Hi, welcome to Write Better Now, a podcast of quick, weekly writing tips meant to help you become a better writer. We’re your hosts with NYT bestselling author Carrie Jones and copyeditor extraordinaire Shaun Farrar. Thank you for joining us.
It’s a super quick writing tip again today. Ready?
When you’re writing dialogue, make every new speaker a new paragraph. If you’re writing kids books? You might as well just keep each dialogue a paragraph of their own?
Why? Our brains are wired to read each paragraph as a new speaker. If we jumble a bunch of different speakers into one paragraph, it slows down the reader’s pace of reading and also can get their brain all hitched up as they try to figure out who is talking and when.
Why else? It makes more white space on the page. The more white space on the page, the less intimidating the text is for the reader—especially the reluctant reader.
So don’t write a paragraph like this:
Carrie said, “Please support our channel.” Shaun nodded and said, “We are insecure.” “That’s true.” They laughed. Shaun added, “Wow. This is boring dialogue to prove a point.”
Instead write the paragraphs like this:
Carrie said, “Please support our channel.”
Shaun nodded and said, “We are insecure.”
“That’s true.”
They laughed.
Shaun added, “Wow. This is boring dialogue to prove a point.”
Pretty easy, right? Now we know who said “that’s true” even though there wasn’t a dialogue tag there. No readers’ brains hitched during the reading of that dialogue and all is good with the world.
For other posts about writing dialogue, check out below:
For exclusive paid content, check out my substack, LIVING HAPPY and WRITE BETTER NOW. It’s basically like a blog, but better. There’s a free option too without the bonus content but all the other tips and submission opportunties and exercises are there.
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This is it! Our final installment in how to punctuate dialogue like a boss
And we’re talking about questions and quotations in dialogue because why not fry our brains a little more. Are you ready? And as a reminder, our last two podcasts also talk about this, so you should check them out.
Let’s start with . . .
Questions and Exclamations in Dialogue and there is not dialogue tag or beat.
They are just standing out there all by their lonesome.
When this happens, you just put the question mark or the exclamation point inside the last end quotation marks.
“Carrie is obsessed with manatees?”
“Carrie is obsessed with manatees!”
So the formula for that is:
BEGINNING QUOTATION MARKS + QUESTION OR EXCLAMATION + QUESTION MARK OR EXCLAMATION POINT + END QUOTES
Questions and Exclamations With a Dialogue Tag
Now let’s add a dialogue tag for those questions and exclamations.
So here again, the exclamation point or question marks are right there inside the second set of quotation marks. DO NOT USE A COMMA, TOO! BANISH IT!
And do not capitalize the dialogue tag. LOWER CASE THAT BABY! It’s all the same sentence even with the exclamation point/question mark in there.
“Carrie is into manatees?” they asked, pretty much scowling because that was weird.
“Carrie is into manatees!” he said, gesticulating at the manatee. The manatee winked.
BEGINNING QUOTATION MARKS + QUESTION OR EXCLAMATION + QUESTION MARK OR EXCLAMATION POINT + END QUOTES + lowercase dialogue tag and the rest of the sentence + PERIOD.
Okay. Moving on to this dangerous territory.
Quote Inside Your Dialogue
Sometimes, you’ll have a character who is telling you a direct quote from someone else or a book or a song lyric within their dialogue, right? So, we have to tell the reader that this quote is a quote they are quoting (look at all those quote words) and not something they themselves are making up.
How do you do that?
You use the magical punctuation!
So, you put those double quotation marks around everything the speaker is saying AND THEN you put single quotation marks around what they are quoting.
“Carrie said, and I quote, ‘I am so into manatees.’ ”
“Carrie said, ‘I am so into manatees.’ Sometimes it’s hard to be married to her.”
Amazing, right?
WRITING TIP OF THE POD
Knowing how to punctuate helps make agents, editors, and readers love you.
DOG TIP FOR LIFE
If you’re quoting someone else, you want to show it. If you don’t? You’re plagiarizing. That’s naughty.
SHOUT OUT!
The music we’ve clipped and shortened in this podcast is awesome and is made available through the Creative Commons License.
We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream biweekly live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook. But she also has extra cool content focused on writing tips here.
Carrie is reading one of her raw poems every once in awhile on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That’s a lot!
In last week’s podcast we started to talk about how to punctuate dialogue because we’re sexy like that. And we’re continuing that discussion this week.
They are calm and lovely and explain things really well.
