One big fella and all his ladies. 

Oh wait, did I already use that line?? 

One big fella and all his ladies. 

Hmmm....reminds me of a certain blogging group. 

A tad gloomy outside - though stunning. 

Good thing we'll be inside (our heads) all day!

We have been working hard (see Bret's picture below), but we also found the time to see this guy - up close and personal.

The Muses are hunkered down this weekend in beautiful Colorado. Here's a peek at our War Room.  (Note the extreme concentration and computing power.)

Check back throughout the weekend for more reporting from the front.

If Veronica thinks going forth is hard with this talented group, she's welcome to try to be Mr. Friday. Anyhow, I echo all the advice this week, but will desperately try to give you my own spin on the subject. I'll do that by telling you the story about how I learned my biggest lesson in writing dialogue. It all started with an embarrassing personality trait, a grimy bar, and a dude from Down Under…

The place was a serious dive. One of those with cheap beer, dim lighting, and a lot of B.O. A few beers in, someone introduced me to a friend-of-a-friend from Australia. The guy grabbed my hand and – like any proper Aussie – said, “G’day, mate.”

With a knee-jerk reaction, I shot back my own, “G’day,” as if I was starring in a Foster’s commercial.

My friend elbowed me in the ribs. Hard.

Gaw. Was I really making fun of someone’s accent to their face? Was I that American d-bag?

The Aussie’s eyebrows furrowed. “Ya from Austraila?”

“Ummm…no,” I managed to eek out. “It’s just…ahhh…didn’t mean to…sorry.”

After another awkward pause, the Aussie tried his own American enunciation of the language (‘Duuuuude, I…ah…don’t know – ummm – brah’). We all laughed and carried on with the night. A few red-cup refills later, my embarrassment subsided and I – as I do – got to thinking.

Was I mocking him? No, of course not. (I was in my early 20s and would’ve sold my soul for that lady-killing accent. In fact, it was an honor I pulled it off well enough for him to inquire.)

Then it hit me like a beer truck: This wasn’t a new trait. When I talk to my grandma, I always picked up her Texan drawl – “Hiii, Grand-MAWWW” (I still do it and my wife giggles every time). When a buddy uses “absolutely” in every sentence, so do I. Shoot, I’ve even caught myself mimicking other people’s facial tics.

That night unearthed a big realization – I’m an Emulator (no, it’s not one of the Strenthsfinder talents). And, for a long time, I was ashamed. Seriously, am I such a follower that I don’t even have my own facial tics? After all, our culture values those that stand out…not those of us who blend in.

Years later, I started to write. *Cue light from heaven and a chorus of angels* And, you guessed it, my Emulator is an asset. A huge asset. I can slip into other people’s vocal patterns and translate it to the page. Plus, since most communication – real or fictional – is body language…my adopted gestures are prime for exploiting in writing.

Now, my coworker and my novel’s sidekick might say, “interesting,” way too often. Or maybe my villain’s cheek twitches and she has a Texan drawl. This strange ability has become one of my greatest strengths and I encourage all you writers to feed your Emulator.

But what if you aren’t an Emulator by nature? Or you are, but don’t want to practice with socially uncomfortable situations? Some ideas:

• Ask a close friend (not the spouse, I repeat, not the spouse) if you can follow them around, trying to sound like them and/or adopt their mannerisms. It’s just like that favorite game 5-year-olds play.
• Go people watching and take detailed notes.  Later on – privately – attempt to recreate their stance, cadence of speech, and tone of voice.
• Study a great actor in a movie scene. Pause it, and re-enact the part, capturing the nuances as best you can.
• Read some good dialogue aloud, but in the character’s voice. Additionally, act out their actions – even those the author left to the imagination.
• The best advice I can give is to follow what the other Muses said: pay attention to the people around you in Target, at work, or wherever. Drink the folks in so you can spit them out on the page later.

If nothing else, you’ll crack yourself up doing these exercises. Believe me. But if you really want to learn how to be a great Emulator…fly to Melbourne, have a few cold ones, and start talking to the locals. You’ll be slurring G’days in no time.

Sometimes it's tough being fourth in line in this group. Have you seen Katy, Donna and Talia's posts on dialogue? They're great - all three of them. They've hit on much of what I wanted to cover: study conversations (in life and in art), keep dialogue tags to a minimum, let story context and/or formatting attribute dialogue.

