Please welcome guest blogger Pat Bertram. Thank you, Pat, for visiting us today.

Pat Bertram is a native of Colorado and a lifelong resident. When the traditional publishers stopped publishing her favorite type of book - character and story driven novels that can't easily be slotted into a genre - she decided to write her own. Daughter Am I is Bertram's third novel to be published by Second Wind Publishing, LLC. Also available are More Deaths Than One and A Spark of Heavenly Fire.

DIALOGUE

One of the hardest techniques for new writers to handle is dialogue. When I first started out, my characters never just said something. They agreed, cautioned, reminded, mimicked, answered, contributed, guessed, explained, responded, admonished, confessed, encouraged, clarified, blurted, pointed, winced, replied, corrected, acknowledged, returned, laughed, challenged, chided, objected, contested, quipped, offered, moaned, complained, repeated, stammered, pleaded, inquired, mumbled, interrupted, confirmed, addressed, countered, advised, completed, allowed, supplied, ordered, asked, continued, chided, answered, whispered, teased, requested, hollered, echoed, declared, informed, spoke, bellowed, spit out, thundered, hissed. All within a few pages. Whew!

Even worse, I would sit and agonize over the way my characters spoke. "He responded sparingly." "She informed him haughtily." He mumbled sadly." Ouch.

It was a joy to discover that modern dialogue relies primarily on "said," such a common word, the reader’s gaze glides over it as if it were invisible. It was even more of a joy to discover that adverbs were frowned on. The dialogue itself, or the beat -- the bit of action accompanying the dialogue -- should show the character’s emotion. "I hate you", she said angrily tells us what the character is feeling. She picked up a rock and threw it at him. "I hate you!" shows us, allowing us to become intimately involved with the character. The only time an adverb is necessary is if the way a character speaks is at odds with the words.

A good example: toward the end of When Harry Met Sally, Meg Ryan tells Billy Crystal she hates him. "And I really hate you," she said tearfully. If you were writing the scene in a novel, you would need the "tearfully" to show her state of mind. You can also use an occasional adverb to modify the word "said." "I hate you," he said softly.

Books on how to write dialogue often suggest we listen to people talk to learn how to write dialogue. Seems like good advice, but have you ever truly listened? "We . . . um . . . we, like . . . you know . . . we stammer and like we repeat ourselves and um . . . you know."

Even when we speak coherently, we don't converse. We lecture. We tell long, boring, convoluted stories. We interrupt others and talk over them. We use clichés. We tell jokes that take forever to get to the punch line. None of which helps us write dialogue. If characters in books talked the way we talk in real life, who would bother reading? We want our characters to sound like us, just not talk like us. We also want their conversations to be witty, to the point, and conflicted.

In life, most of us cannot come up with that clever quip when we need it -- it comes to mind (if at all) late at night when no one is around to be impressed. Our characters don't have to suffer from that malady because they have us and our late night epiphanies on their side.

We can change their words as often as necessary to get it right.

And get it right we must. Good dialogue makes a reader keep reading. Bad dialogue, no matter how crucial to the story, makes readers go in search of other amusements.

So how does one write good dialogue?　

Make speeches short.

Have speakers cut in on one another.

Answer a question with a question.

Ignore questions, or answer it after another exchange of words.

Instead of a character answering a question directly, have him tell why it was done: "Did you eat the cookie?" "They looked so good."

Have characters play tug-of-war with words, each trying to get something from the other.

When editing, review every snippet of speech and ask yourself, "Is this the best, the wittiest, the most dramatic thing the character can say?"

Dialogue is not life. In life, most of us can't think of the perfect response until it is way too late. But in writing you can take your time and make each bit of dialogue a jewel.

Here is a bit of dialogue from Daughter Am I:

Mary noticed, for the first time, her father’s receding hairline, the deep crinkles at the corners of his brown eyes. Soon he would be as old as Kid Rags, Teach, and Crunchy.

Tears stung her eyes at the thought of her father living alone in a dingy hovel, and she vowed she would not let that happen.

Realizing the silence was stretching out awkwardly, she opened her mouth to speak, but he held up a palm to forestall her.

"I don’t want to know what you’re doing," he said. "Whatever it is, I know it’s something you feel you have to do. I thought you should be aware you’re upsetting your mother."

"I don’t mean to."

He heaved himself out of the chair. "That’s all I came to say."

"I’m glad you stopped by," she said. "I planned on calling you later anyway to tell you I’m going to be away for a few days."

