Wickedly pacy! Wickedly solid! Wickedly good!

We’ve all seen them: action movies. All kinetic and showy. The car chases - screeching tyres and engines revving, permanently in the red, with classic corkscrew crashes; the fight sequences, where each blow lands like choreographed ballet and no one ever rubs an injury or swears; our heroine is pursued through an apartment block - there’s a quick apology and a family vase is righted before the villains smash through the door, and mother wonders if the family’s paid up with accidental damage cover.

It’s when these kaleidoscopes of energy start the movie that I imagine fistfuls of dollars (that might make a good title, folks) being burnt to cinders. Whoof!

The truth for me is that all the visual rough’n’tumble means nothing unless I’m invested in a character. Really, it doesn’t matter how stunning it is. Substitute in a crash test dummy - it’ll make no difference.

I want to be sold on a person. I want to know them. I want to be shown why I should care what happens to them. Then, once I’m locked in, by all means, ramp up the tension, turn on the screws; open the taps for chases and fights and troubles galore. [Caveat: film series are slightly different - I’ve already invested and you can take my buy-in as given.]

I’ve read the start of a few thrillers recently and it’s been action from the get-go. Crash! Bang! Wallop! Lots of verbs. Lots of white space - and usually body parts. Dear, dear, murder. Calamity.

There’s nothing wrong with a page turner. A gripping tale right from the outset can be wonderful. It’s just that… well. It gets a bit dull is all. Glitz and no substance.

At the other extreme is ponderous scene setting. We see these in indie-flavoured films. Interminably (in time terms) shots of nature. Trees wafting in the wind. Grasses rippling. Mountains rising majestically out of the landscape. All with wishy-washy music - the aural equivalent of soup can rinse. We don’t even have the luxury of seeing the opening credits superimposed with a lovely font. There’s nada of interest. No-thing.

The parallel in literary terms for me is the endless setting. There’s a well known American writer (can you guess who it is?) who goes to extraordinary lengths to pack in a whole lotta detail. Eventually I come round, but it’s a chew. It really is a chew. The master of endless, interminable description is Tolkein. Epic is the word. I know some (possibly many) will disagree. The man’s description is an epic bore.

So what I advocate and am petitioning for (ask my local MP) is for a blend of the three things I’ve mentioned. Action to propel the story, a hook about the character, and clues about the setting to spark pictures in my mind. All mixed in together and cooked to perfection.