I'm doing that thing where what's coming up is circling in my brain like prescient vultures.
"If we wait long enough ...," Vulture One begins.
"...then we'll have some good eats," Vulture Two finishes.
. . .
"Not in this lifetime!" I shake my fist at them from below.
Instead of worrying about those vultures, I'm going to focus on something in the task ahead that I actually know something about: dialogue.
In my 'day job' (and before that, in my 'day studies at various universities'), I have to take language samples. I have to write down exactly what people say and how they say it. I have to figure out what they mean when they say it. Sometimes, it's one person talking; sometimes, it's conversations. If a word gets repeated, I write it down. If there are long periods of silence, I time them. If there is something not standard about the grammar or the accent used, I have to note it. I've been doing this for over twenty years. I know a little bit about how people talk to one another --particularly children, but grownups are just big kids, aren't they?
Here are a few tips on things I have caught myself doing in my writing. Use them if you think they might help you; ignore them or argue with me if you think they won't. I'll be using them either way.
1. ALWAYS read your dialogue out loud.
Always, always, always. How often? Always. If you trip over saying it, chances are it doesn't sound natural.
2. Don't be afraid to put quirks in the way your characters talk.
We all have go-to phrases that we overuse. We may repeat ourselves or put pauses in strange places. It's okay to give your characters personalities in this way.
3. Conversely, avoid putting your own quirks in the way your characters talk.
I use the word 'just' too much and have a tendency to put big words and too many adverbs in what I say. Unless my character is me, I avoid that. The worst is when all of the characters talk like that. I've done that --don't do that.
4. Don't be afraid to sound informal.
See previous thing about big words. Who talks like that? Most people don't. Most people leave out words and use contractions. Most people use slang. If you read your dialogue out loud (please see Rule #1), you will notice when it sounds more natural and less natural. The exception to this would, of course, be if a character is trying to impress someone because that's what people do. With a historical character, avoid being too formal. I know, I know --old-timey society was more formal. They weren't that formal, unless they were trying to impress someone. People haven't changed that much.
5. Make sure word choice matches both the character and the situation.
You're not going to have a 16-year old girl from Canada talking like a 50-year old man from Mexico. That'd be odd. The words they choose to use will reflect their culture --if you're writing outside of your own culture, be sure to check that you're not stereotyping and you might take a look at anthropology or linguistics texts to understand the rules of conversation in a given culture. If you are basing your character on a real person, listen to that person and try to capture what they say. In formal situations, people will speak more formally --you can use informal speech in these situations for comic effect or to move plot along. The use of formal speech in informal situations will have the same effect --it's unexpected.
6. Don't be afraid to use silence.
In real conversations, silence happens. Some people are naturally quiet. We don't always say what we think. Use that. It's accurate and can convey discomfort in some situations or comfort in others, depending on the relationship between the characters. If there is no silence between characters, it means they are either in complete accord or arguing (in which case, there will likely be interruptions) or one person has hijacked the conversation.
7. Conversations are messy.
In real life, there are stops and starts and interruptions and lecturing and people going off on tangents and so on and so forth. Sometimes, a character might not make sense to another character --happens in real life all the time. It's perfectly natural.
. . .
"Are the vultures gone? They are? Good. Just wanted to tell you all good luck with NaNoWriMo --it's almost here!"
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