On Writing Romance (28 page)

Sometimes the best choice for viewpoint character is apparent. At other times, the choice is less obvious, and asking some questions helps to clarify whose thoughts are most important for the readers at any particular moment in the story:

• Whose story is this? With whom do you want the readers to sympathize?
  

• What information is most important to the readers in this scene, and who possesses that information?
  

• Will the impact of that information on the readers be greater if they get it directly from the character who holds it, or if they're taken off guard when the non-POV character shares her knowledge?
  

• Which character has the most at stake in this scene?
  

• Whose thoughts and reactions are most important?
  

• How can you best preserve any surprise or mystery that occurs in the scene?
  

Usually, the character who shows up most often in the answers to these questions is the best choice for a viewpoint character — but not always. Sometimes that character knows too much, and the shock value of a revelation is greatest when that information is presented from the other character's POV.

While plot is the bones of fiction — the structure on which the story hangs — dialogue is the story's flesh and blood. Good dialogue makes the story sparkle, move, come to life for the readers. Poorly written dialogue is like a pit full of quicksand, dragging the story down. And the differences between good and bad dialogue can be frighteningly small.

Dialogue can be important even before the readers start to absorb the story. It's one of the things readers of romance novels say they look at when they're selecting a book. Conversation catches the readers' attention, breaks up the dense pages of text, and makes the story look easy and fun to read.

Romance novels are a very personal kind of story, focusing on the development of an intimate relationship between a man and a woman. Dialogue between the hero and heroine is a particularly important tool for drawing in the readers and making them feel involved with the characters. When readers listen to what the characters say to each other — when the characters banter, when they argue, when they're whispering sweet nothings — the readers become wrapped up in the characters' world. In a sense, dialogue helps readers to become the heroine and fall in love with the hero, because they're right there in the midst of those most private conversations. When each individual reader feels like the only witness to what the characters are saying, how can she not feel involved in their lives?

An equally important part of the story is introspection — when the character shares his thoughts with the readers. Though introspection can be overdone (we'll talk more about how to handle a character's thoughts later in the chapter), eavesdropping on a person's thoughts is one of the best ways to get to know him — so this internal dialogue is every bit as important as what the character actually says.

Though real speech can be a good basic model for dialogue, the goal you're striving for is well above the mere reproduction of real speech.

Real speakers often break into each others' sentences, use slang and imperfect grammar, don't complete sentences or thoughts, and change subjects abruptly. They repeat themselves and use fillers such as
umm
,
you know, uh
, and the like. Or, they start off a sentence without a clue of how they're going to finish it, then wander all over the place. They use dialects, baby talk, accents, and nonstandard pronunciations. They often respond to another person's statements with insubstantial and repetitive comments like “I see, yes, right.”

Good dialogue, on the other hand, is clear, crisp, logical, substantial, fast moving, and not repetitive. For the most part, it uses standard English spellings that our brains are trained to recognize on the page. Nonstandard or phonetic spellings that attempt to reproduce accents or dialects require the readers to figure them out, and even that momentary delay drags them out of the story.

Every line of dialogue should advance the plot or develop the character — ideally, it should do both. In its many functions, dialogue can:

• Add immediacy to the story.
  Through dialogue, the readers can feel as though they are actually present, watching the action. There's a big difference between summarizing that “Sarah told John how hurt she felt” and sharing the actual dialogue in which Sarah blasts John with the details of how she feels and why.
  

• Help to characterize.
  What a character says can indicate his mood, disposition, or mentality more convincingly than any amount of description. Let's say you have a character who says, “It's a tough break that your mother is dying of brain cancer. I hope it doesn't drag on long, because it's a real nuisance for me not to be able to make plans.”
  

  In just a few words, he's shown the readers that he's an arrogant, heartless, and self-centered jerk. Furthermore, because you've allowed the readers to make that judgment (rather than simply telling them the guy's a jerk), you've drawn them further into the story.
  

• Add humor.
  Even in the darkest stories, in which slapstick or jokes would be inappropriate, a character can show graveyard humor in the way he talks, breaking the tension for a moment and leaving the readers refreshed and ready to be frightened all over again.
  

• Explain action that the readers don't actually see happening.
  For instance, dialogue might mention events that are not important enough to show in their entirety but that the readers need to understand.
  

