Wearing My Writer’s Hat: Writing Effective Dialogue

Whenever I teach a workshop on writing, the two most common questions I’m asked are, “How do you write interesting and effective narrative” and “How do you get your characters to use dialogue that sounds normal and yet moves the story forward?” I’m going to address the second question in this blog by sharing my top ten dialogue tips that I believe will help strengthen your story.

1. Use dialogue to break up long narrative passages.

2. Incorporate dialogue so that it creates, and then heightens the drama/conflict.

3. Use dialogue to make your characters more human, more realistic. Remember narrative writing can describe a character, but dialogue makes them real.

4. Remember that dialogue is not conversation. Conversation can be meaningless, full of redundancies and irrelevant information. Dialogue is important and must move your story forward.

5. If the pacing seems slow, use dialogue to jump-start your scene. Dialogue moves the plot forward.

6. Use tags to help the reader identify who is speaking. Remember, however, to use them sparingly and effectively.

7. If your character is a policeman, a cowboy, an English aristocrat – make certain they speak in the appropriate manner. Police have specific terms for actions and items, so do cowboys, and so do aristocrats. Make certain you know them.

8. Use dialect sparingly. A little goes a long way.

9. Be careful in your choice of words. Don’t try to impress the reader – they will only feel intimidated and jerked from the story if they have to continually consult the dictionary.

10. Avoid dialogue that is too stiff or too formal. Most people use contractions in their speech, your characters should, too.

For those of you who are writers, do you use any of these more than others? Are there any I forgot? As readers, are there any books you feel have outstanding examples of dialogue?

What’s In Your TBR Pile?

I don’t have as much time for leisure reading as I used to. I have a 9 to 5 job and I always have multiple writing projects going. There just aren't enough hours in the day. But I’m currently between projects so guess what? Time to dig into the old TBR pile, which is actually multiple piles in my office at work and my bedroom. So what’s in my TBR pile? I’m so glad you asked! Here’s a sample of some of the books I can't wait to dive into:

The Lantern By Deborah Lawrenson-A modern gothic novel of love, secrets, and murder—set against the lush backdrop of Provence.

The Watchtower By Lee Carroll-Jewelry designer Garet James is still coming to terms with the astounding revelation in BLACK SWAN RISING that she is the last in a long line of women sworn to protect the world from evil.

The Long Fall By Walter Mosley-Introduces Walter Mosley’s new PI bad-guy-turned-good Leonid McGill.

Murder in Passy By Cara Black-The village-like neighborhood of Passy, home to many of Paris’s wealthiest residents, is the last place one would expect a murder. But when Aimée Leduc’s godfather, Morbier, a police commissaire, asks her to check on his girlfriend at her home there, that’s exactly what Aimée finds.

Silver Sparrow By Tayari Jones-With the opening line of Silver Sparrow, “My father, James Witherspoon, is a bigamist,” author Tayari Jones unveils a breathtaking story about a man’s deception, a family’s complicity, and two teenage girls caught in the middle.

The Shirt On His Back By Barbara Hambly-The new 'Benjamin January' novel from the best-selling author - Abishag Shaw is seeking vengeance for his brother’s murder – and Benjamin January is seeking money after his bank crashes.

Ready Player One By Ernest Cline-Part quest novel, part love story, and part virtual space opera set in a universe where spell-slinging mages battle giant Japanese robots, entire planets are inspired by Blade Runner, and flying DeLoreans achieve light speed.

Okay, it’s your turn! What’s on your TBR pile? 

Angela ; )

WHO IS YOUR CHARACTER CHANNELLING?

Confession time. I once wrote a whole novel just so I could kill a character. She was based on a woman who had stolen my boyfriend. It was cathartic, and fun (oh, so much fun). I was young and inexperienced and didn’t realize you could get into Serious Trouble doing that. Fortunately, it was a lousy novel and never saw the light of day. :-)

Since then, I’ve learned discretion. Now, I borrow traits from people I know, not the entire person. People I don’t know, too. That woman with the oversized black sweater and the skinny legs? Looks like a raven when she walks? Great look for the mother of my main character. The boss who does that weird clicking thing with his tongue when he’s concentrating? Would fit perfectly on my teenage character.