And for a reminder: A dialogue tag is just the bits like “they said,” “she whispered,” “he yelled.”
Single line of dialogue with dialogue tag and action
So, for this, you’ve got quotation marks around your dialogue with the dialogue tag following what was said. But before that, right before the end quotation mark, you have a comma. There’s no capital letter for that dialogue tag. Why? Because it’s the same damn sentence, that’s why, and you can’t just randomly capitalize things in there. A period goes at the very end of the action or beat.
“Shaunie is a cutie face,” she said, hoping Shaunie would look her way and smile.
Quotation Marks + Capitalized First Word + Comma + End Quotation Marks + Lowercase First Word in the Dialogue Tag + Comma (usually) + Action/Beat + Period.
You can switch that around and start off with the action/beat and the dialogue tag.
Hoping Shaunie would look her way and smile, she said, “Shaunie is a cutie face.”
Action/Beat + Comma + Dialogue Tag +Quotation Marks + Capitalized First Word + Period + End Quote
So, then you have the interrupting dialogue stuff that writers love.
This is when the dialogue is all the same sentence, but it’s interrupted by the dialogue tag. When that happens, you want a comma before the last quotation marks in the first part of the sentence and then again after the dialogue tag.
“Shaunie is a cutie face,” she said, hoping Shaunie would look her way and smile, “but he doesn’t ever notice me.”
Or
“Shaunie is a cutie face,” she said, “but he doesn’t ever notice me.”
Quotation Marks + Capitalized First Word + Comma + End Quotation Marks + Lowercase First Word in the Dialogue Tag + Comma + Action/Beat + Comma + Quotation Marks + Lowercased first word + End Punctuation (not a comma) + End Quotation Marks.
Two sentences interrupted
Or you can get all emphatic and make it two sentences because it’s dialogue. Then the first sentence has a period before the end quotes and dialogue tag. The dialogue tag ends with a period. The second quote section starts with a capital letter. Whew. That’s a lot. Ready?
“Shaunie is a cutie face,” she said, hoping Shaunie would look her way and smile. “But he doesn’t ever notice me.”
Quotation Marks + Capitalized First Word + Comma + End Quote Marks + Lowercase First Word in the Dialogue Tag + Comma + Action/Beat + Period + Quotation Marks + Capitalized First Word + End Punctuation (not a comma) + End Quotation Marks.
Whew, that was a lot. Our brains are fried? Your brains okay?
Writing Tip of the Pod
Be sexy. Know your punctuation.
Dog Tip for Life
Don’t just bark at people. It’s easy, but it doesn’t get you what you want.
LINKS WE REFERENCE IN THE RANDOM THOUGHTS PART OF THE PODCAST
We have a podcast, LOVING THE STRANGE, which we stream biweekly live on Carrie’s Facebook and Twitter and YouTube on Fridays. Her Facebook and Twitter handles are all carriejonesbooks or carriejonesbook. But she also has extra cool content focused on writing tips here.
Carrie is reading one of her raw poems every once in awhile on CARRIE DOES POEMS. And there you go! Whew! That’s a lot!
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
Dialogue and voice both do some really important things in your story.
Provide context –
You can provide some pretty awesome information via dialogue and idiosyncratic character voice.
Show the subtext –
Subtext is basically the hidden motivation/emotion/wants of your character that aren’t right there out on the surface.
So if I wrote:
“Look at you in that onesie! What a brave person you are.” Shaun said with a grimace.
You’d know that Shaun is really thinking that the other character is more unconventional than brave.
Make things more exciting –
When you have two characters bickering, it tends to be more interesting on the page than saying, “They bickered.”
Dialogue and voice helps provide context, drama, and interest. It pulls the reader in. It’s a big part of showing rather than telling.
“I can’t believe you don’t like my onesie,” she said, spinning around in front of the couch, arms out.
He smirked. “Didn’t say that.”
“Manatees are frolicking on this.” She stopped spinning and pulled out the fabric a bit. “Look! Look at the print. It is imported.”
“You look like you’re two. A two year old with boobs.”
“Boobs! Call them breasts. Oh my word . . .”
“That makes you sound like a chicken.”
“You are the chicken, mister, a negative, judgmental and derogatory chicken and I am incensed that you don’t understand the value of this outfit or me.”
“WTF, baby.”
Shows character difference.
Good dialogue and good voice show us how the characters aren’t the same. Even in my horrible example up there, the two characters don’t sound the same. One has longer sentences and more Latinate word choices. The other is a bit more blunt. One uses conjunctions and the other doesn’t.
