All posts by Jordan

Mechanics, Technique

Dialogue: the bare essentials

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This entry is part 1 of 8 in the series Dialogue

Cool note: this is my 300th published post on this blog!

There’s so much to be said about dialogue. (Oh, wow—totally unintentional pun!) Some of us do it well naturally—we have an “eye” for dialogue. (And it drives us CAH-RAZY to see bad dialogue in published books.) But we all have different strengths—and we all have things to work on and learn.

The barest basics of dialogue are the simple mechanics, in no particular order. (Because, hey, we all have to start somewhere!)

  1. Make it clear who’s speaking.
  2. As a corollary for #1, change paragraphs when changing speakers. (Not necessarily every time someone begins speaking—see #4.)
  3. Use actual speech attributions (verbs like “said”) sparingly, and default to the near-invisible said and/or asked as often as possible.*
  4. Use action beats to help identify the speaker (among other important purposes). Keep those action beats in the same paragraph as the speaker, and if you involve more than one character in the thoughts or beats, make sure it’s clear who’s speaking.
  5. Do not use action beats as speech attributions. Or, as Annette Lyon put it in a guest post here, “Stop smiling words.”
  6. Punctuate thusly (American style): “I can’t do this,” she said. [comma, followed by a lower-case letter for the speech attribution]

    “But you have to.” He rubbed his hands together. [Always a period there! Always a capital next! This is an action, not a way to speak.]

    “Really?” she asked. [question mark, lower case for the attribution]

    He nodded. “Really, truly, Johnny Lion.” [Again, use a period for the action.]

    “But—” [Em dash, no comma or period—but if this was a question, you would put the question mark in. Just to make it hard on you.]

    “No buts. I know—” he glanced around furtively—“you wish you weren’t here.” [Although this one may vary depending on the house style.]

*This is actually one I don’t particularly follow. A couple weeks ago, I read something I wrote ten years ago, and I found almost no speech attributions. In fact, I only used speech attributions if the way someone spoke was important—and couldn’t be conveyed through the dialogue (i.e. whispering, sarcasm, etc.). But I’ve also taken that too far, and sometimes it’s hard for my readers to tell who’s speaking. So I’m slowly learning to slip in those little invisible saids without twitching. Too much.

Tomorrow: what goes between the quotes!

Is dialogue one of your strengths? If so, share your best technique, trick or advice—in a guest post!

Photos by Leo Reynolds

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Works

In ardua tendit

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You know, I forgot. Between granting myself some maternity (and morning sickness) leave, having a baby, and grueling months of editing/reworking/rewriting, it’s now been almost a year since I’ve started a new writing project.

I forgot how hard it is.

Even when you’ve done it, it can be so easy to catch yourself thinking “Easy peasy! I can slam this out in six weeks!” when you open up a new document. I mean, I’m not intimidated by a blank page. (It’s the words that are hard 😉 .)

maccallum crestWriting is one of those forms of art that the pinnacle of achievement can be looking effortless. Like dance or gymnastics. Except few people sit through a competition or performance and walk away thinking “I can do that. I’ll start tomorrow.”

Writing? Pfft. Everyone writes. All the time. Emails, notes, shopping list. How hard could a book be?

Hard. And long. Especially when your time is limited.

But it isn’t impossible. It’s work—but we’re not trying to cure cancer, here!

I’ve married into the MacCallum clan*. The clan motto is In ardua tendit. Translations include “he attempts hard things” and “I strive for the heights” (and various combinations).

Because I can do hard things. And so can you! (But first, a little more research….)

Where do you find yourself getting discouraged in the writing process?

Starting Friday: the dialogue series! Guest post volunteers?

Picture from this site

*At least, we think we’re part of the MacCallum clan. As far as records go, our McCollum ancestors apparently sprang out of the ground in 18th century Tennessee, so we can’t tell what part of Scotland they came from.

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Technique

Dialogue series?

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A while back I took a class on dialogue. While the instructor did give feedback on the dialogue itself in our assignments, it seemed like the things we were really learning wasn’t how to write actual dialogue, but how to paragraph (which is apparently all science, no art) and incorporate everything that’s not dialogue into a conversation. Useful skills, yes, but not what I expected from a class about dialogue. Oddly enough, I kind of thought things would focus more on what goes inside the quotation marks.

I know a lot of people already consider dialogue one of their strengths. But even if it’s one of your best skills (as I consider it to be), we can always learn more (as I am even now).

We could look at the basics of creating realistic and readable dialogue, more intermediate things like skipping the boring parts, and advanced techniques like “indirect” dialogue. And naturally, since I know so many of you guys are good at dialogue, I’d love to have guest posts with your favorite lessons, tips and techniques.

What do you think? Would you like a series on dialogue? Maybe an “advanced” series?