So here are my miscellaneous, leftover thoughts on dialogue:

1) READ IT ALOUD - Nothing will improve your dialogue writing skills than reading your work aloud. Katy mentioned this in her post, but it's worth repeating. That sentence you just stumbled over? Cut it down. The rash of ellipses in your dialogue? Try them aloud. Are all the trailing thoughts or pauses necessary?

2) PACE IT -  Dialogue generally gets things moving along. As readers, we love to hear characters talk. We also love white space on the page. Be aware of that if you're writing a quiet, introspective scene. You might need to weave in setting, narrative, and other details to get the right pacing. Along the same lines, sometimes you can just let dialogue fly. Quick back and forth between characters will turn a scene into a freight train. Point is, dialogue is a powerful weapon. Use it often, but use it wisely.

3) WORK ON SUBTEXT - My favorite kind of dialogue has loads of subtext. We often don't say what we mean when we talk. We say what we think others want to hear, or what is expected of us, or we slip another motive behind our words. If you know your characters and their goals, then this should be really fun.

Finally, have fun! Dialogue is hard work, but it's also most definitely play. Let yourself experiment and enjoy!

I wrote a whole book without dialogue tags.  True story.  There was dialogue in the book too.  A lot.  

No one noticed, but they did comment in a few places that they lost track of who was speaking, so I added a few tags.  I discovered that a well placed said or says can help slow down the pace and provide a much needed beat in a scene.  So dialogue tags and I have made our peace, and I do include them in my stories, but sparingly. 

Dialogue tags (or the lack of them) really impact the voice of a piece.  There aren't necessarily right or wrong choices,  All may be grammatically correct.  It's a matter of style.

I prefer to use what I call pseudo dialogue tags. Pseudo dialogue tags can be physical descriptions, actions, or interior monologue that are placed in the same paragraph as the dialogue, either immediately before or after the dialogue.  These pseudo tags clue you in to who is speaking, without overtly pointing it out.  Occasionally, when I need to communicate tone, instead of using an adverb or active dialogue tag  (like exclaim, whisper, yell), I'll describe the tone of voice as an action. 

By way of example, let's take a short scene from my 2012 paranormal BANDIA:

             He stares out the windshield, lost in thought.  He looks younger than his eighteen years without the too confident grin. 

            My stomach twinges with a familiar little ache of yearning before I can stop it.  “I think at least one of us has to say something before we can consider this a real date.”

            Blake laughs at my comment, even though he still doesn’t look over.  “I don’t know.  Some of my best dates involved very little talking.”

            “I’m not an expert or anything, but I think talking about dates with other girls is generally frowned upon.”  Technically, he’s done it twice now.  The count’s in my favor.  “Although I guess that explains your better dates.”

            He smiles, and for a second I let myself wish he’d turn that smile on me.  He doesn’t.  He keeps staring straight ahead.

            “Look at me.”  It’s out before I can take it back. 

            To his credit, he turns his head in my direction, but his glance is so fleeting that it’s hardly worth the effort. 

            “Nice try.”

            “Brianna.”  Blake’s voice softens.  “We’re going to figure this out.”

“I just want to go home.”  The only thing to figure out is how I managed to wind up alone in a car with a guy who can’t even look at me.  A guy who can only break my heart.  

Did you notice the lack of "said" dialogue tags?  No adverbs or active dialog tags either.  Now, here is the scene again with the pseudo dialog tags highlighted and explained:

My stomach twinges with a familiar little ache of yearning before I can stop it.  [This physical reaction puts us in Brianna's head and since the dialogue is in the same paragraph, we know its her speaking] “I think at least one of us has to say something before we can consider this a real date.”

            Blake laughs at my comment, even though he still doesn’t look over. [Here, the paragraph switch and physical description brings us to Blake, and we know he is speaking next]  “I don’t know.  Some of my best dates involved very little talking.”

            “I’m not an expert or anything, but I think talking about dates with other girls is generally frowned upon.”  Technically, he’s done it twice now.  The count’s in my favor. [Since there are only two people speaking in this scene, a further dialogue tag isn't necessary, but if there were more than two characters in the scene, this interior monologue breaking up the two lines of dialogue should clue us in that Brianna is speaking] “Although I guess that explains your better dates.”