It’s seductive, really. I keep a notebook to jot down the quirks I spot. Sometimes a total stranger will inspire a whole new character thanks to an odd habit. I once had a neighbor who would always wait a beat too long before answering a question. It was disconcerting. Off-putting. But boy, it made a great character trait for a police interrogator.

Nowadays, I rarely remember the origins of my characters. My subconscious does all the heavy lifting and my “people” only emerge when they’re ready. For instance, I’m not really sure where Kate Williams, the chief of police in my latest mystery release, The Tuxedoed Man (the follow up to The Shoeless Kid), came from. She’s tough and rational, but is riddled with insecurities and is a soft touch for the vulnerable ones.

I catch a glimpse of my aunt in the way Kate always wants her hair out of the way; of a man I once worked with in her impatience for people who waste her time; and of my sister in the way she raises an eyebrow oh-so-sardonically.

Who knows who else is hiding in Kate? Me, maybe? Do you have origin stories for your characters?

GIVEAWAY: In honour of The Shoeless Kid becoming available as a pocket book from World Wide Mysteries, I will give away a copy to one person who comments on this blog today. I'll post the name of the winner here tomorrow.

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Supernatural Stakes

I've just started adding something extra to my romantic suspense work-in-progress. I set the book in the world of witchcraft. The addition of the occult setting is a game changer, both for the reader and for the author.

As readers, as soon as we learn that a story contains elements of anything supernatural, we know all the rules have changed and we can't possibly know what the new rules are. Best of all, neither do the characters! The rug can be pulled out from under any character at any time, and thus, it can shake up the reader and add dimension to the experience of the book.

As a writer, giving my story an occult spin makes me an all-powerful god of sorts. Not only can I manipulate the characters and the situation, but I can manipulate their total reality. I can turn up the evil in villains and the heroism in the protagonists. 

I'm having fun with my heroine, the witch character. After a hard bump on her head, suddenly her powers have increased and her magic is now on overdrive. And the villain? She's even more fun with a dash of black magic. 

What about you? Do you enjoy reading books with paranormal elements? Do you love it or hate it when the author pulls the rug out from under you?

What’s a Writer’s Biggest Challenge?

Above all else, writing calls on an author to be an “imagineer.”  To repeat the same old, same old, or to structure each new project on the tried and true, means an author’s not being true to himself.  He’s holding fast to somebody else’s rules of writing’s right and wrongs.  He’s playing in the shallow end of the pool, afraid to take chances, to color outside the lines.

 

            Say you’re baking sugar cookies.  You measure the ingredients carefully, mix them well, and time the baking perfectly.  The result is round, bland and predictable cookies.  Instead, consider taking a muffin pan, turning it upside down and baking the sugar cookie dough over the bottom of the muffin wells.  What you end up with are sugar cook cups.  Fill them with ice cream, sorbet, pudding, fruit, top them with whipped cream, strawberries, sprinkles, butterscotch sauce or the queen of flavors, chocolate.  Now you’ve taken the boring and predictable and morphed it into a glam dessert.

Why not do the same with your writing?  Why not experiment with breaking the “rules” all writers are advised to obey if they ever wish to be published?  I don’t mean all the rules of course, ala James Joyce or Samuel Beckett, but some.

A case in point:  I recently wrote a blog on Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None in which she does exactly that, breaks some of the rules.  In the first 20 pages of the book she introduces 11 major characters.  Count ‘em, eleven.  And for 10 of them, she piles on backstory.  Pages of backstory right at the book’s beginning.  Imagine.  Haven’t you been told to avoid doing so, that it’s tantamount to an authorial crime?

Best of all, she gets away with it.  The book is a literary icon.

The truth is some rules deserve to be broken.  The antihero can act heroically, the heroine can have mousey brown hair, the cozy mystery can have—gasp--sex and a guitar player as the protag.  For me, being able to make unexpected changes like this is what makes the writing game worthwhile. 

