(no subject)

[kbk]

I hate fleshing out dialogue. It's probably my least favourite part of fic. Because every other tag is "he said, ____ly," or "he looked ____" or... Meh.

Meh Meh Meh.

I have dialogue for the last scene. I just don't want to flesh it out. Though I just thought, it can be more Bobby-pov-ish, and... that might work. *blinks in a calculating fashion*

It's bloody TV, that's what it is. They're quite happy to sit and talk to each other, and I know how it would be acted out, I can hear the particular inflections that I want but I don't know how to convey that without the aforementioned tags which, frankly, get boring in short order.

And I think I will leave getting the kid drunk until tomorrow. Or possibly later. Because tomorrow I will work. Honest. And by tomorrow I mean after-next-sleep, i.e. Sunday. Because now I'm going to sleep. Yes.

Meh.

Comments

[(Anonymous)]

It'll read a lot better if you don't flesh it out with stuff like "he said, ____ly". That's a fairly amateurish way of conveying intention. Instead, put all the inflection, all the feeling, in actions surrounding the dialogue. Show, don't tell.

Instead of:

They sat on the couch together.

"Are you interested or not," he said eagerly, "because you know how I feel."

Try something like:

They sat on the couch together.

"Are you interested or not," he said, edging closer and closer, "because you know how I feel."


Not the best example, I know, but hopefully that illustrates the point. Leave the dialogue cold, let actions do the talking.

[kbk]

Yeah, I guess... but then I end up with "he glanced ___ly" and... well, they keep glancing at each other, and staring at the floor, and it all gets repetitive so I start in on synonyms of "said" and that just goes too far too fast, y'know?

Again, Meh.

[kbk]

It's just that with that, I can't help feeling that I'm overdoing it, so I try to simplify and end up back in the land of adverbs, and that's exactly where I don't want to be, she said emphatically.