            He smiles, and for a second I let myself wish he’d turn that smile on me.  He doesn’t.  He keeps staring straight ahead. [Here we have Blake's physical description and no dialogue after, so we know he doesn't say anything] 

            “Look at me.”  It’s out before I can take it back. [Again, interior monologue and a paragraph shift clue us in that the speaker is Brianna] 

            To his credit, he turns his head in my direction, but his glance is so fleeting that it’s hardly worth the effort. [Again, we get Blake's physical reaction, but no dialogue] 

            “Nice try.”[Here, we know Brianna's speaking from the paragraph structure (the move from Blake's action with no tag, and the fact that we've been trained to see this pattern from the sequence above) but if there was any doubt, it's cleared up immediately, by the next line of dialogue]

            “Brianna.”  Blake’s voice softens. [This is almost a true dialogue tag- it describes Blake's tone of voice and provides a beat between the more substantive comment that follows] “We’re going to figure this out.”

“I just want to go home.”  The only thing to figure out is how I managed to wind up alone in a car with a guy who can’t even look at me. [More interior monologue as a pseudo tag] A guy who can only break my heart.  

It's not that I don't like dialogue tags.  Most of the time when I'm reading, I don't even notice them.  But I do have a pet peeve about tags when they are overused,  And yes, it possible to overuse dialogue tags, even without adverbs.  I tried to read one book that had so many "active" dialogue tags that it completely detracted from the story, and I never read past the first chapter. 

Let's take the scene above with active dialogue tags added: 

My stomach twinges with a familiar little ache of yearning before I can stop it.  “I think at least one of us has to say something before we can consider this a real date,” I state.

            Blake laughs at my comment, even though he still doesn’t look over.  “I don’t know," he comments.  "Some of my best dates have involved very little talking.”

            “I’m not an expert or anything, but I think talking about dates with other girls is generally frowned upon,” I retort.  Technically, he’s done it twice now.  The count’s in my favor.  “Although I guess that explains your better dates,” I add.

            He smiles, and for a second I let myself wish he’d turn that smile on me.  He doesn’t.  He keeps staring straight ahead.

            “Look at me,” I exclaim.  It’s out before I can take it back. 

            To his credit, he turns his head in my direction, but his glance is so fleeting that it’s hardly worth the effort. 

            “Nice try,” I berate.

            “Brianna,”  Blake purrs.  “We’re going to figure this out.”

“I just want to go home,” I declare.  The only thing to figure out is how I managed to wind up alone in a car with a guy who can’t even look at me.  A guy who can only break my heart.

Do you see the difference?  It's more than just my clunky use of descriptive tags, it's the overuse of them.  They repeat information we already know (who's speaking) and describe tone that was evident from the dialogue itself.  Not only do these active tags add nothing here, they are so overdone that they detract from the scene.  The entire rhythm feels off to me.

Even the innocuous "said" can be overused in some cases.  I read an adult romance that had a "said" tag on every line of dialogue without exception, even when only two people were talking and it was clear who was speaking. "Said" was simply tacked on to every line of dialogue.  It was tedious and clunky.  Let's try the BANDIA scene again with simple "said" in place of the active tags.  It's less bad, but the pacing is still affected, and it's distracting because we already know who's talking:

My stomach twinges with a familiar little ache of yearning before I can stop it.  “I think at least one of us has to say something before we can consider this a real date,” I say.

            Blake laughs at my comment, even though he still doesn’t look over.  “I don’t know," he says.  "Some of my best dates have involved very little talking.”

            “I’m not an expert or anything, but I think talking about dates with other girls is generally frowned upon,” I say.  Technically, he’s done it twice now.  The count’s in my favor.  “Although I guess that explains your better dates,” I say.

            He smiles, and for a second I let myself wish he’d turn that smile on me.  He doesn’t.  He keeps staring straight ahead.

            “Look at me,” I say.  It’s out before I can take it back. 

            To his credit, he turns his head in my direction, but his glance is so fleeting that it’s hardly worth the effort. 

            “Nice try,” I say.

            “Brianna,”  Blake says.  “We’re going to figure this out.”

“I just want to go home,” I say.  The only thing to figure out is how I managed to wind up alone in a car with a guy who can’t even look at me.  A guy who can only break my heart.

I'm not saying pseudo dialogue tags are for everyone.  And there is nothing wrong with a well placed said or even an active tag if used judiciously.  However, if you struggle with scenes where your tags feel clunky or in the way, try using paragraph structure and pseudo dialog tags instead.