• Describe a person, place, or thing.
  One character telling another about what he's observed is the most natural way there is to share this information.
  

• Provide smooth transitions.
  Having characters come and go in a particular setting, with each combination of characters talking about different matters, is an effective way to glide from one segment of a scene into the next.
  

• Intensify conflict.
  Telling the readers about the characters' disagreements is less effective than letting the characters talk to each other — explaining the logic and reasons behind the particular standpoint each has assumed. As they listen to others' suggestions, perhaps they modify their opinions, clarify what they're thinking, come to a new understanding of their own feelings, or become even angrier.
  

In her medical romance
The Doctor's Rescue Mission
, Marion Lennox pits her heroine, the only resident doctor on a tsunami-ravaged island, against the hero, who's come to tell her the island will be deserted rather than rebuilt:

In this brief conversation, the heroine goes from complaining about the isolation of her island home to defending it and swearing she won't leave, because of the announcement the hero made.

• Share backstory.
  Making a character talk about the significant events in his past is more effective than simply telling the readers what his life has been like. Not only is the dialogue more interesting than straightforward telling, there's an additional layer of emotion and suspense when the character himself shares events as he sees them. For instance, when you, as the author, tell the readers something, the readers assume you're sharing everything of significance, so they can take the report at face value. But when the character himself tells the readers something through dialogue, they are left to judge for themselves whether he's telling them everything, and whether he's actually being straightforward and truthful or if he might be deluding himself.
  

• Foreshadow action, hinting at events that are yet to come.
  Because the readers usually think of dialogue as the cotton candy that rewards them for standing in line at the carnival, they tend to take it less seriously than narrative — which makes dialogue an ideal place to slip in those necessary hints that make future story developments believable, without running up a red flag that shouts, “Here! This is a clue! Look carefully!”
  

You must practice dialogue in order to become proficient. A good way to practice is to read your dialogue aloud, read it onto tape, or have someone else read it to you. Listen carefully to the cadence and the meaning.

If you have to stop to take a breath midsentence, the speech is too long, more like an after-dinner address than real conversation. If you can't get your tongue around a phrase, your readers will most likely also subconsciously note that it's awkward and unnatural to say.

Men and women talk differently. Men tend to talk about things, women about feelings. Men tend to speak in shorter bursts and shorter sentences. A woman asks more questions and is apt to pursue a subject even if it's clear her friend would rather not talk about it, while a man is more likely to let it drop.

While not every man and woman follow these conversational patterns, most do. Since the readers are used to these patterns in real life, they will be uncomfortable if characters stray from the norm. They may not know why, but they will know that the dialogue doesn't seem real.

Though making your characters sound real is important in all kinds of fiction, it's particularly important in romance. If the dame in a hard-edged mystery talks like a guy, it's easier for the readers to overlook — she's a less crucial piece of the action-oriented plot, and maybe she
is
just a hard-edged sort of person.

But since so much of a romance novel involves interaction between a man and a woman, a large percentage of the book portrays the two main characters talking to each other. If your romantic hero sounds like a girlfriend instead of a man, your readers will be dissatisfied even if they can't quite diagnose the reason why they don't like him.

By the time you start writing, however, your own gender-based conversational habits are already so ingrained that you've probably stopped noticing the differences in the ways men and women talk. That makes it difficult for you to create natural-sounding dialogue for a character of the opposite sex.

So here are the main ways in which real men and women differ when it comes to talking — and how your characters should differ if they're going to be convincing.

In general, men approach conversation with an eye toward maintaining status and independence, reporting or obtaining information, and solving problems. Women seek to establish intimacy and rapport, share feelings, and build relationships.

Women ask questions to encourage interaction; men usually ask questions to get specific information. Men make more statements; women ask more questions.

Men say “I'm sorry” as an apology for a wrong they've done; women say “I'm sorry” to indicate regret or sympathy or concern over a situation, whether or not they played any part in causing it. Men rarely say “I don't know,” and they seldom phrase ideas as questions, as in “Have you thought of …?”

Men tend to make decisions, while women try to create consensus. Men tend to make demands, but women tend to express preferences, and women are more likely to volunteer their reasons for those preferences.

Men use shorter and fewer sentences; women use longer, more complex sentences and string more of them together. Men say something is blue; women say it's robin's-egg blue, or navy, or teal.