Dialogue and voice go hand in hand to really make a huge impact on your story. Get cozy with them. Learn their rules. Buy them a coffee. Make them your friends. You won’t regret it.
NEW BOOK ALERT!
I just want to let everyone know that INCHWORMS (The Dude Series Book 2) is out and having a good time as Dude competes for a full scholarship at a prestigious Southern college and getting into a bit of trouble.
Here’s what it’s about:
A fascinating must-read suspense from New York Times bestseller Carrie Jones.
A new chance visiting a small Southern college. A potential love interest for a broken girl obsessed with psychology. A damaged group of co-eds. A drowning that’s no accident. A threat that seems to have no end.
And just like that Jessica Goodfeather aka Dude’s trip away from her claustrophobic life in Maine to try to get an amazing scholarship to her dream school has suddenly turned deadly. Again.
What would you do to make a difference?
After his best friend Norah was almost abducted, Cole Nicholaus has spent most of his childhood homeschooled, lonely and pining for Norah to move from best friend to girl friend status. When birds follow him around or he levitates the dishes, he thinks nothing of it—until a reporter appears and pushes him into making a choice: stay safe at home or help save a kidnapped kid.
Cole and Norah quickly end up trying to not just save a kid, but an entire town from a curse that has devastating roots and implications for how exactly Cole came to be the saint that he is.
Can Cole stop evil from hurting him and Norah again? And maybe even get together? Only the saints know.
From the New York Times and internationally bestselling author of the NEED series, Saint is a book about dealing with the consequences that make us who we are and being brave enough to admit who we love and what we need.
BUY NOW! 🙂 I made a smiley face there so you don’t feel like I’m too desperate.
One of my favorite criticisms is when people say to writers, “Your dialogue is not realistic.”
The reason this cracks me up is because have you ever really listened to most people’s realistic dialogue? It’s pretty funny and makes a pretty bizarre book.
I took this verbatim from a Halloween sleep over at my house in pre-COVID-19 times.
Here’s the scene:
There are six 14-year-olds. They are making cheesy ghosts with olive faces. This is the dialogue. It is verbatim.
And this, my friends, is why us writers don’t have perfectly accurate dialogue in our stories. Are you ready?
The Words They Said:
Didn’t H– make show choir?
She didn’t make it. She tried it again in the spring and she emailed Mrs. Wright and asked her what to work on but she used all these big words so then H– didn’t try out because she was mad.
Oh no… Big words
She told her she needed to work on her voice and stuff.
No offense but she does
(Abby keeps singing.)
Guys do not be mean.
I don’t want to be mean.
Did you hear her solo?
It was good but she got mad after awhile.
She got sick of it after awhile because Ben told her to do something on her solo.
Is Ben the guy who runs the band thing with the saxophones.
No he does the drama.
I’m so mad.
Can we do it?
Guys we would be amazing.
I would do the choreography. I’m so tough.
The three of us. No the four of us.
What about me. You guys hate me!
No… You don’t do musical stuff.
No! All of us can do it.
Oh! I’m so foolish…
I don’t know how to shape the ghost.
You have a hard butt.
Look! It has a belly button.
I got bored so I put more olives on it.
All of my cheese fell-off.Abby keeps singing.
Abby will you shut up!
(Mallory joins Abby in singing.)
Oh my God, you guys. Emily’s ghost looks like a Pac-Man.
It is a Pac-Man.
Oh.
I decided to announce my geekiness to the world.
This is the dialogue, I swear.
As a former reporter, I know how messy it is listening to people talk.
Realistic dialogue isn’t always the point. The point is that you want the dialogue to make sense, to advance your plot, to show character, to make your story sing. People will always ding writers on dialogue because they’ll expect the dialogue to reflect the people in their own world.
But the thing is that we all don’t talk the same. Donald Trump doesn’t sound like Barack Obama who doesn’t sound like Joe Biden who doesn’t sound like Mike Pence who doesn’t sound like Kamala Harris.
That’s okay. Just try to hear your own characters’ voices, but more than that, listen to the voices that don’t sound like you and don’t think that they don’t sound ‘realistic,’ instead rejoice in that difference. It’s pretty beautiful.
Let’s Hang Out!
LET’S HANG OUT!
HEY! DO YOU WANT TO SPEND MORE TIME TOGETHER?
MAYBE TAKE A COURSE, CHILL ON SOCIAL MEDIA, BUY ART OR A BOOK, OR LISTEN TO OUR PODCAST?
