On Writing Romance (30 page)

When it comes to formatting your dialogue on the page, there are a number of basic guidelines that can help you make clear to your readers exactly who's talking at any given moment. Here are the fundamental three:

1. Enclose the exact words of the speaker — a direct quote — in quotation marks. For instance:
   

   He asked, “Will you help me?”
   

   Only the exact words used by the speaker should be included in the quotation marks. If you're not using the exact words, summarize the sense of the sentence in narrative form and don't use quotation marks, as in the following indirect quote:
   

   He asked if she would help him.
   

2. Begin a new paragraph every time the speaker changes, no matter how briefly each speaks.
   

   Beth said, “Why?”
   

   “Because it seemed the right thing to do, that's why.”
   

3. Begin a new paragraph whenever you draw the readers' attention to a character other than the speaker, even if that person doesn't say anything.
   

   Beth felt stunned.
   

Attributions let your readers know who is speaking. As the author, you know who's saying what — but your readers aren't going to be as closely attuned to your characters, and they can't read your mind. You owe it to the readers to make it as easy as possible to follow who is talking. Dialogue tags — the
he said, she said
phrases that specifically state who's talking — are, of course, the most obvious way to attribute dialogue.

Keep in mind that, contrary to what your third-grade teacher probably told you, there is nothing wrong with the verb
said
. In fact, since the eye tends to skip over the word, the readers get the meaning without being interrupted or jolted.
Said
is almost invisible on the page because the readers are so used to it.

Some other verbs, like
shouted
,
whispered
, and
murmured
, are just as useful because they tell the readers exactly how the sentence was expressed. Others, like
orated
,
gritted
, and
averred
, are annoying and intrusive. Verbs like
laughed
and
smiled
shouldn't be used in dialogue tags because one cannot smile or laugh words.

Adverbs added to
said
or to another attributive verb can be problematic. Many are useful in showing the precise way a sentence was spoken (
she said quietly
). But others are annoying (
he interjected grittily
), just plain silly (
she giggled girlishly
), or redundant (
he shouted angrily
).

The best method of attribution will depend on the situation, but using a variety of attribution techniques is a good way to keep your readers informed but not bored.

You don't need to identify the speaker with every single line of dialogue, especially if only two people are conversing. In fact, attributing every bit of dialogue by adding a dialogue tag or an action can quickly establish a sing-song rhythm that actually draws attention away from the conversation.

In addition to dialogue tags, there are a number of ways to clearly identify your speaker:

• Start a new paragraph for each change in speaker.
  As noted earlier, you should also start a new paragraph each time you want the readers' attention to shift to a different character. If you include narration and dialogue in the same paragraph, the speaker and the person taking the action should be the same.
  

  “Why?” Harry raised his eyebrows. “Because it seemed the right thing to do.”
  

  If Harry doesn't speak both those sentences, the second speaker should be set off in a new paragraph.
  

• Make the words themselves identify the speaker.
  In a conversation between a man and a woman, if one of them says “Ever since I was a girl,” it's pretty clear who is talking.
  

• Move the characters around the scene.
  Including action in the dialogue tells the readers that whoever is acting in that paragraph is also speaking the words of dialogue, and it adds color and life to your story-showing.
  

• Use the characters' gestures and body language.
  Though the heroine who defiantly squares her shoulders and raises her chin has been overused to the point she's become a cliché, it's true that adding gestures and body language to the dialogue tells the readers who's talking and offers clues about what all the characters are thinking, even if their thoughts aren't being directly shared with the readers.
  

• Have characters call each other by name.
  Don't overdo this, though. In real conversations, most people rarely use first names other than to get someone's attention.
  

  Keep in mind that if you overuse techniques like incorporating movement, gestures, and the use of names in your dialogue, you can end up making your characters look like clowns and distracting the readers from what's supposed to be an important conversation:
  

  Julia scratched her nose. “Rod, I wanted to talk to you about Kim.” She shuffled the papers on her desk and found the letter she wanted.
  

  Rod rubbed the back of his neck. “Go ahead, Julia.” He got up from his chair and started pacing the floor.
  

  “It's about her nanny, Rod.” Julia shook a paper clip from the holder and jabbed it through the letter she'd just finished printing. Then she held it up, looked at it, and nodded. “Yes. Now, as I was saying, Rod.” She pushed her chair back from the desk.
  

  As this made-up example shows, adding more than one form of attribution per paragraph or speech simply gets in the way and slows the story to a crawl.
  

