Eight tips on using dialogue tags
Very, very informative and helpful, sure is going to save me a lot of stress later I must say, and I think that any future readers will be happy as well. Didn’t realize I was doing so many things wrong; you win this match Crow.
In our last post on writing tips, we gave general advice on how to write good dialogue. Today, we want to blog about so-called dialogue tags.
A dialogue tag is a verb such as “said” or “asked.” The function of a dialogue tag is to let the reader know who’s speaking. If used correctly, dialogue tags are a good thing because they avoid confusion, so here’s some advice on how to use dialogue tags:
1) Avoid “creative” dialogue tags
Some writers become overly creative when it comes to dialogue tags. They seem to think that “said” is boring, so they use a plethora of tags such as whined, admitted, yelled, grumbled, etc. Please don’t do that.
“Said” and “asked” (and the occasional “shouted” or “whispered”) are actually the best verbs to use in a dialogue tag. Readers’ minds skip over it, while other tags pull the readers’ attention away from the dialogue and become a…
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