: Re: How do I write a MODERN combat/violence scene without being dry? Warning: I have ADHD and this might be a little ramble-y, sorry. I'm completely stumped. I'm trying to get into writing fiction

@LarsenBagley300

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Welcome to the SE.

In general, dry writing is 'journalistic' writing, in that it records events. Gripping writing records interior reactions to events.

Interior writing is tougher to write, in particular because it involves knowing the background and emotional make-up of not only the main character, but the friends and close secondary characters.

Take your first excerpt:

Several armored cars pull up, with "MPDC" emblazoned on the side. Six
policemen in full gear close in. "Riot police, masks on." I whisper. A
voice is broadcast from the helicopter. "THIS EVENT HAS BEEN DECLARED
AN UNLAWFUL ASSEMBLY. LEAVE THE AREA OR YOU WILL BE ARRESTED" Defiant,
we step forwards, approaching the barrier. The police tighten their
formation. Suddenly, a burst of machine gun fire tears through the
first picket line. Harris drops, along with thirty other men. "FALL
BACK," I yell. They do. Well, the people with me do. I feel a bullet
strike my chest, and as I look back I realize the reason I'm not dead
is because it had already been through two others. We flee.

It's almost entirely a log of events. It's even quantified. Six cars, the details of what is written on the sides of the cars. Very journalistic, very methodical, and very much not in-the-moment. Details are good, but they need to enhance the emotion not read like a report.

In your second excerpt, you still shy away from the reality of living through such a situation. You throw in some levity (arguably a bad choice) and colloquialisms, (kills tension).

One possibility is to convert your excerpt (either of them) with the addition of more screams and blood, things ripping, fetal positions, memory flashes apropos of nothing that mean something to the character, stressed-out dialog, and so on. No quantification.

For the purpose of engaging the reader in this moment, it doesn't matter that he's a soldier and is quantifying everything--you can establish that elsewhere and leave it to the reader to remember that this guy is in charge of the numbers and details.

And cut back on any extra qualifying words, too.

Armored cars pulled up, heavy, dented cars that could probably take
out a tank if they wanted. Six policemen, full gear, piled out.

Shit.

"Riot police," I hiss in a panic, but the pulse of pressure waves
from the chopper above drowns my words.

"YOU ARE UNLAWFULLY ASSEMBLED. LEAVE THE AREA OR YOU WILL BE ARRESTED."

We rush the barrier, and a burst of machine gun fire tears through the
picket line. Harris drops, blood spurting once, twice. A snatch of
song, my mother during the air raids in London, flashes
through my mind.

"Fall back," I scream to the others, panic undoing me. Something
pounds into my chest, and I slam my hand against it and fall, but
there's no blood. The bullet had gone through my buddy before it hit me.

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