Scott Rush
New member
Who writes them well, who doesn’t? What are your favourites?
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I’m very fond of John Marsden (the Tomorrow Series). Normally I’m not too keen of first person action scenes; I find the style kills suspense. It’s harder to believe that the protagonist isn’t going to make it. That said Marsden really plays to the style’s strengths, we get a lot of insight into how what is going on is impacting the viewpoint character emotionally, which I really dig. The service station attack/train chase from “The Other Side of Dawn” and the infiltration, attack on and escape from the airfield sequence from “Burning for Revenge” are masterpieces of sustained suspense.
I don’t really like the Tom Clancy Techno thriller Style. It’s too dry for my taste. I don’t find reading about expensive sounding military acronyms blowing up other expensive sounding military acronyms and long info dumps about the weapons used by every single character to be riveting stuff.
Neither was I fond of the way Suzanne Collins wrote the action in the Hunger Games books, mainly cause second person reminds me of the "choose your own adventure" books. I also found the action to be a bit rushed and lacking in atmosphere. Compare the Katniss hiding from the careers in the tree sequence with a similar sequence in “Darkness be my Friend” by John Marsden or any of the survival stuff to "the Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon” by Stephen King, there’s really no comparison.
For a change of pace, I love Terry Pratchett in full slapstick mode. The climax of Truckers and Moving pictures and the Unseen University faculty plotline from Reaper Man are pure madcap insanity of the best sort.
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I’m very fond of John Marsden (the Tomorrow Series). Normally I’m not too keen of first person action scenes; I find the style kills suspense. It’s harder to believe that the protagonist isn’t going to make it. That said Marsden really plays to the style’s strengths, we get a lot of insight into how what is going on is impacting the viewpoint character emotionally, which I really dig. The service station attack/train chase from “The Other Side of Dawn” and the infiltration, attack on and escape from the airfield sequence from “Burning for Revenge” are masterpieces of sustained suspense.
I don’t really like the Tom Clancy Techno thriller Style. It’s too dry for my taste. I don’t find reading about expensive sounding military acronyms blowing up other expensive sounding military acronyms and long info dumps about the weapons used by every single character to be riveting stuff.
Neither was I fond of the way Suzanne Collins wrote the action in the Hunger Games books, mainly cause second person reminds me of the "choose your own adventure" books. I also found the action to be a bit rushed and lacking in atmosphere. Compare the Katniss hiding from the careers in the tree sequence with a similar sequence in “Darkness be my Friend” by John Marsden or any of the survival stuff to "the Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon” by Stephen King, there’s really no comparison.
For a change of pace, I love Terry Pratchett in full slapstick mode. The climax of Truckers and Moving pictures and the Unseen University faculty plotline from Reaper Man are pure madcap insanity of the best sort.