He stared at her for a moment, then shrugged. "I don’t understand what you’re trying to accomplish, but I suppose you know your own mind."

You are so wrong. I don’t know anything.

He walked to the door, paused with his hand on the knob for a second, then turned to face her.

"I love you," he said softly.

She swallowed. "Oh, Dad. I love you too."

He opened the door. "Be careful, okay, honey? You don’t know what you’re getting yourself into."

Daughter Am I: When twenty-five-year-old Mary Stuart learns she inherited a farm from her recently murdered grandparents-grandparents her father claimed had died before she was born-she becomes obsessed with finding out who they were and why someone wanted them dead. Along the way she accumulates a crew of feisty octogenarians-former gangsters and friends of her grandfather. She meets and falls in love Tim Olson, whose grandfather shared a deadly secret with her great-grandfather. Now Mary and Tim need to stay one step ahead of the killer who is desperate to dig up that secret.

Website: http://patbertram.com

Blog: http://ptbertram.wordpress.com

Publisher: http://secondwindpublishing.com/DaughterAmI.html

Great post. Another bit of advice I got from an author: "Don't bury your dialogue."

I'll be giving a workshop on Dialogue Basics at the NOLA STARS Conference in March. I love being able to put words in other people's mouths!

Great advice - thanks for sharing! Your books sounds very interesting :)

To me one of the hardest parts in writing dialog is keeping the voices of each character unique. I think the time spent in building your character before starting to write is crucial. The post here is fantastic and I enjoyed it.

Great advice, Pat. I think I will have to go through my manuscript again. LOL. :)

Very powerful piece of dialogue. Thanks for the tips. I liked the reminder not to answer a question directly. Good luck with your book.

Hi Pat,

I enjoyed your post today. I see that I must be guilty of some of what you say. I do believe though, that dialogue has to be tight, as you say. You really can't afford to have anything in there that isn't serving an immediate purpose or setting up something to come.

I'm enjoying your tour very much.

Reading the dialogue out loud--no fair just thinking it through!--can amaze you. If you can't say it, a character probably can't either. If you can't IMAGINE anyone EVER saying it...well...hit delete.

Nancy, thank you for inviting me to Florida to visit your blog. It's great to be here!

Terry, I love putting words in people's mouths, too. For years I used to carry on conversations in my head, so it was easy for me just to turn those conversations into character dialogue. Best of luck at your conference!

Traci, thank you very much for stopping by. I hope people enjoy reading the book as much as I enjoyed writing it.

Johnny, interesting that you should mention about keeping characters' voices unique. That was what I'd intended this article to address, but somehow it grew too long. I have so many different characters, that I had to rely on props, tag lines, and individual speech idiosynchrocies to make each character unique.

Lyn, the beauty of writing is that after the moving finger writes and moves on, it can also go back and rewrite!

Kathy, thank you. I've read that one should never have a character answer directly, but I think that is carrying things a bit too far. Used occasionally, it can be a wonderful dialogue device.

Tracey, I'm so glad you're enjoying the tour! It's nice to have your company.

Joanna, great advice!

Let's not neglect dialect. Less is best. A few phrases tossed in, a cadence, a foreign word here and there works better than constant dialogue in a thick accent.

Pat,

You always make such great points! I especially liked your comment regarding adverb usage.

An excellent narrative on dialogue. I like the advice of using a question to answer a question in your dialogue.

Shannon/Saoirse: I had to go check what I wrote about adverbs. Just couldn't remember! Thank you. I'm so pleased you stopped by to visit me here in Florida.

A.F., I have characters answering questions with questions at times. As with every other suggestion about dialogue, it can be overused. I've seen an entire page of nothing but questions. Not entertaining!

Hi! Just posted about this guest post at Win A Book, Pat. Enjoyed your post here!

Just dropped in to check out your blog. Enjoyed your conversation here and the writing tips. I loved your list of much-used adverbs from your early writing. I have also gone back to my earlier writing and found so many unnecessary words and explanations. I've heard many of these tips before but it's always good to be reminded again. Often we fall into bad habits without realizing.
Congratulations on the publication of your newest novel!

Nice tips Pat! I love 'answer question with a question'.
Your book's intrigued me. Love to read it.

Pat - Good points all. Sorry I'm late, just getting caught up. Hope your tour is going well. Ms Cohen - This is a cool site - as a fellow Floridian & writer I'll have to check it out.