I have a quick, pre-recorded Teachable class designed to make you a killer scene writer in just one day. It’s fun. It’s fast. And you get to become a better writer for just $25, which is an amazing deal.
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
This is from when Em was super young and I wrote it all out and saved it because that’s what I do.
There is a Halloween Sleep Over at my house. There are six 14-year-olds. They are making cheesy ghosts with olive faces. This is the dialogue. It is verbatim.
This is the reason why we don’t have perfectly accurate dialogue in our stories.
DIRECT CONVERSATION BEGINS NOW
Didn’t H — make show choir?
She didn’t make it. She tried it again in the spring and she emailed Mrs. Wright and asked her what to work on but she used all these big words so then X — didn’t try out because she was mad.
Oh no … Big words
She told her she needed to work on her voice and stuff.
No offense, but she does
Abby keeps singing.
Guys do not be mean.
I don’t want to be mean.
Did you hear her solo?
It was good, but she got mad after awhile.
She got sick of it after awhile because Ben told her to do something on her solo.
Is Ben the guy who runs the band thing with the saxophones.
No, he does the drama.
I’m so mad.
Can we do it?
Guys we would be amazing.
I would do the choreography. I’m so tough.
The three of us. No, the four of us.
What about me. You guys hate me!
No… You don’t do musical stuff.
No! All of us can do it.
Oh! I’m so foolish…
I don’t know how to shape the ghost.
You have a hard butt.
Look! It has a belly button.
I got bored, so I put more olives on it.
All of my cheese fell-off.
Abby keeps singing.
Abby will you shut up!
Mallory joins Abby in singing.
Oh my God, you guys. Emily’s ghost looks like a Pac-Man.
It is a Pac-Man.
Oh.
I decided to announce my geekiness to the world via a Pac-Man cheesy ghost.
Why This DIALOGUE WOULDn’t Work In A Story
It’s pretty simple.
It’s all talking heads. We don’t know who is talking or responding until the end.
It’s a lot of filler. Would the real point be Emily announcing her geekiness to the world of her friends or would it be someone being excluded and then included or would it be about X not making show choir?
Dialogue needs to keep up the pace, move the story forward and reveal something about the characters.
Don’t get me wrong. We can tweak this dialogue and make it work. We can add in some tags, physical reactions and actions, setting, backstory and it could be pretty snazzy. But right now? Right now, it’s a bit of a talking-heads mess.
Steve Wedel and I wrote a super creepy book a few years back called After Obsession and it’s making a big freaking splash in the amazing Netherlands thanks to Dutch Venture Publishing and its leader Jen Minkman.
Check out this spread in a Dutch magazine. I met a whole bunch of Dutch readers last Friday and let me tell you? They are the best.
It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed!
You can order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?
You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps).
A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you.
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
At the grocery store last night, there were people in the line behind me who were not from Maine. The evidence for this conclusion?
1. They were tan. 2. They had no fleece clothing on. 3. They were really, really tan. 4. They said things like, “Oh, this store is so funny.”
But that isn’t the point.
The point is that there was all this chemistry going on between them. You could hear the air crackle between these tan, wealthy-looking, late 40-somethings. It was obvious they had decided to go on a romantic trip together and that they weren’t married. Evidence?
1. No rings.
That’s all my evidence, actually.
So, I’m getting ingredients for bouillabaisse and the check-out lady, Deb, is finishing up scanning my items and then she grabs the basil. Rich Lady from Away: Oh, is that the delicious smell I’m smelling? Deb, the Check-Out Woman: It’s basil.
Deb smiles. Deb is nice. Rich Lady from Away: Oh, it smells soooooooo delicious I would just like to rub it all over my body.
Deb’s hand freezes. She passes the basil onto the conveyor belt to the Bagging Boy. Deb looks up at me. She makes big eyes. Bagging Boy snorts. Rich Man from Away: I know what I’d like to rub all over your body.
AIKEEE!!!!! Too much information! Too much information!
Now, I’m going to Revision Land and when I get to page 300 I’m going to reward myself and never think about tan people rubbing basil on their bodies again.
It’s with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed!
You can order this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?
You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps).
A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you.
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
So, I’m back in the camper for the summer because we rent out our hosts to tourists every year. Well, it’s the second year, that almost makes it every year, right?
To put this in perspective, we have two dogs, one obese cat, two humans (occasionally three) in this tiny camper from the 1980s. We painted it white so it wasn’t as depressing, but let me tell you, painting things white doesn’t make anything actually bigger.
