- To carry on the plot
- To foreshadow coming conflict
- To reveal character
- To indicate the setting
Move the story and build up the character with dialogue.
Remember, dialogue is there for a purpose – it isn’t just filler – so avoid the ‘one lump or two, vicar’ kind that tells us nothing.
The way your characters speak should appear natural – without the real ums and ers. Real speech is not good dialogue. Good dialogue gives the semblance of real speech.
Stilted over-formal expressions are usually fatal to dialogue. Naturally, it’s possible to have a character who speaks in a particular stilted fashion – that’s his characterisation.
The majority of people speak using contractions – I’ll, I’m and we’ve, for example: I am, I will and we have are stilted and again slow down the speech.
Try to make each speech pattern appropriate to the character. One person might use lengthy sentences with long words, while another will speak in a terse fashion.
Dialogue is always useful where there might be a tendency to POV-switch. Instead of jumping into another character’s head and thoughts, get that character to voice his thoughts.
Avoid vernacular. Yes, in short bursts it might be humorous or even character defining, but it can soon wear thin over a novel’s length. Don’t overdo the truncatin’ of words, either. Modern readers don’t like to struggle with the meaning of what a character is saying – dialogue should flow and be clear. Besides, vernacular and unusual phrasing slows down the story. Mary Webb’s Gone to Earth (1917) is a deserved classic, but it wouldn’t be a runaway bestseller now – its vernacular makes it heavy going to the modern eye and ear.
There’s a tendency for beginner writers to have their characters constantly using each other’s name in a conversation:
‘I know, Josh, it’s awful.’
‘Yes, indeed,
Mary, I don’t know what to say.’
‘But Josh, we
must do something!’
‘I guess so,
maybe we could stop referring to each other by name, since we know that already
– and besides, there’s nobody else in the room?’
‘What a good
idea, Josh!’
So, if it’s obvious that it’s only Josh and Mary speaking, dispense with the verbal reference – or indicate by gestures linked to the character’s words, e.g.:
Josh ran a hand over his face. ‘I’m really worried.’
Mary’s eyes searched his face. ‘What about?’
Try to convey the period, the person’s profession and background, and the character with the use of appropriate vocabulary.
Dialogue can also suggest mood or emotion in a scene. A shared painful past is hinted at in the pages of The $300 Man, for example where Corbin meets Jean (pp18-22). It’s a rather lengthy sample, but I think it illustrates many of the points already discussed. Here, I’ve tried to underplay the anguish and create a mood through dialogue, gesture and observation. Yes, dialogue isn’t always in speech – but in body language.
He rapped on the door with his
hook.
‘Who
is it?’ Jeannie’s voice was throaty and tremulous; perhaps a little rougher
round the edges than he remembered.
‘It’s
the man who saved you from Turner’s knife.’
‘Yes,
of course, Mrs Begley said you’d be back.’
The
key in the lock turned.
He
thought it odd that she should lock the door now though not while she was being
intimate with her customers.
He
heard her move away from the door and some wooden furniture creaked. ‘Come in,’
she said.
Opening
the door, he tried to smother the memory from an hour earlier, when Jeannie had
been threatened and bleeding. He entered the room, taking off his hat, and
closed the door after him.
She
sat in a rocking chair. Looking at him from hollowed eye-sockets, she seemed
malnourished. The jutting cones of her breasts were more pronounced than he
recalled, pressing against some white gauzy material while her legs were
covered by a white frilly petticoat. Her feet were bare. She hadn’t managed to
clean away all the blood, he noticed; there were traces on the bridge of her
left foot.
‘Thank
you for stopping Mr Turner, sir,’ she said, and offered a lop-sided smile.
Her
smile hadn’t been that way before, he realised. Something had altered her face
– her nose still turned up at the tip, but it had been broken and was now
slightly askew. The freckles were barely noticeable under the powder. Her thin
lips usually offered the promise of a winsome smile but now they were dark red
and unnatural. At one time her hazel eyes sent his heart soaring when she
looked at him, but now she was hardly focussing on him or her world. Her mind
was in some dark and distant place. Life once brimmed from her, now it was
little more than a flickering candle in a gale.
‘Have
your cuts been doctored?’
She
blinked, returning from her reverie, and nodded. ‘Mrs Begley brought in Doc
Bassett. He sewed up two cuts and the rest weren’t too deep. The iodine stings,
but he says I’ll be OK.’
‘Just
keep the wounds clean,’ he said. He refrained from commenting on how many young
lives he’d witnessed being snuffed out on account of dirty wounds.
‘Thank
you for caring, Mister.’ Her smile was thin, fragile, as if she was afraid that
it may be misconstrued, his kindness sullied.
