EelKat Wendy C Allen - Dark Fantasy Author












Writing Dialogue, Monologuing Characters, & Preposition Abuse


By EelKat Wendy C Allen


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Writing Dialogue, Monologuing Characters, & Preposition Abuse

So, I was over on Reddit, you like I often am, and found this question. And answered it, like I do. However, the answer I initially gave was a simple generic answer. If you want to read my original answer unaltered, simply click on Reddit's embed feature links which Reddit provides for webmasters to be able to post their answers on their websites, while linking back to the original thread on Reddit (if you didn't know Reddit offered and encouraged the use of this feature, look for it in the "share" features underneath every post, comment, and reply on Reddit).

I am answering random questions today about world building, over on Reddit and decided to take my answers from there and expand upon them even further over here. So that's what this page is. Me rambling on about various aspects of world building techniques I use when writing the Quaraun series. The questions I am answering are embedded here. Clicking the link in the embedded question will take you to the original Reddit page where you can see the original answer along with other people's answers. If you wish to comment, you can do so on the Reddit page where a place to do so is provided.

In any case, as with all of my Reddit answers found on my site here, my original post on Reddit is much shorter then the article here.


Writing Dialogue, Monologuing Characters, & Preposition Abuse

I have a rather opinionated and long answer, but hopefully it'll help. I have a degree in Teaching High School English Literature & Grammar. I'm seeing some grammar issues in your posts here, which, probably are happening in your novel writing, and may be what is causing your character dialogue issues.

Question: Are you still in high school? If so, please focus on your grammar classes. If not, what grade did you get at graduation and is there a local community center, adult ed classes, GED center, where you can take grammar classes? You, do need them. You don't talk like a high schooler. Your vocabulary, you talk like someone in their 30s or 40s but you have grammar issues common with high schools. You have the vocabulary of someone very well read, someone who probably has a college degree in Maths or Sciences, but struggles with Grammar rules. If that makes sense.

And could I ask: Is it possible your native language is French? You're making a HUGE amount of grammar errors, but one is standing out. It's commonly referred to as "back handed double talk", and it's some VERY common with French speakers who have recently learned English. It involves a lot of subject-verb reversal, and putting words in the wrong order to such an extreme that the sentences become almost completely unreadable. And you don't appear to be aware that you are doing it.

For the most part, your grammar is good, but the parts that are in error, are unusual errors for native English speakers to make, but are very common from French to English speakers to make. Over explaining a thing is common in French to English speakers, because they are uncertain if they said the correct word, so they say the word, then describe what the word meant. It results in insanity loooooooooooooooooooooooong sentences. 30 words. 40 words. 50 words. You haven't yet typed a 70 word sentence here at least.

For example:

This seems to be especially true for my experience due to the nature of the science fiction setting and plot as well as the type of characters and their levels of involvement being somewhat direct at times.

37 words to say:

"In my experience sci-fi characters can be quite direct."

9 words.

I get the impression based on your phraseology, grammar usage, and writing style, that you are quite well read in the classics, like Edgar Allan Poe, Robert Louis Stevenson, Charles Dickens, Benjamin Franklin, but don't read modern literature much. It almost looks like you originally spoke French and taught yourself English by reading classic literature.

Your OP is written in monologue format. A very outdated style that has not been seen in published novels since the mid-1800s. Seeing how most people write the same way they talk in conversations, I'm guessing you are someone who in a conversation, talks a lot, talks very fast, and is too focused on what you are saying to notice when or if the other person is talking. The thing that cues me into this is all the compound, run-on sentence, and a near complete lack of any use of punctuation. This is a typical speech and writing pattern of men who are tuned into Science. Men who like to analyze and study things and tend towards a very scientific outlook to everything in life. This makes them very good in Science, Math, and Technology, but often they struggle with Grammar.

