Write Sparkling Dialogue
Seven tips for writing dialogue effortlessly
I once heard an editor at a writer’s conference say she scans a manuscript to see how much white space and dialogue is included in a novel before she decides to read it and eventually acquire the story.
So, why would an editor say this? Does it seem illogical?
Actually, it makes perfect sense. She checked for dialogue because dialogue moves a story forward, and narrative tends to slow a story down.
Dialogue is interesting, defines your characters, picks up the pacing of the novel, and readers enjoy reading it more than they do exposition.
Therefore, it behooves us to learn to write good dialogue and to include a lot of it in our stories.
Writing good dialogue
What makes dialogue good? This is one of those things that we recognize when we read it. Good dialogue flows well; we become so immersed in what the characters say that we barely notice that we are turning the pages. It sounds like real speech (deceptively so), and it sounds the way the specific character would speak.
But how do we achieve this natural dialogue that feels effortless and interesting?
