Sins of the Writer.

[Dragonfleet]

Indeed, dialogue is another means of 'showing not telling' ^^

[Spiderkeg]

My greatest strength lies is my talent for creative story telling. I am very good at having a vision, and then reverse engineering that vision in order to detail the causes/effects which propell the end story. I am very detail oriented where story construction is concerned.

My greatest weakness would lie in my inability to convey my ideas. What an ironic twist of fate. I am not a great writer, though I do try. I have come to realize that my stories would make a better graphic novel than book anyways. Chances are at some point I shall endeavor to have my epic turned into a graphic novel.

[Havoc]

First for the original question:

Strong point: Insanely strong surges of raw inspiration and a nigh one-ness with the characters/stories at those times.

Weak points:
- Avarage time between surges... several months of inactivity.
- Dialogue (I'll come to it later...)
- Ideas don't match up, working at several projects at once, no focus.


Ok, the dialogue thingie. Basically what I think most writers struggle with is the tendency to fall into the classic:
person 1: blah blah blah
yadda yadda said person 2
person 3 replies, yeckedie smeckedie
blah, raged person 1, blahdie blah blah fool!
and so on and so on.
Whenever I feel a dialogue coming up in my head I hear the words and feel the emotions behind them, the words all fit in a specifc order, it's like watching a movie, but you cannot literally transcribe a movie conversation into a book. It feels forced, the pacing is off, the emotions need extra expressing or conversely need to be left to the reader to discover on their own, etc. I dread dialogue because modes of speech that come natural to me and to those I speak with, do not lend themselves for book-format.

[Dragonfleet]

I tend to use a lot of dialogue tags in mine. Not sure how much is necessary but it gives some indication that people's expressions or postures change given what is said to them.

[Magus]

I once had a conversation about dialog tags, and in the end we agreed not so much that dialog tags were important, but more that action tags were what many people lacked. Instead of simply saying "He Said"/"She said", try describing their recation to the dialog, how they express themselves specifically, what leads up to and results from the verbal exchange. This goes along hand-in-hand with the oldest and most well know writer's adage: Show, don't tell. Dialog tags, while OK every now and then, are telling. Action tags are showing.

[Dragonfleet]

Sorry, action tags is what I meant. I have a lot of fun with those but sometimes when I'm writing I'm unsure what tag to use at the time. Good thing I've complied a list but there is a point where you list too much!

[Havoc]

Both action and dialogue tags should be used with moderation. I've read a lot of dialogues (and written) that used too much of either, and it feels fake, forced, made up, unreal. It's just difficult to get a proper pacing in a dialogue, it will often break the pace of your chapter if done incorrectly. I noticed this in many books by proffesional writers, it's something everyone struggles with because the reader is very adept at dialogue (talking daily etc.) so it's easy to spot a fixed sentence that doesn't come across as right. Specially when pacings off.


I know, I'm hamering on the pacing, another one of my weaknesses.

[Magus]

Is that because of action/dialog tags, or for another reason entirely?

Every author needs to doscover for themselves how much is too much, and hos much is too little. Sometimes you need the dialog tags to make the reader aware of who's speaking. Sometimes you need the action tags to show the reader what signifigant actions are happening while the dialog is going on. Sometimes you need nothing at all, then you simply end one bit of dialog and move on into another bit, in order to keep a proper pacing when nothing new can or needs to be added in.

[Havoc]

It's the pacing mate... PACING!!!

lol, just kidding.

It's all combined I think. I struggle with it, when to use which tag or no tag at all. How do you keep it as straight as possible. How do you make it feel like a real conversation. I've yet to write one I feel happy with.

[Ariel]

Educate me. Tags?

[Magus]

Narraration that follows dialog in the same paragraph. Dialog tags are things like "He said"/"She Said"/"He asked"/"She roared". Action tags relate to what they're physically doing, or how they're physically reacting to what's being said.

[aldan]

An example of an action tag would be something like, "He stepped back in shock at what she said." I know, a bit overkillish, but hey...