So, I've been editing Further Ahead diligently lately. And today I spent the bulk of my afternoon at a local Starbucks, tidying up chapters three and four. The amount of time I've spent doing revisions has really put me in touch with my strengths and weaknesses as a writer.
My biggest weakness is dialogue. I suck at writing dialogue. When I read the words coming out of my characters' mouths, their voices sound like my own. Maybe the key to writing good dialogue is having multiple personalities. This is something I should really work on.
But in all seriousness, when I was working with Klim, he taught me a lot about dialogue. The key is to get inside the characters' heads. What makes them tick? What are their fears, their desires? After a while, you find yourself driving your car, alone, and having a conversation with one of your characters (in your head, not out loud, psycho). They become that real.
One of the biggest limiting factors of my dialogue is the use of attribution. I suppose it's the habit of a trained journalist. You want to attribute every word that comes out of someone's mouth to cover your ass. Well, this doesn't fly in fiction. Most of the time, through the use of paragraph breaks, it's pretty easy to see who's talking.
"Another tell-tale sign of weak dialogue, for me, is the use of adverbs to modify speaking verbs," Joe said gruffly. Screw the adverb. I need to employ diction to convey tone.
"Another tell-tale sign of my bullshit, weak-sauce, half-assed dialogue is the use of adverbs to modify speaking verbs."
That's more like it.
Anyone have any tips on writing dialogue for me? Let me know in the comments section.
Games
7 months ago
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1 comments:
Hm, dialogue is a tough thing, isn't it? The only help I can think of is being observant - observant of other people speakig naturally and of writers who are good at writing dialogue.
I'm thinking of Mercedes Lackey. She writes fantasy. And though it's hard fantasy (wings, elves, magic, etc.), she has a knack for making her characters somehow human. Even though I like fantasy, I usually read her more for her writing ability than her sometimes boring or tedious plot lines.
In any case, she's great at dialogue too. I was reading something by her in the Baen Free Library while at work today (This Scepter'd Isle). I didn't even notice it, but the main character was switching his style of speech depending on whom he talked to. When he talks to children, his voice sounds different in my head than when he talks to adults. And when he talks to humans (he is an elf of some sort?) it sounds much more strained than when he talks with other elves (around whom he is much more comfortable).
Somehow, however, it is always HIS voice.
I'm not sure how she does this, but she does. Lackey is a beast. If you can stomach a couple chapters of hard fantasy, I'd recommend going over to the Baen Free Library and reading something by her. Or just ask me and you can borrow something of hers that I already have. Like I said, the actual plot of her stories can be tedious (wrapped up in all kinds of court politics and things), but her writing is always gorgeous.
--- Michelle
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