Hands
gripping the brim of his hat, he said, ‘You don’t recognise me, Jean, do you?’
‘No,
I can’t say as I do.’ She gave him another travesty of a smile. ‘You
appreciate, I entertain many gentlemen. Unfortunately, my memory isn’t as good
as it was, you know?’ She lowered her feet to the floorboards and thrust
herself out of the chair, which creaked in protest at being abandoned.
‘Let
me take a good look at you,’ she said, gliding up to him. She still walked with
an enchanting serene movement; once, he’d thought of her as poetry in motion.
He
looked down at her and he could see the stirrings of memory reasserting
something in her, in the glinting of her eyes.
Brow
wrinkled, she glanced at his hook and then his skewed nose. ‘We make a good
pair, don’t we?’ she said.
‘Yes,
I guess we do.’
She
eyed the small scar on his forehead. Reaching up, she brushed a hand gently
through his black hair, lingering on the clump of white hair on the left, just
above the scar. At one time her touch would have sent his heart pounding; now
he just felt sad. Finally, her gaze lingered on his. There was no mistake.
Recognition widened her eyes and moisture formed at the rims. She stepped back
a pace, a hand rising to her chest, over her heart. What little colour she had
seemed to drain from her face. ‘Corbin? Is it really you?’
‘Yes.’
‘Oh,
my God,’ she whispered, turning away. She crossed over to the bed and sat down,
studying her feet and let tears fall to the floor where they darkened the dust
and wood. ‘Oh, my God.’ A small fist beat at her right breast, plaintively.
He
moved to sit beside her on the bed but refrained from touching her. ‘It’s been
a long time, Jean.’
She
nodded. ‘A lifetime.’
Having
observed the change wrought in her, he could understand how she must feel. He’d
last seen her in ’62 – twelve years ago.
‘You’ve
changed,’ she said, her hands resting in her lap. Turning her head, she studied
him, eyes ranging over his broad shoulders and muscular arms and thighs.
‘You’re taller, bigger – quite a man now, Corbin.’ She shook her head. ‘I
didn’t know about the hand – well, anything really.’
He
could feel the trembling of her body transmitted through the bed’s mattress. At
any other time he might have appreciated the irony, of sitting here on a bed
with her; in those far-off days he had coveted her young nubile form, though he
hadn’t rightly understood all the emotions that had threshed through his
adolescent frame. Now, he understood all too well.
Gently,
he placed his hand on hers. ‘Life changes us. I’ve been through a war – and a
lot besides.’
She
gave a wan smile. ‘You don’t want to know what I’ve endured, Corbin. You really
don’t.’ She looked away again, the back of her hand wiping the tears from mottled
cheeks. ‘Best you just go and leave me be.’
Corbin
shook his head. ‘No, I came to see you. I’m not leaving.’
She
faced him again, her eyes wide with a cynical edge to them, which he found
surprisingly distasteful. Her upper lip curled. ‘You want me, is that it?’
‘No,
Jean. I didn’t turn up here as a customer.’
‘Client,’
she corrected.
‘Whatever.
As it happens, you’re the fourth Jean I’ve tracked down. The others were false
trails.’
‘Tracked
down?’
‘Oh,
I haven’t made it my business. Sometimes, though, in my travels, I get to hear
about a woman called Jean and the description seems to fit yours.’ He eyed her
copper-coloured hair and felt impelled to stroke it, as if that motion would
brush away the past so they could return to those times of innocence. He raised
a hand and gestured vaguely. ‘So I take a detour, just to put my mind at rest.
Today, my detour found the real Jean.’
‘But
why are you looking for me?’ Her eyes shone with a forlorn hope.
‘I
wanted to be sure that you’re all right. And there are a few things I need to
know – things only you can tell me.’
- extracted from Write a Western in 30 Days (pp117-122) Available as an e-book from
Amazon.com here and from Amazon.co.uk here
The $300 Man (hardback) is available from the book depository post free worldwide here
Review. When I started Nik Morton's WRITE A WESTERN IN 30 DAYS, what struck me was that this wasn't just a book of guidelines and tid bits for someone attempting a western, this is a fantastic map to anyone who wants to dive into the world of genre fiction. What Morton lays out are some of the best, common-sense rules for writing that I've ever come across - especially the chapters on plotting and structure. If you're not writing a western, it doesn't matter; what can be found in this book can be applied to any genre novel... Morton lays a solid foundation for a way for writers to follow a path to get their work done in the cleanest, most efficient way possible - and discover their best work besides. Highly recommended. - C. Courtney Joyner, film producer, author of Shotgun.
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