Anyways, I was trying to quickly make a camper video about dialogue and I failed completely. Here it is below. Don’t judge too harshly.
If you don’t want to die from secondhand embarrassment let me sum it up for you. The takeaway from this video is meant to be people react to different things in different ways. People speak in different ways. Show this in your dialogue. Think of how your mom talks, your bestie, your avo, the lady at the bar, your rabbi. Not everyone talks the same. Think of how they all react to one simple situation like a rat popping out of the garbage bin in the kitchen. It wouldn’t all be the same, right? Respect and embrace that difference and show it in your story.
WRITING NEWS
IN THE WOODS – READ AN EXCERPT, PREORDER NOW!
My next book, IN THE WOODS, appears in July with Steve Wedel. It’s scary and one of Publisher’s Weekly’s Buzz Books for Summer 2019. There’s an excerpt of it there and everything! But even cooler (for me) they’ve deemed it buzz worthy! Buzz worthy seems like an awesome thing to be deemed!
You can preorder this bad boy, which might make it have a sequel. The sequel would be amazing. Believe me, I know. It features caves and monsters and love. Because doesn’t every story?
You can get exclusive content, early podcasts, videos, art and listen (or read) never-to-be-officially published writings of Carrie on her Patreon. Levels go from $1 to $100 (That one includes writing coaching and editing for you wealthy peeps).
A lot of you might be new to Patreon and not get how it works. That’s totally cool. New things can be scary, but there’s a cool primer HERE that explains how it works. The short of it is this: You give Patreon your paypal or credit card # and they charge you whatever you level you choose at the end of each month. That money supports me sharing my writing and art and podcasts and weirdness with you.
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
Mushy dialogue sucks. It’s nothing space in your story and sometimes it’s nothing space in your life. You know what I’m talking about, right? You meet some cool human at a coffee house and talk to them and it goes like this:
“Hey.”
“Hey.”
“How’s it shaking?”
“It’s shaking well, thank you.”
“Yeah. Weather is nice, right?”
“It’s quite sunny.”
“Cool.”
“Yes, it’s lovely.”
Random bad dialogue that I just made up
One of my writers in the Writing Barn class that I’m teaching for the next six months, directed me to a blog post about the Five Biggest Writing Mistakes and How to Fix Them and one of those mistakes according to James Scott Bell is marshmallow dialogue.
Bell believes that dialogue is one of the best ways to make a story better or make it absolute trash. He advocates fast-paced dialogue full of tension. Blah dialogue he says is ‘puffy,’ and ‘overly sweet,’ and everyone sounds the same no matter who is speaking.
Bell kindly gives hints about how to make characters sound different from one another.
Those include:
Making documents written solely in one character’s voice.
Keep working on it until every character sounds different and you can distinguish them at a glance (I added that)
Make sure there is tension going on. What do people want? Why are they talking? Do they want the same thing?
Make your dialogue simpler. Get rid of extra words. You can cut and copy dialogue into another document and then hack away at it.
He uses the following example of compressed dialogue.
“Mary, are you angry with me?” John asked.
“You’re damn straight I’m mad at you,” Mary said.
“But why? You’ve got absolutely no reason to be!”
“Oh but I do, I do. And you can see it in my face, can’t you?”
The alternative:
“You angry with me?” John asked.
“Damn straight,” Mary said.
“You got no reason to be!”
Mary felt her hands curling into fists.
Bell’s example
I’m annoying and I send my apologies to Mr. Bell, but that example is wonderful at compressing dialogue, but those people? They still sound the same to me. In the first example, they both sound like middle class people who are having a hard time expressing their feelings. In the second example, they sound like people who are expressing their feelings in exactly the same way and are probably are still the same social/economic/education background.
Look at what happens if you keep one character’s original lines and one character’s new lines.
“Mary, are you angry with me?” John asked. “Damn straight,” Mary said. “But why? You’ve got absolutely no reason to be!” Mary’s hands curled into fists.
Or….
“You angry with me?” John asked.
“You’re damn straight I’m mad at you,” Mary said.
“But why? You have absolutely no reason to be?”
Mary’s hands curled into fists.
Revision
I’d argue that’s even better. For more about how language and dialogue changes with the speakers, check out our Dogs are Smarter than People podcast from last year. And good luck with your dialogue!
Links that go with the podcast (the important words are here and here.
