Dealing With Dialogue

Camp NaNoWriMo update: 28000 words and counting! 3,000 words in 2 days, which is ahead of schedule!

I have a hard time writing dialogue. Maybe it’s because I lean towards introversion. Maybe it’s because I am no good at small talk. Maybe it’s because I’m an only child. Whatever the reason, when I get to a scene where the characters have to talk to one another, I cringe and procrastinate and try to avoid writing it. When you want a romance to build between two characters, you simply cannot have them sitting in silence every time they meet. So for those times, I present my five sure-fire methods of dealing with hard-to-write dialogue:

1. Awkward silence. Strip one of your characters naked and have the other character happen upon them suddenly. The awkward silence you wrote will fit right in!
2. Make-out session. Who needs words when you’ve got body language?
3. Narcolepsy. One of your characters just can not seem to stay awake, and keeps falling asleep at dialogue-heavy moments. You can get bonus word count by including a dream sequence each time!
4. Animal attack. When you’re suddenly staring down a rabid grizzly, ain’t nobody got time for chit-chattin’!
5. The Ultimate Silence. Kill off one of your characters, and then have them appear only as a non-speaking apparition. If it’s good enough for the Ghost of Christmas Future, it’s good enough for me!

I hope these tips help your writing, Dear Reader, as much as they have helped mine.