles, alongside my co-author, capturing that same distinctiveness is vital to our storytelling. We wanted our readers to instantly recognize the deep structural differences between our characters’ styles. But translating martial arts to the written page presents a major trap: generic action.
Too many written fights fall back on a flat checklist: “I punched him, he blocked it, then I kicked him.” That is not how those classic movies came across. They relied on brilliant choreography and great cinematography—which is an intricate art form all its own.
A Note on Authenticity vs. Outcome
Before we begin, it is important to clarify the goal of this guide. This book teaches fiction-facing authenticity—the art of making fighting styles feel distinct, plausible, and narratively consistent. It is designed to provide you with the vocabulary and framework to capture the vibe of a martial art on the page. Please note, however, that “authentic martial arts writing” is not the same as “guaranteeing realistic fight outcomes.” In fiction, narrative necessity, character growth, and pacing often dictate the results of a fight. This guide helps you craft a style-forward, cinematic experience, not a simulation that guarantees every style matchup reflects real-world fight statistics.
When we first transitioned that cinematic energy into the novel format, I honestly struggled with it initially. The camera wasn’t there to do the heavy lifting anymore; the words had to become the camera. To solve this, I started building comprehensive “Combat Bibles” for my characters. I stopped focusing on just the names of the moves and started focusing on the signature experience of the character in motion—how they manipulate space, how they handle impact, and how they think under pressure.
As I developed this system and watched our action scenes transform into deeply character-driven sequences, I realized that other authors might be searching for the exact same blueprint.
This short book is a collection of the practical insights, templates, and bibles we built along that road. I hope it helps you elevate your action scenes as much as it has helped me.
Train hard. Write harder.