When a person is prone to scientific thinking patterns, they tend to talk very fast, very long, and over other people, and they have a tendency to write exactly the same way they talk, so in their writing, often do not use periods or commas, because they only stop the writing in place where they stop talking, but because their brain is going very fast, they don't naturally stop talking here a period should be, thus they both talk and write in very long run-on sentences.

I think this is what you are doing.

And I think... this is the issue you are seeing in your dialogue in your novel.

None of this is a bad thing, it just means you have a very scientifically creative brain, which is a good thing and helps you envision your novel before you write it. But it can trip you up when writing, resulting in a higher than normal need for editing later on.

Here's what I think is happening and how I would go about fixing it. I think you are someone with a very active brain, that is always thinking, always pushing forward, sometimes so fast that you can't keep up. Before you've finished typing one sentence your brain is already thinking 3 sentences ahead, so you have to write fast to keep up. Without realizing it, you inadvertently start writing in a quai-shorthand fashion, where you stop using articles, periods, and commas. And you write an entire paragraph as though it were one 50 word long sentence. (Count the words of each sentence in your post and you'll see what I mean.) What should be 10 sentences, suddenly is one long monologued mess. And while you are in the flow of writing, you don't realize it is happening.

But then, when you go back to read what you wrote, then you see it. Then you realize: "Something ain't right here. How do I fix this?"

When I was in college a writing teacher (who was also a bestselling novelist) gave a bit of advice that I found helps, and perhaps will help you with this issue. What he said was this:

"When writing novels always follow the rule of 7. Have no more than 7 words per sentence. No more than 7 sentences per paragraph. No more than 7 paragraph per scene. No more than 7 scenes per chapter."

He said: "If your sentence has more than 7 words, you are using too many adverbs, adjectives, conjunctions, and prepositions."

This sentence for example has 41 words in it:

Many characters can either be explaining or reasoning with each other at length resulting in what on paper seems like a monologue or court argument but in reality they can be speaking as plainly or exaggerated as I to you.

If your characters in your novel, talk like THIS, it's easy to fix. Here, I'll fix it:

Many characters reason with each other at length. The text looks like a monologue or court argument. They are speaking as plainly as I am.

Sentence 1 = 8 words

Sentence 2 = 8 words

Sentence 3 = 8 words

You now have 3 sentences instead of 1, and a word count of 24 instead of 41. Simply by changing passive voice to active voice and correcting the grammar errors. And it can be cleaned up more.

As an example: One chapter I have found great difficulty with involves a non-criminal related closed door committee of people and the description of an event that occurred and why it happened. The details discussed provide some world building and character development as one disagrees with involvement while the another has hidden proof but does not wish to implicate the other publicly as it would potentially slow down their objectives. They do however need to convince the committee that the event occurred and could have been prevented so they can help push support for preventing future related events. In this case writing dialog last may have been difficult?

You are writing in what is known as "backhanded double talk", I'm not sure if you realize that. If your characters are doing the same thing, again, simply correcting the grammar errors will completely fix the problem. I'll fix this post and show you what I mean:

  • As an example 
  • Should be: For example (3 words becomes 2)
  • One chapter I have found great difficulty with involves a non-criminal related closed door committee of people and the description of an event that occurred and why it happened. 
  • Should be: I have difficulty with one chapter. It involves a non-criminal, closed-door committee. (30 words in 1 sentence becomes 12 words in 2 sentences.)
  • The details discussed provide some world building and character development as one disagrees with involvement while the another has hidden proof but does not wish to implicate the other publicly as it would potentially slow down their objectives. 
  • Should be: Worldbuilding and character development occur during the discussion. (38 words becomes 8 words.)
  • They do however need to convince the committee that the event occurred and could have been prevented so they can help push support for preventing future related events. 
  • Should be: 28 words completely removed.
  • In this case writing dialog last may have been difficult? 
  • Should be: ??? This sentence causes me to ask if English is your first language? I could translate it into proper Grammar, if I could figure out what it was you meant to say. It's like you put this sentence from your native language into Google translate, changed it to something, not English, then translated it to English from that. It's gibberish. It's literally words thrown at a dartboard and arranged however they landed, with no subject or verb and just does not convey any clear message at all.

