Writing Tool: Praxis Practice

Less musing, more moving.  

While writing my novel (and re-writing, and re-writing again), I've learned I have a problem with writing my character in action.  I guess my default mode is writing him musing or observing.

To address such weakness, I reckon I need some practice writing action.  Therefore, I will set up scenes where my main character is already too passive and then spin out several alternative scenarios to put the fire under his (and my) posterior.

Scene 1: Walking after a mysterious stranger

• He runs after the stranger, begging him to teach him about the history of the fall of civilization.
• He threatens to turn the stranger into the lawmen, unless he reveals his secrets.
• He fends off a ravenous band of beasts and thus wins the stranger's trust.
• He challenges the stranger to a duel of wits in return for revealed secrets.
• He tosses an artifact of dubious worth at the stranger's feet, asking him what it is.

Scene 2: Musing in the woods after a chase

• He climbs a tree to check the surrounding countryside.
• He practices with a firearm that doesn't work very well.
• He creeps through the undergrowth, convinced that he's being followed.
• He has an argument with himself about how to be a true hero.
• He realizes he's lost his radio and frantically retraces his steps to find it.

Scene 3: Talking with a mysterious armored man after realizing he wasn't an enemy

• He ducks behind brush and tries to circle around the armored man.
• He holds out his radio towards the armored man and pretends that it is a bomb.
• He has a tense showdown where he holds up a rusty rifle and the armored man keeps advancing.
• He runs from the armored man, climbs a tree, and then tries to jump down and tackle him.
• He bluffs his way towards the stream, then jumps over, assuming the man is an android and won't cross water.

Scene 4: Observing an enemy camp

• He sidles closer to take a shot with his rifle.
• He tries to steal a weapon from the armored man in order to rush in and save a mysterious woman.
• He breaks a twig underfoot, causing a manhunt in his direction.
• He sneaks as close as he dares to whisper to the mysterious woman.
• He argues with the armored man and threatens to shout unless the man helps him charge the camp.

Scene 5: Wandering around a university

• He poses as a student and tries to enroll in the university.
• He breaks into the library after dark to read the books on the fall of civilization.
• He sneaks into the soldier's quarters, looking for answers about the captain of the guard.
• He enters into a friendly wager with the guards, hoping to gain information about an important professor.
• He hops from class to class, searching for the professor he'd been sent to find.