Polishing your dialogue

Writing dialogue in 3-D, part 6 of 6

Finishing touches

So you’ve written great, sparkling dialogue with unique voices, a light dash of dialect, and a balanced mix of simple tags, internal monologues, internal thoughts, and context so readers always know who is speaking without any distractions that pull them out of the story.

But wait… there’s more.

Photo by engin akyurt on Unsplash

I tend to avoid taking A Writer’s Block into the realm of grammar and punctuation details. There are plenty of resources out there to assist writers with these mechanics.

However, this felt like a good place to dive into grammar-nerd mode.

When it comes to dialogue, mastering the basic grammar and punctuation mechanics shows your professionalism as a writer as well as provides clear signs and guideposts for readers. I see so many excellent writers struggle in this particular area.

Proper paragraph style

Keep each character’s dialogue line, actions, and internal thoughts/narration in its own self-contained paragraph.

When a line of dialogue, an action, or an internal thought is from a different character, start a new paragraph. For example, look at this paragraph:

“Then let’s go.” She waved for a taxi. He opened the cab door for Stella and slid in beside her. “410 Main Street, please.”

In that paragraph, it’s impossible to tell who said “410 Main Street” because both characters take action in the same paragraph. There should be a new paragraph beginning at ‘He opened the cab door...’ like this:

“Then let’s go.” She waved for a taxi.

He opened the cab door for Stella and slid in beside her. “410 Main Street, please.”

With “410 Main Street” is in the same paragraph as his action, it’s clear that he said it.

If she said it, then “410 Main Street” would go in a third paragraph, and might still need a dialogue tag or action beat to ensure it’s clear who is speaking, depending on the overall context, like this:

“Then let’s go.” She waved for a taxi.

He opened the cab door for Stella and slid in beside her.

“410 Main Street,” she said.

Where should dialogue tags go?

Dialogue tags can be placed in a several different places. You can start a sentence with a dialogue tag, or you can end it with the tag.

Here are a few examples: