Writing Science Fiction & Fantasy

emphasize a word in a line of italic type, use roman type:

Isn’t she ever satisfied?

sometimes their words are all we need, but sometimes we definitely need more.

Rely on rhythm and vocabulary, not phonetic spelling, to convey accent or dialect.

Don’t let your hero say “Eew, gross” every time something bad happens.

(g) Read your dialogue out loud. Does it sound natural, as if real people might speak it under the conditions you describe? If not, rewrite.

heavy Transylvanian accent,

BBC World News, so much the better. You may notice that a Briton will say “I’ve a new computer,” while an American will say, “I’ve got a new computer” — which changes the rhythm of the whole sentence.

To see how awful “real” dialogue is, dig up a copy of the Watergate Tapes transcripts. President Nixon and his henchmen were not only crooks, they could barely speak English.

Your job as a dialogue writer is to convey character and move the story along, without bogging down in the repetitive mumbling that most people use.

Some tips for making your dialogue “better than real”:

We were in a car smash” is Tennessee English; “We were in a fender bender” is California English for the same accident. “