  Julia Quinn is particularly gifted at creating effective dialogue, including this example from her Regency-period historical
  When He Was Wicked.
  In a society in which male — female friendships were limited and certain topics simply weren't discussed, the heroine confides her desires to the hero, a long-term friend but not a lover, with predictable results:
  

  “I beg your pardon?”
  

  She'd shocked him. He was sputtering, even. She hadn't made her announcement to elicit this sort of reaction, but now that he was sitting there, his mouth hanging open and slack, she couldn't help but take a small amount of pleasure from the moment.
  

  “I want a baby,” she said with a shrug. “Is there something surprising in that?”
  

  His lips moved before he actually made sound. “Well … no … but …”
  

  “I'm twenty-six.”
  

  “I know how old you are,” he said, a little testily.
  

  “I'll be twenty-seven at the end of April. I don't think it's so odd that I might want a child.”
  

  His eyes still held a vaguely glazed sort of quality. “No, of course not, but —”
  

  “And I shouldn't have to explain myself to you!”
  

  “I wasn't asking you to,” he said, staring at her as if she'd grown two heads.
  

  “I'm sorry,” she mumbled. “I overreacted.”
  

  He said nothing, which irritated her. At the very least, he could have contradicted her. It would have been a lie, but it was still the kind and courteous thing to do.
  

  Finally, because the silence was simply unbearable, she muttered, “A lot of women want children.”
  

  “Right,” he said, coughing on the word. “Of course. But … don't you think you might want a husband first?”
  

  In this example, Quinn uses attribution (“he said,” “she mumbled”), actions (“His lips moved”), silence (“He said nothing”), adverbs (“he said, a little testily”), and paragraphing (alternating paragraphs between the two characters) to make clear who's talking at any given time. If there is any possibility for doubt about who's speaking, as in the next-to-last paragraph, which falls after a long silence, Quinn tells us who's talking.
  

Though Julia Quinn's
When He Was Wicked
is a historical novel, the subject and tone of the dialogue has a contemporary feeling. Move the characters to a presentday setting and they could have essentially the same conversation — and that's true of much dialogue across the range of romance novels. People talk about much the same things, whether it's the thirteenth century or the twenty-first.

In other ways, however, dialogue in various kinds of romance differs. Historical romances are more likely to use the dialect and slang of the time, and in those cases it's very important to be sure the readers can pick up the meaning of the words from the context, as in this example from Elizabeth Boyle's historical single title, set in 1801,
This Rake of Mine
:

No reader can mistake that conversation at the opera for one happening at a modern movie theater — even though the fear that a child will marry the wrong person is just as current a topic of conversation among parents today. The specific terms Boyle uses —
cit, chit
— may not be familiar to readers new to historical romance, but Boyle puts them in context to make the meaning clear. And using those unusual terms from the time helps to anchor the readers in the historical period of the story.

Dialogue in romance novels differs from author to author (one author will write light, witty, sparkling dialogue, while another will create slower-paced but more dramatic conversations) and among story types (romantic comedy requires a lighter, faster pace than romantic suspense). Many romance categories can include a number of different story types, so a single category won't necessarily have one identifiable style of dialogue.

1. Take another look at the romance novels you've been studying, reading the dialogue. How do the characters talk to each other?
   

2. Do you always know which character is talking? How does the author tell you who's speaking?
   

3. If you have several different types of romances on hand, look for ways the dialogue differs between types. Do historical heroes and heroines talk to each other differently than contemporary heroes and heroines? Than chick-lit heroes and heroines?
   

4. How do the heroes and heroines talk to each other when they're arguing? Just talking? Making love?
   

Introspection
is just a fancy word for thinking. When your characters talk silently to themselves, contemplate taking action, reflect on past events or worry about future ones, or otherwise share what they're thinking with the readers, they are being introspective.

Introspection is useful in romance novels because it gives the readers direct access to a character's thoughts and allows you to bring in emotions that are otherwise difficult to express on the page. Like listening to the characters' private conversations, eavesdropping on their thoughts draws the readers further into the romance.

The main advantage of fiction over screenplay is that it allows you to use introspection. That's also one of the main disadvantages, because you may be tempted to allow far too much think-time for your characters.

Showing a heroine thinking about how angry she is at the hero — and vice versa — is no substitute for placing the characters in the same room and letting them argue. When writing introspection, be careful not to allow the character to give too much information to the readers, or to give that information too early in the story, thus ruining all the suspense. If the readers know all the character's history or innermost thoughts, there's little left to surprise the readers.

Characters' thoughts can be shared with the readers in two ways — directly and indirectly. A
direct thought
is the exact words the character is thinking, while an
indirect thought
sums up the idea without using the exact words.

