Tag: writing

charlesoberonn:

The problem with being a writer is that you have to be your characters.

You can’t write a charming character by saying they’re charming, you actually need to be charming and write them charming dialog. You can’t just state somebody is smart, you need to write smart things for them to say and do.

mostlyhydratrash:

fountainfinity:

things people do in real world dialogue:

• laugh at their own jokes

• don’t finish/say complete sentences

• interrupt a line of thought with a sudden new one

• say ‘uh’ between words when unsure

• accidentally blend multiple words together, and may start the sentence over again

• repeat filler words such as ‘like’ ‘literally’ ‘really’ ‘anyways’ and ‘i think’

• begin and/or end sentences with phrases such as ‘eh’ and ‘you know’, and may make those phrases into question form to get another’s input

• repeat words/phrases when in an excited state

• words fizzle out upon realizing no one is listening

• repeat themselves when others don’t understand what they’re saying, as well as to get their point across

• reply nonverbally such as hand gestures, facial expressions, random noises, movement, and even silence

This is all good advice,  especially if your dialog tends to be somewhat stiff or unnatural, but reading it all in a list, I’m imagining a section of dialogue with literally all of these, back to back, in order, and it’s fucking hilarious. Someone write me a microfic. I don’t even care who it’s about.

phantomrose96:

Prompt-based fandom events are when you really learn everyone’s colors like you’ll find the people who take the prompt “death” and come up with some smarmy ship-art of character A and character B walking over dead leaves while wearing scarves and drinking hot cider and then you’ll find the people who take the prompt “sunshine” and write how a bright glint of sunshine reflected off the barrel of a gun is the absolute last thing character A sees before taking a bullet to the chest

you can lead a content creator to water but you sure as fuck can’t make him drink