Making characters distinctly different from each other is not always easy, especially when you are writing from the POV of several characters. I just finished a novel by one of my favorite authors and throughout the entire book I was very conscious of how each character “sounded” in my head.  Each character seemed to have the same type of smart-alecky, sarcastic self-talk, and also used the same swear words. Perhaps it was just me - I love smart-mouthed characters like Bruce Willis in the “Die Hard” movies.  Or maybe after writing a number of books with the same characters, the author herself can no longer “hear” distinct voices.

In any case, it was a reminder for me to pay attention to not only dialogue, but to my characters’ internal attitudes, their self-talk, when I’m writing from deep POV.  I think we tend to think of the spoken word when we write character dialogue, but I’m learning dialogue is much richer than that. Adding action tags, rather than “he said”, paints a more dramatic picture and conveys more about the character. The writer can show nervousness, for instance, by having a character twist a strand of their hair or drum their fingers on a table. (Yes, cliches, but they work!). The dialogue itself might appear mundane, but the actions belie the words.

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 14th, 2007 at 2:47 pm and is filed under Write A Novel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.