The Tenth Step - Writing Style - Narrative and Dialogue

 

Narrative

  • Ensure that the ‘narrator’ is appropriate – (see Narrators in The Eleventh Step)
  • Lead with the circumstances and character of the storyteller
  • Explain who they are, why they are telling the story and who they are telling it to
  • Take time to create atmosphere, develop setting and build up the characters
  • Keep the narrative moving along – move as quickly as possible from one high spot to the next
  • Ensure that there is sufficient narrative fiction and not too much fact – you are not writing a history – but a novel in which individuals emotions and reactions are important
  • Do not have driving the facts as an imperative - be prepared to sacrifice some facts – never lecture the reader
  • You must see, feel, hear, smell the physical environment, you must also share the character's feelings
  • A good descriptive passage has three elements: (1) well-observed detail (2) revelation of the character's inner self and (3) motivation, what drives the character
  • Careful Observation

Lasting fiction is powered by the author's accurate and original study of the world

Observation is expanding yourself into the world

Observation is expanding yourself into other people

Observation is looking. It is not judging, guessing, or assuming

Watch actions, see the consequences

Careful observation gives you the building blocks you need to write convincing scenes in vivid prose

  • Careful Imagination

You need to create convincing truths and imagine realities that could be

You must imagine truths in your invented world that could just as easily be truths in the real world

  • Careful Language

Good writing is more than good grammar and a wide vocabulary

It means cultivating an ear for the right sounds and training your eye for the look of the words on the page

You need to develop the sense of the rhythm of the paragraphs and chapters, an understanding of the pace and flow of the narrative

When the flow turns a little odd or stops you in your tracks, you have trained yourself to know what went wrong, and be able to deal with it

  • Narrative Style

All stories have their own styles, flow and rythm. What you need to do is find it for each one you write. This might involve shifting from third to first person, or setting it as a cruel war setting, or putting it into present tense, or using pared-down language

Find the right style to tell your story in the right way. What it is about and how it's told become a single entity

When you can't write easily and the words don't flow your single entity has disappeared

It may be the beginning of the end when you discover you only have one style

  • Attention is sometimes allowed to wander
  • Colourful irrelevancies will creep in - to make lighter reading
  • You must see, feel, hear, smell the physical environment, you must also share the character's feelings

 

Dialogue

  • Dialogue is probably the most difficult novel element to master

Why is Dialogue Needed?

  • It is an essential part of most novels – it is one of the most satisfactory ways of conveying conflict and advancing the story – it needs colour, sparkle, rhythm and flow
  • Dialogue has always been one of the best ways of capturing and maintaining reader interest
  • Dialogue in a novel must be in conflict
  • Action dialogue is always preferable to narration, at least for all the crucial points of the story
  • There should be a number of high spots presented in action dialogue rather than narration
  • We should be able to read the dialogue and know which character is speaking
  • Dialogue is brought to life by the underlying emotion and conflict that's driving it.
  • A few good lines of dialogue can do more to bring the story to life than pages of narrative
  • It should: -

Be revealing of character
Advance the story
Provide necessary information

  • But remember, dialogue is not always the best or most convenient way of hinting at conflict
  • How are you going to make the dialogue sound like it comes from real life?

Characters, like real people, should each have their own voice. So dialogue must be tailored to fit the person speaking, the situation they find themselves in, and suitable for their action or reaction

Dialogue needs to sound like the way that people would talk in keeping with their characters – readers do not want to hear social chit chat, repeated items, sentences not ended, etc.

