In part one of How to Write Good Dialogue we talked about avoiding “Q&A” sessions, not letting your characters say everything they’re thinking, and pacing yourself on releasing information. Many of you took the time to share your own dialogue struggles and asked some great questions. I’ll get to them all – it’s just going to take a couple posts!
Here are some more ways to write good dialogue:
Oh, boy, was I ever guilty of this as a new writer. And even now I lapse into this during my first drafts.
Any 30 Rock fans out there? My all time favorite exchange on that show is from last season where Liz (Tina Fey) and Jack (Alec Baldwin) accidentally get married. Liz – who is the main character – yells, “I’m sorry you got caught up in another one of Liz Lemon’s adventures!” And Jack says, “My adventures. I am the protagonist!”
In the dandelion story, all the dialogue is Paige-focused. Even when two other characters are talking, they are talking about Paige. She’s the protagonist – who else would they be talking about?
Themselves. That’s the way it works in real life. Haven’t we all had the experience where we walk away from a conversation and think, “I could tell you anything you want to know about them … but I don’t think they know a thing about me!” We’re all guilty of being focused on our problems, our lives, our fears – make your characters guilty of it too!
One of my new writing pet peeves is an exchange that looks like this:
“My father … is being transferred at the end of June.”
“The end of June?!” he exploded. “We’re a week into June already!”
That sounds so forced to me. It’s much more natural, I think, if Carter says, “That’s, like, 3 weeks away!” (There are other things wrong, of course. Like that Carter “explodes.” And I’m not even sure Paige should be including a time frame yet, but that falls more under “pacing” than it does “info dumping.”)
Think about your characters and what their motivations are for saying what they’re saying. And for-the-benefit-of-the-reader is not a good enough motivation.
She has a what?
“Bee in her bonnet” is something I would never say. But to my mother – who watches old movies, reads historical fiction, and was raised by Oklahomans – it seemed like a very natural thing to say.
It’s also important to pay attention to word choices. When I go grocery shopping, I’ll say, “I went to the grocery store.” When my best friend, Roseanna, goes grocery shopping, she says, “I did some marketing.” Or if you’re in you 30s or 40s, headphones are called headphones. If you’re younger, headphones are earbuds.
Tonya from our wonderful Go Teen Writers community brought up that she struggles with her antagonist’s dialogue. I do too. Because my main character and those who support her make sense to me, and those who oppose her do not. At least not early on when I’m writing.
This is where that “Why?” question becomes so important. It’s not enough for someone to just be mean to your character or to serve as a blockade. You must ask Why? Like:
Why is Autumn being mean to Sabrina?
Because she’s jealous that Patrick likes Sabrina instead.
If Autumn is angry with Sabrina … then why is Autumn also made at Alden for the poor way he treated Sabrina?
Because deep down she loves Sabrina and knows she deserved to be treated better. Also because if Alden had treated Sabrina the way he should have, the two of them would be together and Patrick would be free.
The only way to achieve the feat of your characters sounding, behaving, and thinking differently than each other is to spend time mulling over who they all are, where they come from, and what is motivating them at this moment in time.
Early on in my first draft, I find that difficult. But by the time I’ve spent 70,000 words exploring these people, it starts to click. This snippet comes from a manuscript of mine, and it falls in the last 25ish pages:
“I didn’t mean to date Glen.” Mom says it so quietly at first I’m not sure I heard correctly. “I went to the market that day for very simple things—milk, arugula, and butter. And then Glen…”
Roseanna commented that my choices for “simple things” said a lot about my character., but I honestly hadn’t thought much about it. By that time, I knew my character’s mom well enough, and I had a recipe in my head that she made all the time, and it included arugula.
There’s still a lot more to cover about dialogue, so stay tuned for part three!
Tomorrow is news day around here – if you have news you’d like to celebrate, please email it to me at Stephanie(at)GoTeenWriters.com with “News Day” in the subject line. Remember news can be anything from starting a new project to joining a critique group to winning a contest!
Have a great Wednesday, everyone!