Lewis' Book of Reviews and Writing Advice

DIALOG

DIALOG! Now, I mentioned this a little bit in the chapter before this (on character development), but now I would like to get into the mechanics of dialog. So many people just CAN'T understand this. I'm not a professor in dialog either so PLEASE correct me if I make a statement which is not correct in dealing with this subject. Alright, so here we go:

"?-.";-,."."',.'.",". What do we use?!?! We have ALL these signs to take advantage of and yet, hardly any are in use. So here is an example of how I believe  a sentence within dialog should be written with the proper signs.

 "Hello, Steve. How are you?" inquired Lewis.

  You can see that I have place quotations (which are these "" things) around each side of the actual dialog. I have seen people use these ' for dialog, but those truly work better for thoughts.

After the first ", I have placed a comma because you will always place a comma before speaking someone's name. So how do we know when to use a comma? Basically, a comma goes wherever you pause when speaking. So, if you need to, read the dialog line out loud and listen carefully for where you stop and rest for a moment. It comes naturally.

Now I have put "how are you" in a separate sentence by setting a period (.) between statements. However, if my assumption is correct, you can use the ; sign.

  Adding life to your dialog. Alright, so dialog can be a wonderful tool in writing. Take a look at this sentence:"I'm going to die."

One could write this, but what if the author (you) wants to give the impression that this character is choking on the words without directly saying so? Or what if this character is angry? What if they're excited? Here are some examples:

Angry: "I AM GOING TO DIE!!!" (what sets this apart? 1# All the letters are capitalized. 2# We changed it to "I am" instead of "I'm" which puts more emphasis on the words and their meaning. 3# I have placed an exclamation point (!) at the end)

Choking or whispering: "I'm...go-ing...to.......die..." (What set's this apart? 1# the silence between words which is indicated by the periods (three on average, but more can be used if necessary) 2# the —— lines which depict that this character is struggling to speak. 3# there is no exclamation point which shows that this is a quiet statement, in which, the character is most likely addressing to itself.

I'm not sure how to classify this one. It may fit into angry or excited: "I. Am. Going. To. Die." It also puts emphasis on both the words and breaks.

In addition to those statements, you can also use Italics. Putting a word in italics helps give it character and life. EXAMPLE:

"I'm tired of mowing the lawn; I'm tired of weeding the garden and I'm sick of eating carrots." Opposed to: "I'm tired of mowing the lawn; I'm tired of weeding and I'm SICK of eating carrots."   

 

 PROFFESIONAL DIALOG. So you're writing a book and you REALLY want people to enjoy it and you want your readers to respect you for your style. The way to do this is not to have your dialog look like this:

 'I gone 2 store come home eat food @ table. now I sad. Jenifer said.

        ......................................

        ...................................................*dies*

How many of you cringed in reading that? How many of you have read things like that and put down the book? So how can we fix this statement? The best thing for it really, is just to die, but let's say the author wants to keep it. Here's what we'll do.

1#: Add the proper quotations!!! ""

2#: Correct the road-kill grammar (I went to the store, for example.)

3#: GET RID OF ALL ABBREVIATIONS. NOTE: Abbreviations (such as O.K., @, using numbers in the place of words, LOL, TTYL) can be fun and fine for a cheesy book, but they are EXTREMELY unprofessional. Remember, wattpad is like a business deal. You have the producer and consumer.

4#: Remember to capitalize words at the beginning of sentences!!!

      Why Care? So why did I find Dialog so important that I wrote a whole chapter on it? Because, dialog is very fun! It can be hysterical, but it can also be really meaningful. You can bring across points and build both characters and plots through dialog! As I stated before, your book is your product. Treat your consumer with respect. Making your book complete, finished and edited is one way of building your fan-base.

 NOTE: So, I should probably mention something though. I talked about dialog and how your individual characters should have their own way of speaking in the last chapter. If you have a modern story and your character is always saying "Lol," then go a head and keep that in your dialog, but make sure that it really fits both the character situation and era.

 Your faithful writer, Lewis