 

It's a busy time for me. Last week, I was able to announce the exciting news about my book, SKINNY, being sold to EgmontUK. This time of year, I'm also totally immersed in trying to get university classes up and running smoothly for my day job as a college administrator at Colorado State University. Best of all, I'm preparing for a Colorado writing retreat this weekend with the YAMuses. The weather here is gorgeous and I can't wait for them all to arrive this Friday to show off the beauty of the Rockies in the fall. We'll stay up at the YMCA of the Rockies (check out the webcam) in Estes Park and write and read and write some more.

In the midst of all this, I'm also working feverishly on a deadline to complete edits for SKINNY (Scholastic, US) by September 26th. Although the work is going well, and I'm very pleased with the outcome, I can't help but notice one thing that always seems to jump out at me as I re-read and revise - DIALOGUE!

Here's what I'm learning from this draft:

1) "ADVERBS SHOULD BE FEW AND FAR BETWEEN," SHE SAID, SERIOUSLY. Stephen King gives this advice in his book On Writing: "Spend adverbs sparingly, like they were $100 bills." Using too many adverbs is one of the biggest mistakes I see in my earlier writing. Now, I'm challenging myself to describe the character through their actions during the dialogue without just using a "telling" word as a tag.

2) SHE TURNED TO GLANCE OVER AT HIM. "CORECT PUNCTUATION IS CRITICALLY IMPORTANT WHEN WRITING DIALOGUE," SHE SAID, THEN WALKED OUT THE DOOR. It doesn't matter how many degrees I have, I still have trouble remembering punctuation rules for dialogue. It's probably laziness, or maybe a mental block, but I'm always making mistakes about where the comma goes or when to capitalize the next word. I keep a resource handy and constantly try to remind myself of the correct usage. I still make mistakes.

3. "YOU DON'T HAVE TO USE TAGS ALL THE TIME," SAID SUE.
"REALLY?" ASKED BILL.
"SERIOUSLY," SAID SUE. "READERS KNOW WHO IS TALKING WITHOUT THE TAG."
"WOW," SAID BILL. "I'M GOING TO TRY THAT."

Leaving off the tags on dialogue punches up the pace. It's often evident who is speaking by the punctuation and the content of the conversation. Putting a name to every statement makes the narrative drag. My editorial challenge is to see if I can read and understand who is speaking with as few tags as possible.

So all kidding aside, let's see how it's going. Here's a snippet from SKINNY. Please forgive the strange formating issues. I'll blame those on blogger this time :)


“There’s something I’ve always wanted to say, Dad.”
He leans in and pats the top of my plastic-covered head. “What, Peanut?”
I should be worried about something, but I’m not. I feel fine. Better than fine.
“Dad,” I say. My mouth is dry. I lick my lips and try again louder. “Dad.”
“I’m right here.”
“There’s this fairy thing that sits on my shoulder and whispers in my ear. Bad things.”
“He thinks you’re crazy talking.”
Another giant, blue robed figure comes around the curtain. “You ready to go?” he asks.
“I have to tell my dad something.”
“Tell him quick. The operating room is waiting.” He unlocks the brakes on the hospital bed.
My dad clears his throat. “I love you, Ever,” he says, and kisses me on the cheek.
“I can hear her, Dad. In my ear.”
He nods and smiles down at me.
“He thinks it’s the drugs.”
More people come into the room. I try to focus on my dad, but they start to roll the bed out from behind the curtains and down the hall.
“I’ll be here when you get back.” He waves at me until the big doors swing shut behind my rolling feet, and he’s gone.
“I need to tell him,” I mumble.
The operating room is freezing. I know it, but I don’t really feel it. People move all around me. Some talk to me. Others don’t. They count to three and pull me over onto a flat table. Lying on my back, I squint up at the big lights.
Someone behind my head says, “I’m going to put this mask over your face now, okay?”
I guess I say okay because the mask comes down over my nose and mouth.
“Now count backward from one-hundred.” The voice behind my head continues.
Obediently I start to count. One-hundred…ninety-nine…ninety-eight…
“Her name is Skinny,” I say. Then everything goes black.