Photo by Peter Patau

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Technique

Personal, timely stakes for suspense and immediacy

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This entry is part 26 of 26 in the series Tension, suspense and surprise

One of my writing friends, Marnee, is working on digging deeper and raising the stakes on her WIP. I loved the way she described this:

I wanted all my characters to have a stake in the outcome of their actions. And, I wanted that “stake” to be something immediate. It couldn’t be something without a timeframe. My hero only has a certain time to catch the villain because once the villain realizes he’s on to him, he’ll disappear and my hero will lose his chance. My heroine needs to take the “job” my hero has offered because she needs the money—fast. My villain can’t run and hide even when he’s foiled because of . . . well, something I haven’t figured out yet.

Their needs have to be immediate and volatile and in complete opposition. And they have to be completely invested. No turning back.

I like the combination of personal stakes and a deadline—a great way to create suspense and immediacy, as Marnee points out.

I also like that she’s taking the time to do this for the villain (even if she hasn’t gotten the answer yet). “To be evil” is not a sufficient motivation for the villain’s heinous action. We want our villains to be rounded characters with believable motivations, not just amorphous evil that our hero’s got to defeat. They have to have a dog in this fight or they’ll cash in their chips and go home. So why this person? Why this (despicable) action? It could be something as simple as money—but there are lots of ways to make money. Why this way?

What do you think? How do you do this in your works?

Photo by Dayna Mason

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Technique

What keeps you going?

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Writing a book can be a long process. It’s easy to get discouraged or just plain bored before you reach “The End.”

For me, one of the big things that keeps me going is what Holly Lisle calls “candy bar” scenes:

First, let me define a “candy-bar” scene. It’s one that you’re just itching to write — something sweet enough that you can dangle it on a stick in front of yourself so that you can say, “When I’ve done these next three chapters, I’ll get to write that one.” . . .

Make sure your candy-bar scenes are spread out through the book, not all clumped together. Write down a single sentence for each of them. Don’t allow yourself to do anymore than that, or you’ll lose the impetus to move through the intervening scenes.

Holly Lisle also advises writing the ending first (so you have the goal in mind), writing about people you want to spend time with (because, hey, you’re going to be spending a lot of time with them in the writing process, and you want your readers to want to spend time with them, too), using an outline, and allowing yourself to be surprised. I’ve tried and loved all of those things except writing the ending first (meaning I haven’t tried it, though I might).

What do you think? How do you keep going until you reach “The End”?

Image by Emily Hoyer

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Uncategorized

Perseverance

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It’s that time again! For no apparent reason, I’m feeling discouraged today—like I’ll never get the WIP that I’ve been working on for almost two years good enough (and nothing else I ever have or ever will write will be, either) (man, the more I think about this the worse it gets!).

And then I come across a little encouragement:

Most people quit when it gets really dark. Those who succeed are the ones who refuse to stop.

from Annette Lyon’s Top 5 Pieces of Advice for Writers

we need to feel good about what we have accomplished without comparing ourselves to others. And that is what success really is – knowing we have done something good and taking appropriate pride in that, without feeling less because others have done more than we have.

from Tristi Pinkston, LDS Author

And, of course, to put things in perspective:

Detail of Star Wars painting by Hugh Fleming

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Technique

The noble goal

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It’s been a long time since we talked about creating sympathetic characters, but one of the timeless techniques for character sympathy came back to me last night. We were watching one of our favorite shows, which happens to be a game show. The opening of the show always features short biographies of the four competitors, wherein they almost always predict their ultimate victory and gloat about how much better they are than the competition (whom they’ve never met).

I was all set to really dislike one of last night’s competitors after the usual boasting in her introduction—and then they asked her what she’d do with the prize money ($50,000). She planned to put a downpayment on a home in Brooklyn.

Okay, so that’s not stunning or anything—owning a home has always been part of the American dream. But she didn’t just want a home for the sake of fulfilling the picket-fences plan that’s been programmed into us—she wanted to be able to buy a home in a good area of Brooklyn so her daughter could go to the best school in the city.

BAM! I was on her side in a flash. I was all ready to root against her—until she had a noble goal.

Note that this goal is still kind of self-centered, and not for the betterment of society or anything. But because it’s focused on another person—especially a child (what can I say? I’m a parent, too)—it still helps that person appear sympathetic.

And if it can work on real people, it should work on fictional people. In How to Write a Damn Good Novel, II, James N. Frey argues that a noble goal is key to developing reader sympathy with characters. We need to have a reason to root for the character and hope for his success. Even a despicable degenerate can win readers over if we can sympathize with his goal.

What do you think? What are some examples (from your books or books you’ve read) of characters you didn’t like but still rooted for?

Photo by Robb North

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