Good morning lovely writers,
It’s so good to see you back here and it' feels so good to be back at it. Now I’m sure we’ve all struggled with poor dialogue and felt unsure about how to fix it. I know I did and sometimes still do. Though now I think my dialogue is where my writing is the strongest.
Now, before I get to the tips, there are some things you should know about dialogue and what it should do for your book and when to eliminate it. Dialogue should do at least one of the following:
advance the plot by moving characters around or determining events
reveal something about a character
reveal something about a place/object/scene/setting
And if the dialogue does none of these things, then it’s very likely it is not necessary at all. Your main goal when writing a story/book is to advance the plot to carry the reader through the story so if the dialogue is droning on and on about nothing important or is just made up of small-talk without revealing any actual tension or awkwardness between characters then it doesn’t have a purpose. And you want your dialogue to serve a purpose and not bore the reader.
A lot of the greatest dialogue in your story (believe it or not) doesn’t come from the first draft. For example, when I writ I’m just putting all my ideas onto the page in rough chronological order but I’m not yet sure exactly what I’m wanting to say or how I want to say it. That’s why I tend to change a lot of dialogue or cut out a to of unnecessary conversations when I go back to edit and revise. Because I’m learning what I want to say and how I want to say it to best keep readers engaged.
Now, some tips to help you edit good dialogue and how to tell if your dialogue doesn’t fit. I recommend reading your work aloud as it helps you to catch rambling or awkward dialogue much quicker.
does it sound awkward? does the awkwardness have a purpose?
is a character rambling unnecessarily? or are they rambling because they’re nervous?
are your characters often conversing in small-talk even when they are more than newly-acquainted?
awkward small-talk rarely has a good place in story writing
do your characters voices/tone/word-usage and phrases differ from each other? does the dialogue back up their personality? or does it meld together as though they are one person talking back and forth? does your dialogue reflect your characters?
does it reveal something about the relationship between two characters? or between a character and their current environment?
Alright, that is all the tips I have for today, but I’m sure I will think of more and I’ll be back with another post on this subject very soon. Thank you for tuning in and I hope these tips were helpful. Have a great rest of your day writers. Lots of love! Happy reading and writing. Until next time.
Celine Rose Marie