On the other hand, part of me thinks your brain is just thinking so damn fast, that your hands can't keep up, and so, some of your sentences come out like this, because your brain has sped off ahead and your fingers in their rush to catch up, just typed whatever and kept on going. Again, this is VERY common with someone who has a Scientific mind you probably have a very high IQ, actually. This sort of writing error is common with high IQ people. It's fairly common for someone with an IQ over 135 to make these sorts of writing errors and very simply caused by their brain thinking too many thoughts at once and their fingers getting confused and typing bits and pieces of each thought at once.

I've seen this sort of error before. There's a guy I work with, everybody thinks he's kind of crazy, he's very eccentric, but OMG! You start tossing Math and Science equations at him and you can't keep up. His brain just goes woooosh, past you. He's been trying for years to become a police officer. So, he gets to the point of taking the State police exam, and they tell him, well, you gotta take an IQ test. He scores 148 on the IQ test and they tell him: "You're a frigging genius, we can't higher you." He's like: "What? Why?" And they explain to him, that because of the way his brain works, he wouldn't make a good cop, because he over thinks things, analyzes everything, and likely suffers from writing issues. They tell him, a lot of the job is writing up police reports, and people with a mind like his, can't sit down and write a 3 page report because over alizes the situation and end up turning in a 300 page essay instead of a 3 page report, because they over explain everything. Well, this guy, I've seen his writing. He writes a piece of a sentence, and ends it with the piece of another sentence... and there should have been 2 or 3 sentences in between that never got written, because his finger couldn't keep up with his brain.

Anyways, that's what the last sentence there reminded me of. I'm getting the impression you are like this guy. High IQ, Scientific, and thinks a lot.

End result 5 sentences totalling 109 words, is now 3 sentences totaling 22 words without changing the meaning.

This:

As an example: One chapter I have found great difficulty with involves a non-criminal related closed door committee of people and the description of an event that occurred and why it happened. The details discussed provide some world building and character development as one disagrees with involvement while the another has hidden proof but does not wish to implicate the other publicly as it would potentially slow down their objectives. They do however need to convince the committee that the event occurred and could have been prevented so they can help push support for preventing future related events. In this case writing dialog last may have been difficult?

Is now this:

For example: I have difficulty with one chapter. It involves a non-criminal, closed-door committee. Worldbuilding and character development occur during the discussion.

Can you see what I did?

If not, here's what I did:

  • All unnecessary exposition and irrelevant explanations have been removed.
  • Rarely is more than one preposition needed per sentence. I removed all unnecessary prepositional phrases.
  • A preposition must have an object. I removed all free standing, objectless prepositions.
  • Pre-position means place before. I removed all reversed prepositional phrases that ended instead of began, with a preposition.
  • I removed all back handed double talk.
  • to, the preposition and to, the infinitive are not the same; I've removed those as well.
  • A preposition is followed by a "noun". It is NEVER followed by a verb. I've removed these as well.
  • I added punctuation. Commas where you need to remind your brain to slow down and pause. Periods in places where you need to tell your brain to come to a full stop and take a deep breath. People who talk fast, often forget to pause or stop in their conversations and then do the same thing in their writing. A lot of grammar teachers calling "the New York conversation" because New Yorkers talk this way and often write this way.

Your biggest problem is you have absolutely no clue how, when, or where to use a preposition. You are literally tossing words on the page with no regards to where they should be. And it's killing your writing. It makes your writing style VERY difficult to read.

I think, if you were to brush up on how, when, and where to use prepositions, and simply just start using commas and periods, I think you'll find your writing dialogue is going to improve immensely.

These should help get you started, but definitely invest in a Grammar textbook (college) preferably one with a heavy use of diagramming sentences.

