Writing Better Dialogue

[grahamguitarman]

Personally I'm using Ywriter for my novel - its free and has annoying no grammar checks (and its easy to write in small chunks then rearrange them afterwards) I prefer this because when writing dialogue you have to suspend grammar rules as people don't really use grammar when talking unless its a pre-written speech.

I'm trying to avoid putting plotlines into my dialogue, but will use dialogue as a prompt for more descriptive text eg

Bill "I thought you always got out early in the morning"
bob let that pass, it had already been a long and tedious morning before he even got out of the door blah blah blah.

rather than

Bill "I thought you always got out early in the morning"
Bob "yeah well its been a bad morning , all sorts of things happening blah blah blah"

in the first example the discussion still takes place but only half the spoken dialogue is included, a very simple way of making dialogue more expansive without endless speeches (especially since you can get away with putting more info into the non dialogue part of the discussion).

also its not necesary to always quote who spoke when eg;

Bill looked at Bob "nice day isn't it" Bob shrugged "yeah guess so" "well I think so anyway" Bill replied grumpily

there was no need to put 'bob said' because it was obvious which part was his reply, it wasn't even necesary to put Bill said, this can't always be used but its a useful device when it works

Thats my approach most of the time anyway - maybe others will disagree and take another view

 

[Lord Darkstorm]

Just to clarify, it's the telling of information that all parties involved in the conversation already know that should be avoided. Dialog is an excellent place for story related information, but only when one character is informing another character that doesn't already know. Bringing in a dim witted forgetful character is probably not the best solution to this type of problem.

 

[grahamguitarman]

Just to clarify, it's the telling of information that all parties involved in the conversation already know that should be avoided. Dialog is an excellent place for story related information, but only when one character is informing another character that doesn't already know. Bringing in a dim witted forgetful character is probably not the best solution to this type of problem.

yeah it does sound pretty dumb telling someone information they should already know

 

[Xanados]

"I can see what you mean.", he waved the cigar before placing it in his mouth and lighting it. "This is going to be bad business." He turned to enter the house, pulling a gun from his under his coat.

Hey, sorry, I'm just trying to come to terms with proper dialogue punctuation. Shouldn't it be:

"I can see what you mean," He waved the cigar before placing it in his mouth and lighting it. "This is going to be bad business." He turned to enter the house, pulling a gun from his under his coat.

Comma after the 'mean', right?

"His name, " murmured a voice from behind, "is Dragon."

 

[sashamerideth]

I've heard sneaking in information through dialogue referred to as the "As you know, Bob" phenomenon. "As you know, Bob, the brain-eating zombies are always more of a problem on odd-numbered days of the month that start with a T."

Here's a link:
http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/AsYouKnow

I am late to the party but I swear I will kill you Angharad. As soon as I escape from tvtropes. You will be safe for the foreseeable future, but you shall rue the day you sent me to that accursed site!

 

[Kate]

Just to clarify, it's the telling of information that all parties involved in the conversation already know that should be avoided. Dialog is an excellent place for story related information, but only when one character is informing another character that doesn't already know. Bringing in a dim witted forgetful character is probably not the best solution to this type of problem.

That's a great way to clarify the distinction. Will keep that in mind.

Hey, sorry, I'm just trying to come to terms with proper dialogue punctuation. Shouldn't it be:

"I can see what you mean," He waved the cigar before placing it in his mouth and lighting it. "This is going to be bad business." He turned to enter the house, pulling a gun from his under his coat.

Comma after the 'mean', right?

"His name, " murmured a voice from behind, "is Dragon."

Right. All your punctuation goes inside the quotation marks.

In the case of your example, I'm fairly certain there's a full stop after 'mean', not a comma: "I can see what you mean." He waved the cigar.....
It would be a comma if you were using an attribution. "I can see what you mean," he said. He waved the cigar....

Do double check that, but I'm 99.9% sure it's right.

 

[Angharad]

I am late to the party but I swear I will kill you Angharad. As soon as I escape from tvtropes. You will be safe for the foreseeable future, but you shall rue the day you sent me to that accursed site!

Wow, I've received my first death threat! I must be doing something right!

 

[Shadoe]

Hey, sorry, I'm just trying to come to terms with proper dialogue punctuation. Shouldn't it be:

"I can see what you mean," He waved the cigar before placing it in his mouth and lighting it. "This is going to be bad business." He turned to enter the house, pulling a gun from his under his coat.

Comma after the 'mean', right?

This is not correct. It should be:

"I can see what you mean." He waved the cigar before placing it in his mouth and lighting it.

The reason you want a period there is because you're done with that sentence. ("I can see what you mean.") The next bit is a new sentence, so begins with a capital. For a comma, it would have to be something like this:

"I can see what you mean," he said, waving the cigar before placing it in his mouth and lighting it.