Christopher Pike's Writing Advice

Chapter Five: Writing Great Dialogue

Beginning writers often ask if writing great dialogue is the same as writing realistic dialogue. It depends what you mean by realistic. If you set your cell phone to record and chat with people all day, at work or at school, and then play back what you've recorded at the end of the day, you'll quickly discover that few people, if any, speak concisely and clearly. Most of us pause a lot, we say things like: "You know," "It's sort of like," "Then you kind of," "Well," "I don't know," "I think maybe..." I could go on and on. You get the point.

Characters in books cannot speak exactly like people do in real life. Dialogue must be condensed and clarified, otherwise you'll end up with endless pages of clutter. However -- and this is a big however -- it's crucial to retain the "sense" of realism. Just as important, a skilled writer should be able to portray who a character is by dialogue alone -- without descriptions of their mannerisms or their actions. That's why the most powerful words in a novel are: he said; she said; or John said; or Jane said. If a writer is forced to keep adding phrases like: she sighed wearily; he muttered under his breath; she snapped loudly; he groaned impatiently; she scolded vehemently... Again, you get the point.

The dialogue alone should be powerful enough to convey what the character is saying, how they feel. Now, like any rule, there are exceptions. Occasionally I'll have a character groan loudly or sigh softly. But I only use such phrases when I feel I must. Otherwise stick with he said or she said.