THIS is what a diagramed sentance looks like if you've never seen one:

http://www.k12reader.com/worksheet/sentence-diagramming-guide/view/

it's something you would have been taught in 5th grade, but most 5th graders think it is boring so ignore it, and then as adults wonder why they have trouble with grammar rules.

Instructions for how to diagram a sentence:

https://www.thoughtco.com/how-to-diagram-a-sentence-1856964 .

I HIGHLY recommend, you take the chapter that is causing you trouble, and diagram EVERY SINGLE sentence of it. If's what your editor is gonna do if you plan to publish. By the end of the day, I guarantee your characters will have stopped monologuing and will be speaking more clearly. Nothing cures writing problems, like digraming your entire novel as part of the editing process.

This app (free), may help you fix you character dialogue issues: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/store/p/sentence-diagrammer/9nblggh10hzs

But here's some help with prepositions, that should fix a lot of your characters' dialogue issues:

http://www.grammarbook.com/grammar/probPrep.asp

http://www.grammar-monster.com/lessons/prepositions.htm

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:English_prepositional_phrases

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:English_phrasal_prepositions

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_prepositions

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Preposition_and_postposition

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Category:English_prepositions

https://www.englishclub.com/grammar/prepositions-rule.htm

https://www.englishclub.com/grammar/prepositions-rules.htm

http://grammar.yourdictionary.com/parts-of-speech/prepositions/rules-for-prepositions.html

I do break up as best I can with background information or minor events such as moving a character in a scene when actions are available but what I have found is that my writing tends to become at length to a point I feel may be excessive.

Yep. May be excessive.

You took 48 words to say: "My writing may be excessive." (5 words.)

And yes, I am aware of the fact that my post here, is ironic, as it is itself, excessive. But, hey, it takes one to know one, eh?

I have a problem being long winded and wordy in my writing (you've probably noticed). My drafts are a nightmare. They require so much editing. So much re-writing. So much removing excessive wordiness.

I completely understand when you say:

although my reddit style is of the slightly absurd variety, I can say that my normal writing style is not

I feel your pain.

Now...

Let's take something else into consideration.

All of what I have just said up to this point, are changes you would make if you wanted your novel writing in perfect English Grammar.

The question now becomes... but do you want it written in perfect English Grammar?

No one can answer that but you.

There is a market for long winded prose. And you are clearly very good at writing this style. It's a Literary market, so it's not as big as a genre fiction market. But it's out there, and it does like reading long winded fiction.

Anyone who is a fan of Edgar Allan Poe, LOVES 13 pages long sentences. That's not a joke. The Fall of House of Usher, contains a 13 page long sentence. Several hundred words in one single sentence.

Have you considered the possibility that, you don't NEED to change anything about your writing style?

I mean, I listed the things that need changing, because, well, you asked. But does changing your novel out of the style you wrote it in, and into perfect English Grammar actually improve the story or not?

If you have a character who monologues and rambles on, filling pages with text... well, that kind of says a lot about that character's personality. Their thought process. And you yourself said, the long monologue was important to character development.

The details discussed provide some world building and character development as one disagrees with involvement while the another has hidden proof but does not wish to implicate the other publicly as it would potentially slow down their objectives.

What I wished to accomplish was world building in a more interactive means involving the main characters instead of getting it from the narrator that just feeds background information. It is information expected to come from dialog within this setting and actually helps push the importance of what the event involved. I don't want to just say that a character described this and that. If the character has passion for or against what he/she is saying then they should do so right?

Here's a thought... have you considered reading stage play scripts?

A stage play has a paragraph of scene description on the first page, followed by dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, dialogue, and oh look, more dialogue.

Before I wrote novels, I started out writing stage play scripts. I LOVE live theatre, so that's where I started out. And it shows. A lot. When you read my published novels. The fact that I started out in theatre before novels sticks out like a sore thumb.

You want to know something about my novels? They are almost entirely dialogue. There is no narrator, because there are no descriptions. None outside of dialogue at least. Even when the dialogue stops, and some non-dialogue shows up, the non-dialogue is nothing but the internal thoughts of the character who just stopped talking. It's called "head hopping" and boy am I ever good at writing it.

