Since I started critiquing stories for critters.org, I have a new appreciation for how many aspiring writers are out there, at all levels of ability. Some are young people, inspired to create the kind of fiction they love, but not yet knowledgeable about the craft of writing. I thought I would post some "tips" here—not that this is a high-traffic blog—in the hopes that they'd be useful to someone.

I haven't published any of my own fiction yet, so I'm not presenting myself as an expert on the more subtle matters. I have published nonfiction, and I worked as a technical editor for many years, so I'm comfortable talking about certain elements of the craft of writing.

There are many resources on punctuation, mechanics, grammar, and style basics. To use them, however, you generally need to know what question to ask. I'm hoping that my tips, by being topic-focused, will be more accessible. The advice I give is generally a distillation of standard references. I'll be careful to note when I'm offering a personal preference.

Dialog Basics

Most stories include dialog. Well-written dialog brings characters to life and advances plot. Poorly written dialog marks a story as amateurish. Here are a few basic tips that will keep your dialog out of trouble.

Punctuation

The basic form for a line of dialog is this:

"It's a dark and stormy night," said Julia.

The sentence spoken is enclosed in quotes, the terminal period replaced by a comma. The comma is inside the quotes. The sentence is followed (optionally) by a tag identifying the speaker.

If the speaker is addressing another character by name, the name is set off with commas, regardless of where it falls in the sentence:

"John, it's a dark and stormy night," said Julia.
"It's a dark and stormy night, John," said Julia.
"I hate to say it, John, but it's a dark and stormy night," said Julia.

If the sentence the character speaks would naturally end in a question mark or exclamation point, use that punctuation instead of the comma. (The comma only replaces a period.)

"It's a dark and stormy night!" said Julia.
"Is it dark and stormy tonight?" Julia asked.

People don't always speak in complete sentences. It's alright to have a sentence fragment in dialog.

"Dark. Stormy. What a night," said Julia.

An incomplete sentence can end in ellipses or a dash:

"It's a dark and stormy..." said Julia.
"It's a dark and stormy—" said Julia.

The ellipses (three periods, no more, no fewer) imply that the speaker is trailing off, perhaps mumbling, or unable to collect their thoughts and finish the sentence. The dash (indicated by two hyphens in a typescript-style manuscript) implies that the speaker was interrupted.

Do not put dialog spoken by different characters in the same paragraph. Always begin a new paragraph when you change speakers. If one character is making a long speech that you need to break into paragraphs, omit the closing quotation mark for each paragraph but the last. Keep all opening quotation marks:

"Well, I have something to say about that," said Julia. "Long ago, when our people migrated across the great void and came to Calonia, there were many storms. The nights were dark. There was great fear in that time, and no one knew who to trust.

"Then it happened that a brave leader came to us, and helped us find a new home in the wilderness. Her name was Clasia, and she was tall and strong. With her help, our people found a new home where we could live in peace and prosperity. And there we lived happily ever after."

Tags

Dialog tags seem to cause beginning writers a lot of grief. The best piece of advice I can give is this: your dialog tags should not attract attention. They should do their minimal job of helping the reader keep track of who is speaking, and otherwise fade into the background. Sometimes beginners learn that it's bad to reuse the same words frequently (true enough), and so employ an endless stream of synonyms for "said" (a bad idea). Characters do not need to whine, whisper, growl, chortle, implore, inquire, state, proclaim, explain, pontificate, mention, exhort, boast, chirp, snicker, mumble, or confide at every turn.

So when would you use a more descriptive term in placed of "said" or "asked"? The only good reason for this is if the character is saying something in an unexpected way. If it's already clear that the characters are hiding and trying to plot something without being discovered, readers will already assume they are whispering. If one of them becomes upset and shouts, that's worth noting.

Often, with only two characters speaking, you will not need tags at all, after the first exchange. This is especially true if the dialog is emotional and fast-paced (an argument, for example). Nevertheless, do not go on for long stretches without an occasional reminder of who is saying what, and be very cautious about omitting tags if there are more than two people present.

It's a mark of amateurish writing to adorn dialog tags with adverbs:

"It's a dark and stormy night," said Julia sweetly.
"Shall we go now?" John asked awkwardly.
"I'm not ready yet," she replied curtly.

Why is this bad? Besides being annoying (Iike anything done to excess), adverbs usually just do not carry their own weight. They usually don't convey anything the reader cannot reasonably infer from the context and the personalities of the characters. In the worst cases, they actually repeat the content of the dialog itself:

"I love you," she said lovingly.
"I can't remember where I put the car keys," he said forgetfully.

Yuck. It's easy to drop these adverbs in when you write, but they should come out when you edit. Your first cut should be to remove them all. Rarely, you will find one that really does convey something crucial that can't easily be conveyed some other way. Those can stay. You will find some in even the best well-written fiction, but they are scant. A carefully chosen "said synonym" is usually preferable to an adverb.

Another alternative that can work well is to have no tag, but identify the speaker by describing their actions or appearance.

"It's a dark and stormy night." Julia rearranged the blanket on her shoulders.
"I'm cold." John's face was flushed, his eyes red.

This identifies the speaker indirectly, and also gives us a concrete image of the scene (something often absent in dialog). Like anything, it can be overused. Make sure what you say about the character makes a solid contribution to the story, and is not just a tag variation.

Most of your dialog lines should be without tags. Those that have tags should be mostly a simple "said" or "asked". Identifying speakers indirectly should round out the corners. Use "said synonyms" and adverbs only when nothing else will do.

Next

This is a "beginner tip," so I won't get into the subtler points: giving each character a unique voice, indicating accent or dialect, or making the back-and-forth of dialog feel realistic. These are all things to pursue after mastering the basic mechanics. To go further, I recommend asking yourself these questions the next time you read a section of dialog in published fiction:

• What did this exchange tell me about the personality of each character?
• What has changed after the exchange (in terms of plot or relationship)?
• What elements of the dialog (word choice, idiom, pacing, etc.) helped it fit, realistically, into the world of the story?