One of the fake writer landmines is the so-called “he saidism.”
Some editors and style experts will tell you to never use any dialog tag other than “he said” or “she asked.” They might allow an occasional “she whispered” or “he shouted.”
This landmine is easily avoided because 1) it’s not difficult to understand and respect, or 2) you can stomp on it and discover that almost no reader cares. Many huge selling writers put all sorts of dialog tags in their fiction. “He shrieked” “he groaned” “she sighed” “she warbled.”
I tend to stay with “said” and “asked” because I want my readers to skim right past the tag. The purpose of the tag is to make clear who is speaking. If I want to convey a sigh, groan, or shriek, I would be more likely to show it through what actors call a “beat.”
An actor’s beat is a facial expression, a posture change, a turn of the head or eyes, or handling a prop of some sort. These beats reveal to the movie audience what’s going on in a character’s mind.
Novelists can reveal the point of view character’s thoughts by simply having them ruminate on them.
“I don’t think we can stay together,” he said.
So this was it. The moment I had feared. The moment I had connived and lied and schemed to avoid. If he knew how much effort I had put into deceiving him, he wouldn’t just say that so blandly. Did he think I was one of his employees, to be dismissed and replaced without a second thought? Unless . . . “Who is she?”
In that example, we are in first person and the narrator reports her thoughts to us. I don’t need to put on a “I said” tag at the end because we know it’s her talking.
But what about other characters? We can’t write their interior monologue if they aren’t the current POV character.
The answer is to ahve them perform a beat to convey a bit of their emotion AND signal who’s speaking.
I met him exactly on time. I knew something was wrong because he wasn’t at our table in the back corner. Instead he was at a two-top by the window. It wasn’t as private. As soon as he saw me coming he grimaced and put on his sad eyebrows. Totally fake. I sat and looked at him and waited.
He spun his coffee cup between his palms, little quarter turns. Precise, the way he adjusted the vent fan in the car. “I don’t think we can stay together.”
“Who is she?” I just blurted it out. But how dare he dismiss me like one of his lazy employees? If he knew just how hard I had worked (etc, etc)
Here’s another beat.
He bit his lip and looked out the window. “I don’t think we can stay together.”
Just keep the dialogue in the same paragraph with the beat.
So if you find yourself getting antsy because you’re repeating “she said” tags a lot, replace them with beats. They are marvelous for stretching out tension, indicating pauses, or re-introducing walk-on characters to refresh readers’ memories.
Use this technique today on purpose. That will require a little thinking, but not too much. Then move on and let it settle into that back of your mind.
When you add a tool to your skillset, your inner storyteller will start using it.
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