If you start looking for it, you'll quickly find that most authors freak out and preach the evils of "head hopping" and say, no, no, no, no, no, don't EVER do that! No! Shame on any one who does! But does that stop me from writing it? Nope. Why? Because it fits the main character. He's a drug addict and he often is uncertain if he is in his own head or not. It's an unusual writing style, yes, and perhaps it should be avoided in most novels, but for the series in question, it works. It fits with the theme of the story, to have a non-traditional writing style going on.

The point is, it sounds to me, like you are writing in a very non-traditional style, and it also sounds like, you are only considering changing it because you are comparing what your text looks like when compared to other novels, right?

What I wished to accomplish was world building in a more interactive means involving the main characters instead of getting it from the narrator that just feeds background information. It is information expected to come from dialog within this setting and actually helps push the importance of what the event involved. I don't want to just say that a character described this and that. If the character has passion for or against what he/she is saying then they should do so right?

Charles Dickens once wrote a character who had a passion for watching ripples in the water...and then spent 24 pages of none stop one character dialogue as that character stood on a bridge and described every ripple in the water below.

Charles Dickens is considered one of the great classic writers whom all writers should strive to write like. This logic tells us that we should therefore all write characters who self-dialogue on their favourite things for 24 pages without interruption. Why then does no one do this? Because it's as boring to read someone gushing over a passion as it is to listen to a real life person doing it.

Thus you have long boring, dull blocks of dialogue like this:

"... and so that's when you add the half-cup of sugar. Did you ever notice how sugar looks like snow? Funny isn't it. How white it is. But you gotta keep stirring. Stirring constantly, so it doesn't stick and burn on the bottom of the pan. And by the way, you really should be using a copper bottom pan, you know the one made out of steal, that silver metal, with the copper coating on the bottom, that orange metal, and they usually have a black handle. So after you add the sugar see, next you add the frozens strawberries, which are small and red and got seeds in them. Did you know strawberries come from Florida. Florida had a deep freeze last week. It actually snowed, Can you believe it. It never snows in Florida. I'll bet the strawberry crops have all been destroyed. So after you add the strawberries you want to increase the heat and keep on stirring constantly. And besur to use a wooden spoon. You know, the big, long handed, oak wood ones. Don't use one of those small, silver metal ones. It'll affect the taste...."


If one character in your novel is doing it, then this is a good opportunity to show this character as dry, dull, and boring. Having other character interrupt him saying "It's getting late" trying to drop hints, but him just continuing to talk and talk and talk and talk...


"... and so that's when you add the half-cup of sugar. Did you ever notice how sugar looks like snow? Funny isn't it. How white it is. But you gotta keep stirring. Stirring constantly, so it doesn't stick and burn on the bottom of the pan. And by the way, you really should be using a copper bottom pan, you know the one made out of steal, that silver metal, with the copper coating on the bottom, that orange metal, and they usually have a black handle..."

"It's getting late..."

"Yeah, I know. Just a minute. I'm almost done. So after you add the sugar see, next you add the frozens strawberries, which are small and red and got seeds in them. Did you know strawberries come from Florida. Florida had a deep freeze last week. It actually snowed, Can you believe it. It never snows in Florida. I'll bet the strawberry crops have all been destroyed..."

"I need to go to bed."

"Oh, yeah, sure. I'm almost done. So after you add the strawberries you want to increase the heat and keep on stirring constantly. And besur to use a wooden spoon. You know, the big, long handed, oak wood ones. Don't use one of those small, silver metal ones. It'll affect the taste...."

Can you see how boring it would be if I just let him done on and one describing every shape and colour of every item he mentioned? Because this character is hell bent of world building and describing everything, this character is seen by the reader as a dull bore. So this is an example of how sometimes you WANT a character monologuing and describing things, because you want to show that the character is annoying.