  • Do not use ‘I’ and ‘I’ll’ unless absolutely necessary
  • Do not use formal speech unless absolutely necessary
  • Use ‘thanks’ or ‘ta’ not ‘thank you,’ unless it is a formal occasion
  • Dialogue in fiction is not supposed to reproduce every-day speech, it is supposed to mimic it, sounding real while actually being terser, tauter, and to the point
  • Readers have a higher expectation for dialogue than real life conversations. Dialogue needs to have more impact, focus and relevance, than ordinary conversation

Structural and Technical Points

  • Good dialogue allows us to observe emotions, the ways that people mean or don't mean what they say, attempt to manipulate others, stake emotional claims, demonstrate sexual interest or disinterest, confess or conceal their hopes and fear
  • The characters must listen to each other, but there may be points where one person does not listen to the other, quite deliberately
  • Dialogue should be enhanced by wit and humour, and by a change of mood
  • Bad dialogue only does one thing – bore the reader
  • Dialogue on its own can become tedious. By adding a few simple descriptions to produce a mix of dialogue and description solves this problem and provides context
  • Instead of addressing some difficult topics explicitly, like abortion, it is better to only allude to the topic
  • Short descriptions and explanations given via dialogue are considered by authors as a “show” and not a “tell” – hence it is OK to do this, occasionally
  • We use many devices in addition to voice when we speak – expression, emphases, gestures, differing paces, pauses etc.
  • Use indirect dialogue – the person speaking says one thing but means another
  • It should not be obvious to the reader that they're being fed important facts. Let the story unfold naturally
  • When an action phrase either precedes or is at the end of a sentence of dialogue, then depending on the action phrase used the dialogue may mean entirely different things
  • Interior speech can be extremely useful, providing a glimpse into the character's true state of mind, but use with caution, as too much and the reader may think you're being lazy
  • It's perfectly all right to treat internal dialog as though it is spoken
  • There are no rules on how much dialogue to include

What is the difference between male and female dialogue?

  • Men tend to use harder and harsher language then women – more harsh in stressful situations

Harder words - “Alright, we need to figure this one out”; “Ring any bells?”; “Handle it”

Men’s dialogue may be emphasised by including manly type actions either before or after the dialogue – “His jaw tightened”; “He waded in”

  • Use specific words that indicate it is a man talking – “My wife is coming with us”; “Sweetheart, if you’re caught”
  • Women tend to use softer and more pleading language than men – unless they too are in stressful situations

Softer words – “Oh, its been known to happen”; “ I am so happy”

Women’s dialogue may be emphasised by including womanly type actions either before or after the dialogue – “she gave him a nervous nod”; “she said sheepishly”

  • Use specific words that indicate it is a woman talking – “I’m pregnant”; “I’ve informed my husband”; “I like being around him”
  • But…there are always exceptions to these - and it will depend on the individual characters and their frame of mind at the time, and the situation they are in
  • Male and female dialogue words like the above may only need to be used sparingly in most situations
  • If the characters are well established (the reader knows a lot about them) then a large differentiation between male and female dialogue may not be required

General Points

  • In general, keep sentences short
  • Give no character more than three uninterrupted sentences at once - but there may be exceptions
  • In real life we almost never say the name of the person we're talking to: you know who you're addressing, and that person knows he or she is being addressed – dialogue is the same
  • Too much jargon will confuse and irritate the readers – use it very sparingly
  • Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word or a jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent

Attributes

  • Avoid repeated obtrusive attributions – ‘gritted’, ‘gloomed’, ‘worried’ etc.
  • You do not need to attribute each speech for several lines providing you use the name of the person who is being spoken to, or paragraph speech
  • The use of  ‘said’ very occasionally is OK
  • Use an action statement instead of a speech attribute
  • Do not use adverbs with speech attributes

Punctuation and Paragraphing Dialogue

  • It's best to give a new paragraph to each person who speaks
  • Narrative describing a person’s actions can be included in the same paragraph either before or after the speech, or both
  • Open quotation marks at the beginning of speech and close them when the person stops talking
  • ‘Use single quotations marks’ for dialogue
  • In the novel we only have the printed word – therefore use punctuation and italics for effect

Thoughts

  • Should you put thoughts in inverted commas or italics? - Either is possible, though inverted commas can be confusing and italics looks clumsy
  • Alternatively, thoughts can be made obvious from the context of the story
  • Or, use a reported form – ‘He thought that she believed him’

Four letter words

  • Avoid them

Anachronisms

  • Read through all your dialogue to check whether any of it has a modern ring