Writer So what's your best writing advice?

[Valery Noble]

A lot of really good things have been said already, so I'll only add one thing. It's to really treat dialogue properly. Something I struggled with when I started writing was making all of my character dialogue sound super formal and professional as if I was writing a paper for school again. It sounded unnatural to me. But asking myself the question "Would someone actually talk like this?" helped me fix that.

There are exceptions, of course. Writing droids or if it's an intended character trait, but the language used in dialogue is generally different from the rest of the text.

 

[Matt the Radar Tech]

Fiiiiine, guess I'll be helpful:

When it comes to character dialogue, and you're not sure if it sounds natural or how someone would speak, read it aloud.

That should give a good indicator of whether it should be adjusted or not.

 

[DECEASED Erskine Barran]

Fiiiiine, guess I'll be helpful:

When it comes to character dialogue, and you're not sure if it sounds natural or how someone would speak, read it aloud.

That should give a good indicator of whether it should be adjusted or not.

actual legit advice

sometimes the imagination ain't as fluid as folks would like to imagine, same goes for all dialogue that "flows" in the scenarios we envision putting into text format.