Normally in most novels, your dialogue should be quick and snappy and look like this:

"... and so that's when you add the half-cup of sugar..."

"Did you ever notice how sugar looks like snow?"

"Yeah, Funny isn't it. How white it is."

"Hey you two! Pay attention. You gotta keep stirring."

"Yeah, yeah. Stirring constantly, so it doesn't stick and burn on the bottom of the pan."

"And by the way, you really should be using a copper bottom pan..."

"This is the one that was there."

"It's getting late..."

"Yeah, I know. Just a minute. I'm almost done."

"So after you add the sugar see, next you add the frozens strawberries.

"Did you know strawberries come from Florida?"

"Florida had a deep freeze last week. It actually snowed! Can you believe it?"

"It never snows in Florida."

"I'll bet the strawberry crops have all been destroyed..."

"I need to go to bed."

"Oh, yeah, sure. I'm almost done."

"So after you add the strawberries you want to increase the heat and keep on stirring constantly. And be sure to use a wooden spoon. You know, the big, long handed, oak wood ones. Don't use one of those small, silver metal ones. It'll affect the taste...."

(That right there, btw, is called "The Ernest Hemingway Style of Writing", if you decide you want to look into it more. It means the dialogue between 2 or more characters, written without any name/said tags and without a narrator. It's considered a Literary style of writing dialogue and is not often seen in genre fiction; it is however how I write all my novels, and is what I was talking about when I told you my novels are straight up dialogue without any narrator. In normal novels there would have been "he said" tags and breaks of narration in between.)

Can you see how instead of it being one long droning passage by one character, I've now broken it up onto a quick, snappy exchange of conversation between 3 characters?

If you go through the dialogue of your novel, you shouldn't see any blocks of text, but rather should see lots of tiny snappy sentences going back and forth between characters.

In real life conversation, people jump in and it's rare anyone gets to the end of a sentence before someone else starts to speak.

All of your dialogue passages should bounce back and forth between characters very quickly, with each character saying only about 7 words before the next character starts talking.

If you have any passages of dialogue that contain more then 20 words before changing character, you need to find ways to re-write those blocks of text to create more realistic and easier to read dialogue exchanges.

In real life, people do not talk in long uninterrupted speeches. And when a person does do that, they are self absorbed, not paying attention to the people around them, and are usually coming off as a "know it all jerk who won't let anyone else speak"... and in your novel, a character who says more then 20 words before the dialogue changes characters, is going to be seen by your readers as a "know it all jerk who won't let anyone else speak". Thus the only time you would have a character monologuing is if you want to convey to your readers that he is a "know it all jerk who won't let anyone else speak".

But again, as before, all of the Grammar rules are subjective, and can be ignored if you are going for some kind of avant garde literary style and effect.

In any case, hopefully thi all helps you out.

Good luck with it.



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Where to find more info on my methods to writing Elf culture, Elf society, Elf ethics, and the Elven way of life (aka other writing related articles that started out in life as Reddit answers):

  1. What makes an Elf an Elf?
  2. Moon Elves - Albinism in The Quaraun Series.
  3. How To Write Hot Sex - Video Interview On Elf Sex Lives
  4. On Writing A Clinically Insane Character Accurately, While Avoiding The Psychopath Stereotype
  5. Wizards vs Witches vs Sorcerers: How are they different?
  6. FAQs About Quaraun
  7. Psychedelics In A 'High' High Fantasy World (High Elves Getting High)
  8. High, High Elves: Elves on Opium | Drug Use 
  9. Writing Horror That Features Violence Against Children 
  10. Spell-casting Side Effects of Magic
  11. Child Sacrifice in Fantasy Novels
  12. Meet the Characters - Who is GhoulSpawn
  13. Marriage in Moon Elf Culture 

The Complete Index To Everything You Ever Wanted To Know About Moon Elf Society, But Was Afraid To Ask;

or

The Zaharam-Chapelle-Parunas  Ethnographical World Building Questionnaire