HELP US AND DO AN AWESOME GOOD DEED
Thanks to all of you who keep listening to our weirdness on the DOGS ARE SMARTER THAN PEOPLE podcast as we talk about random thoughts, writing advice and life tips. We’re sorry we laugh so much… sort of. Please share it and subscribe if you can. Please rate and like us if you are feeling kind, because it matters somehow. There’s a new episode every Tuesday!
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No question is too wild. But just like Shaun does, try not to swear, okay?
Here is the link to the mobile app and our bonus podcast below.
You can order my middle grade fantasy novel Time Stoppers Escape From the Badlands here or anywhere.
People call it a cross between Harry Potter and Percy Jackson but it’s set in Maine. It’s full of adventure, quirkiness and heart.
MOE BERG
The Spy Who Played Baseball is a picture book biography about Moe Berg. And… there’s a movie out now about Moe Berg, a major league baseball player who became a spy. How cool is that?
It’s awesome and quirky and fun.
FLYING AND ENHANCED
Men in Black meet Buffy the Vampire Slayer? You know it. You can buy them here or anywhere.
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
It’s Writing Tip Wednesday and today we’re talking about talking.
What’s that mean?
Dialogue, baby. It’s that magic place where the characters get to speak for themselves.
So, the number one tip is super obvious, but yet… so many of us don’t do it.
SAY YOUR DIALOGUE
Out loud.
That’s easy enough, right? But actually listen to how the words sound. Is it awkward? Too perfect? Is someone saying an 895-word sentence?
Think about the breath units.
Wait. Breath units? What’s that?
A breath unit is how many syllables are read in one breath. You breathe at periods and commas and punctuation marks, right?
So, if your dialogue sentences have more than 20 syllables? It’s going to be cruddy. If it’s all five or less? It’s going to sound cruddy too.
Poets use this writing tool and think about this all the time. Fiction writers should too because the cadence of your words and your writing matters AND because you should have as many tools in your tool box as possible.
Once you know the tools, you can break the rules for dramatic effect. Stephen King often writes a 100-word sentence full of long breath units and follows it with a one-breath-unit sentence-slash- paragraph for a dramatic punch.
Genius.
And I sort of did that up there.
See? This sentence is super long (40 syllables):
Stephen King often writes a 100-word sentence full of long breath units and follows it with a one-breath-unit sentence-slash- paragraph for a dramatic punch.
And followed it with this (2 syllables):
Genius.
That’s not dialogue, but it helps make it understandable, right?
And to be fair, not all people and all cultures have that typical upper middle class white person in the United States breath unit. Think of Eminem or Busta Rhymes or Tech N9ne for a second and all the words each of those men can say in one breath. Chopper-style rap has this awesome, intense emphasis on speed and pronunciation, which throws the rules of breath units out the window. Here’s a link to some fast rap examples courtesy of Red Bull.
Warning: There is profanity.
And those differences are important. It’s good to remember where the ‘rules’ come from and who they come from and also to give yourself the liberty to play with them or against them.
So, do that. Say your dialogue aloud. Play around with the breath. Think about the things your character is feeling underneath the words she’s saying.
If a cop or a werewolf is chasing your Scooby gang, they aren’t going to be eloquent and have long beat units. If they’re on drugs, giving a speech, or borderline hysterical? Those beats are going to show that.
WRITING NEWS
I’m heading to Freeport, Maine on Sept. 28 and then Houston and Virginia Beach pretty soon to promote my picture book biography of Moe Berg. It’s called The Spy Who Played Baseball.
I’ll be hanging with a lot of other cool authors in Freeport.
ENHANCED, the follow-up to FLYING is here! And the books are out of this world. Please buy them and support a writer.
Flying
The last TIME STOPPERS BOOK is out and I love it. You should buy it because it’s empowering and about friendship and bias and magic. Plus, dragons and elves.
How to Get Signed Copies:
If you would like to purchase signed copies of my books, you can do so through the awesome Sherman’s Book Store in Bar Harbor, Maine or the amazing Briar Patch. The books are also available online at places like Amazon and Barnes & Noble.
For signed copies – email barharbor@shermans.com for Sherman’s or email info@briarpatchbooks.comand let them know the titles in which you are interested. There’s sometimes a waiting list, but they are the best option. Plus, you’re supporting an adorable local bookstore run by some really wonderful humans. But here’s the Amazon link, too!
Art Stuff
You can buy prints of my art here. Thank you so much for supporting my books and me and each other. I hope you have an amazing day.
Share this if you want and also because it would be super nice of you!