A direct thought most often uses present-tense verbs and first person — just as dialogue does — because it actually
is
dialogue; the words just aren't spoken aloud. If the character is thinking about past events, the thought will be expressed in past tense; a direct thought will be in the person's exact words (even if those words are unspoken).

An indirect thought uses past-tense verbs and third person — just like narrative — because it actually
is
narrative — it's a summary of what the character is thinking.

How thoughts are handled in the published book is often determined by house style — the rules and guidelines governing how a particular publisher edits and typesets text. All the books printed by the same publisher will show thoughts in the same way. In many cases, direct thought — using the character's exact words — will be shown in the finished book in italics, which makes direct thought clear to the readers even if attribution (she thought) is omitted. So the above example would probably look like this:

This guy is a major pain in the butt.

Publishers vary, however; the examples in this book show several ways of handling thoughts. In your manuscript, you can use either italics or underlining to make a direct thought stand out from the surrounding text. Indirect thought isn't set off in any special way — no italics and no underlining — because it's just part of the narrative, reporting what's going on. Some publishers still prefer authors to underline direct thoughts in the manuscript because it's easier for typesetters to see the distinction.

Avoid using quotation marks when writing a character's thoughts, because thoughts set apart in this way are easily confused with spoken dialogue.

Is direct or indirect thought better? That depends. If the actual words going through the character's mind are brief and pithy, direct thought is probably the better choice. If you're covering an extensive meditation, it's probably better to summarize with indirect thought.

Most romance authors use both direct and indirect thought, though in first-person books, such as chick-lit, any thought the viewpoint character shares is by definition a direct thought — because, like the rest of her story, it's expressed in the POV character's exact words. Since there's so much direct thought in these books, chick-lit usually doesn't use italics to indicate it.

This example from Dianne Castell's short contemporary novel
A Fabulous Wedding
relays both direct and indirect thoughts:

The section in italics is direct thought, the character's exact thoughts phrased in first person and present tense (like dialogue). The rest of the selection is indirect thought, a summary of the character's thoughts phrased in third person and past tense (like narrative), though it's phrased in language we can easily imagine the character using.

Each character should think in his own style, with images appropriate to his experience, not to yours as the author. A figure skater will think in physical images, a nanny in childlike ones.

Male characters should think in masculine language and use images appropriate to their personalities. Keep in mind, however, that the hero's thoughts about the heroine should be about more than just his physical reactions to her. It's fine for him to notice her body, but if that's all he sees or thinks about, he's not a very appealing hero.

Characters should not think in full narrative paragraphs, reliving an entire sequence of events in a neat package and a logical order. People think in snatches; they don't start from the beginning of the problem and review it all in order each time it crosses their minds. Men in particular are more likely to think in fragments, and this trait can be handy in keeping the past details of a male character's story under wraps. Portraying a character jumping into the middle of a thought allows you to pass information to the readers in an intriguing way without giving away too many secrets.

In any case, just because the character knows something doesn't mean he'll be eager to share it with the readers. In this example from my sweet traditional romance
The Daddy Trap
, I wanted to share the feelings my hero had over meeting the heroine, his ex-wife, after a nine-year separation — without going into detail about the reasons they split up:

Gibb's musings on his failed marriage are intentionally far from complete. Had he been considering a business problem instead, he'd have been a great deal more linear and thorough in his thinking. Even more important is the way his thoughts light on and then skitter away from the subject of Lindsay's son. Only a masochist would think in detail about such a painful subject.

If it's necessary to do more than hint at a character's experiences or emotions, consider using dialogue instead of thoughts. It's livelier and more natural to have someone explain a situation to another person, especially if it's a complicated situation, than to think about it step-by-step. Keep the characters' thoughts to a minimum, and use introspection only when other ways of relaying the information don't work as well.

1. Look through the romance novels you've been studying. How much of the story is told through the characters' thoughts?
   

2. How are the thoughts shared?
   

3. Find examples of direct and indirect thoughts. Is one style more common than the other?
   

4. How does what the character says and does compare to what the character thinks?
   

5. Can you find differences in how the various authors handle thoughts? Differences between different kinds of romance novels?
   

Write a dialogue, including body language, gestures, words, and the thoughts of the POV character, between a man and a woman as they:

• Are on their way home from an office party where one of them was offended by the other's behavior.
  

• Stroll through a park.
  

• Talk about a friend who has fallen in love.
  

• Discuss whether they should have a large wedding or a small one.
  

• Reminisce about how they met.