When tagging with action (a.k.a beats), remove any redundant speech tags: “Here’s to getting a better insurance policy.” I raised my tequila bottle. “Here’s to getting a better insurance policy,” I said, raising my tequila bottle to return his toast. The same is true whether the dialogue ends with a period, question mark, or exclamation point. There should a full stop (not a comma!) inside the quotation mark, then the tagging action begins a new sentence, complete with capitalization. The proper way to do it is “Line of dialogue.” A bit of action. (not “Line of dialogue,” bit of action). “Here’s to getting a better insurance policy,” I raised my tequila bottle to return his toast. A little movement now and then is natural and good, but too much of this over a long stretch of dialogue will make the characters seem like Chihuahuas who got into the author’s cocaine stash. You know you’re overdoing it if each time a character speaks, she also makes a face, moves her eyeballs around, shifts in her seat, or makes some other minor twitch or movement that doesn’t change anything. Keep the Chihuahuas out of the cocaineĪction tags can be terrific, but take care not to overuse them. It would be redundant with the action tag (frowned) indicating who the speaker is. Note how we don’t need to add “he asked” after the question mark. Like spitting, one can make these faces while speaking but it’s an amateur’s mistake to use them as dialogue tags.Ĭorrect (but still pretty stock, action-wise): “You’re engaged?” He frowned. They’re just faces, and rather stock faces at that. I wiped his spittle droplets from my face.īill may speak, Bill may spit, and Bill may even do both at the same time, but spat is not a proper dialogue tag.įrown, sneer, smile and scowl are not dialogue tags. “Sure you will, so you can get away with murder,” Bill said. Note how the new sentence separates the speaking from the spitting. Had Bill literally spat at his dialogue partner, the proper punctuation would have been “Sure you will, so you can get away with murder.” Bill spat at him. At worst, the dialogue itself is too weak and needs to be propped up by a descriptive tag. Assuming you’re writing fiction geared for grown-ups, this probably isn’t how you want to portray your characters.Īt best, a tag like spat is redundant. Maybe you can do it, but it sounds like terrible acting. Please growl some words, and then sob a sentence or two. Work up a nice loogy and try to spit some words. You might spit a little while you’re talking, but you can’t spit words. It’s really hard to spit, laugh, growl, sigh, or groan words. Seriously. “Sure you will, so you can get away with murder,” Bill spat at him.*Īction tags or “beats” are great in theory, but they get misused an awful lot. If you’re now using descriptive dialogue tags, replace them with said or asked, then strengthen the dialogue and surrounding action, context or narrative to carry the line. If you’re writing fiction for anyone older than 13, avoid descriptive tags. Explanatory or descriptive dialogue tags are a crutch, and the more you avoid them the stronger your skills at writing sparkling dialogue will become.ĭescriptive dialogue tags get a pass for middle-grade fiction because early readers may lack the background and experience to pick up on nuance. Well-written dialogue can stand on its own two feet. The dialogue itself, the characters speaking it, the surrounding action and the overall context should provide the nuance of how things are said. Just say no to characters constantly grunting, groaning, murmuring and muttering words, and ly adverbs that render your dialogue into Tom Swifties. Those lists are compiled by the devil to make your writing suck. Unless you’re writing middle-grade fiction (aimed at children), avoid long lists of “alternative” dialogue tags–I don’t care what your creative writing teacher told you. Said and asked are your go-to tags because they are practically invisible. It doesn’t mean you have to, but they should make up the majority of your dialogue tags (not including properly used action tags or “beats”). You could write a 150,000-word novel using no dialogue tags other than these. Said and asked are your dialogue tag MVPs If you think you’re sure but are using dialogue tags other than said or asked more than once every 5,000 words, keep reading. If you’re not sure how to properly tag dialogue, keep reading. I’ll be covering several varieties of bad dialogue tags and what you can do to fix them. The bad dialogue tags in self-published fiction make my eyeballs spurt blood.
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