I love dialogue. Part of me credits it to my acting background, the fact that on stage so much has to be conveyed through speech. Part of me blames it all the voices I hear inside my head. And the rest of me recognizes that I find it easy to write and relate to dialogue, and therefore depend on it.

However, there is a drawback to all this. In my current WIP I’ve found that all my characters do is talk. I joke that it's like the movie My Dinner with Andre only in costume, but it's a joke that hits all too close to home. So my first draft is full of dialogue, but I can fix that in revision, adding setting, depth, and texture. At least that's the plan.

I've been trying to think of good advice for writing great dialogue, but I’ve found the best advice comes from others.

Anne Lamott, in her fabulous book on writing and life, Bird by Bird, tells us that we should be able to identify each character by what he or she says. Each one must sound different, and they should not all sound like the author. She suggests reading your dialogue out loud to make sure it sounds in the mouth the way it reads on the page.

In The Writer’s Digest Handbook of Novel Writing, Dwight V. Swain suggests listening.  Listen to the world around you speak.  When watching movies or TV shows that have been recorded or TiVoed, stop and go back and listen to inflection, word choice, sentence structure and meaning.  He says that men speak differently when they’re in a group without women.  That teens speak differently from grandmothers.  That people from different backgrounds have different rhythms of speech.  It doesn’t mean write in dialect.  Just write with an ear to the differences.

In the same book, Loren D. Estleman gives us reasons for using dialogue in a novel.  It brings immediacy, provides a change of pace, creates character.  Estleman, too, suggests listening to people and reading your own dialogue aloud.  But also writing plays – depending on dialogue is a good way to strengthen it.  But the most important advice I got out of the article was to relax.  Pushing dialogue, like pushing theatrical performance, makes it wooden.  Flat.  You want your dialogue to soar.

On the rather contentious issue of dialogue attribution, Stephen King (in On Writing) says that the best form of dialogue attribution is said.  He makes a great case, giving examples of overly-adverbed tags (shouted menacingly, cried bravely, etc.) and tags with implied adverbs (grated, gasped, jerked out).  But I still find this the most difficult part of dialogue.  Long ago, I heard a writer in England disparage Enid Blyton’s style with the accusation that “All she ever does is use said!”  Ultimately, “said” should be invisible at best.  If possible, don’t use attribution at all.  If you’ve done the rest of your dialogue work, and you only have two people talking, most of the attribution should be obvious.

So with so much advice, how do you go about writing dialogue?  Just do it.  Let the characters take you through a scene word by word and see what happens.  Anne Lamott suggests putting together two people who would do anything to avoid each other and see what happens.  It doesn’t have to go in your novel, but it could certainly strengthen your characters’ voices.

And just for fun, I leave you with a taste of dialogue that got cut from GILT.  I like this interaction OK, but in the end, it didn’t move the story forward.  So it had to go.  Thanks again, Stephen King, for the phrase “killing my darlings.”  In this scene, Catherine Howard (Cat, who is queen to Henry VIII) is trying to elicit a promise from my protagonist, Kitty Tylney, to keep a very dangerous secret.

“I would never betray you, Cat, you know that.”

“You can’t even speak of it in the confessional.”

“Why would I?” I asked, thinking it wasn’t my truth to confess. 

“Because he’s the head of the church,” she said, ignoring my question.

“That doesn’t make him all knowing, Cat,” I said.  She was losing her power of reason.

“Don’t be stupid, Kitty.  If he were truly a god on earth, he would be able to heal his ulcers and maybe lose a few pounds.  But regardless, anything said to any priest will get back to the king one way or another.  Not through divine intervention.  Just cold, calculating ambition.”

“Oh.  Of course.  Either way, I won’t tell.  None of us will.”

“The Coven would sell their souls to the devil for a crumb of gossip.”

“Then throw them out.”

“I can’t.”

“You’re the queen.  You can do anything.”

“And when they leave these rooms, there will be no one to stop them from saying whatever they please,” Cat said. “They could disbosom themselves of every morsel of scandal gleaned from Norfolk House.  No, they’re staying with me.”

“Then we shall have to do our best to keep them happy.”

“Is that a royal ‘we’?” Cat asked.

I laughed.

“We wouldn’t presume,” I said, speaking with royally clipped consonants and clear vowels.  Then I dropped to a whisper. “I mean you and I.  We’re a team.  We’ll make it through.”

“A team,” she echoed. “Sisters of the soul.”