That said, some rules remain virtually inviolate especially in the mystery form.  Justice prevails.  The culprit is caught.  The good guys win.  In And Then There Were None, all 10 victims are killed because they had committed crimes.  So Christie retained a vital rule.  She served justice while breaking enough other rules to give her book an interesting edge.          I’ve tried to emulate her example.  In Designed for Death I had my heroine work in an arty business, made her a grieving widow with sexy, showgirl legs, and tossed in a few wild characters of a type not usually found in cozy mysteries  But . . . and we all know nothing matters till we reach the but . . . the good guys do win in the end.

So a lot of innovation can take place within the boundaries of a form.  I’m learning to keep what has been proven to work but to put a fresh spin on it.  Sometimes you want a round sugar cookie to dunk in your milk.  Other times, you transform that raw dough into a little vessel that will hold all manner of surprises.  The chance to choose between the two, not to have to follow the well-trodden path, is what makes writing such an exciting journey.

Now I’m off to find the kitchen.   

   

Check out DESIGNED FOR DEATH by Jean Harrington

The Professor Winner!

And the winner is -

Jane!

Please contact me through my website www.cperkinswrites.com for your copy

Thanks again to everyone who stopped by and helped celebrate The Professor's release!

Cathy Perkins

Guest Author: Alanna Coca and Giveaway!

Hello! Thanks for having me today. My name is Alanna Coca, and although I've only published one romantic suspense so far, it is certainly my favorite genre to read, and I'd love to write more. My idol is Sandra Brown, who started out writing genre romance, and now has these twisty and engrossing books that make me want to grovel at her feet and beg for paper scraps.

I won't do that though. I have some pride.

My stumbling block is the fact that I'm a pantser. Now, flying by the seat of my pants works fine when I write contemporary romance, and it's very easy when I write erotic romance under my alter ego Olivia Brynn. Those characters have no problem talking me through their plot as I'm typing away. I like to add a little bit of mystery and a few twists to those books as well, but a romantic suspense needs a little (okay, a lot) more thought beforehand.

For example, I wrote PreView back in 2008. In my mind it was going to be a straight up mystery. I thought I'd write a series of books starring this heroine as she goes through her everyday life solving crimes that have yet to occur using her prophetic dreams.

This is the first book where I started with chapter one, because that's what woke me from a sound sleep one autumn morning.

 Before the "new wip glow" wore off, I immediately wrote the last chapter, because I knew just how I wanted the whole conflict resolved. Back to chapter two, where the heroine informed me that she's got a love interest.

Oh, okay. So it's a romance. Got it.

*Tweak the final chapter*

This is when I see that Trevor, the love interest, is a difficult guy to like. (One reviewer describes him as dark chocolate, "a bitter treat") So I tried to talk Ryann, the heroine, out of a happily ever after with this guy, but she's got her sights set. So I bounced from beginning to end, and worked my way to the middle. This involved a lot of tweaking, a little hero-slapping, and several scene rewrites. 

Sigh.

If only I could plot!

But finally, I finished the book, and ended up falling for the hero right along with Ryann. and couldn't have been happier when Carina Press took it. To have PreView sitting on the virtual shelves with the amazing authors and books you'll find at Carina was a thrill. I'll admit to a little bit of happy dancing, and maybe more than a little bit of liquid-spirit-lifting.

For more of a taste of PreView, you can visit my website where I have a trailer and excerpt set up.

To thank the lovely Not Your Usual Suspects authors for letting me crash their blog, I'd like to give a copy of PreView away to a NYUS reader.  Just comment here with a snippet of the last dream you remember having. Now, if it's a sex dream, I probably don't want details, but the weirder the better. I'll choose one random commenter to win a digital copy of PreView.

I'll start: The last dream I remember involved my friend's tiny baby who for some reason was no bigger than a mouse. I had to change her poopy diaper.

Sometimes I wonder about me.

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