Dialogue That Pops!
An Exploration With the Guys of Apple Hair
Welcome to the Apple Hair CANON!
Here, I’ll explore creating a fictional universe, and I’m hoping you’ll follow along with your own world. I’m by no means an expert, so let’s discuss how to create a believable, magical, and captivating world. Let’s be storycatchers together!
Want to read Apple Hair, the boy band fantasy novel, from the very beginning? You can start here! Apple Hair is a fictional, Asian American boy band from Hawaiʻi.
Welcome to the newsletter, and I’m excited to lay down the foundations of our storyworlds together, one word at a time.
Hi, storycatchers! In the last edition, I talked about the story setting—the backdrop where all your action occurs. In this edition of the CANON, I wanted to explore dialogue with you. Don’t get me wrong! I am not an expert in dialogue. It’s something that was a bit of a struggle for me. How do I write it so that it comes across as natural as possible? As engaging as it needs to be?
So, Apple Hair has five members. My challenge from early on was how I could make each member’s dialogue unique without making them two-dimensional. I needed them to be round. (The concept of round characters is a topic for another day, but it means that a character has many facets to them—opposite from flat.) With dialogue, it’s easy for me to shift into more robotic territory—or even make it melodramatic.
What is your best tip for creating dialogue? I am very interested to know!
For instance, Van, the leader of Apple Hair, is more sassy. But does that mean I have to infuse every sentence with sarcasm? Even though the answer is no, sometimes my brain tells me that every line of dialogue needs to be obviously from that character.
But sometimes, we need something boring like “I need to use the bathroom.” Or even a simpler phrase like “Oh, maybe.”
So the conundrum continues on!
And I’ll bring up another character—Corrin. He is the most childish member, but at the same time, I didn’t want to make his dialogue sound like it was coming from a middle schooler. It’s also quite difficult when he uses a generous amount of exclamations, emphasizing a lot of words which calls for a heavy use of italics.
In the end, dialogue must be used to insert momentum into the story.
So, it’s not very good to have dialogue like this:
“How was your day?”
“Um, good. You?”
“Fine. And what about the recent rain?”
“Oh! Yeah, that was bad. I hate the rain. How do you feel about it?”
Sure, characters have small talk sometimes, but it can feel like the pacing has drawn to a halt when we have conversations like these—we want to frame the scene, but sometimes it’s great just to jump into what the characters need to say.
Kaden, Seiya, and David also give me a problem with their dialogue. Eventually, I had to really question whether the line is something an actual eighteen/nineteen-year-old would say, or whether I’m pushing the reader’s tolerance a bit too far.
Dialogue is a great tool, but sometimes I’d rather explore internal monologue. Also, it’s one of my favorite things to flesh out some good exposition. Action scenes too can be challenging, but definitely not as challenging as the pesky ole dialogue.
Several critique partners of mine have told me my dialogue can be unnatural at times. This was such a hard thing to combat! But… after a lot of practice, I think I’ve found a hold on writing things that a character would actually say, at the same time having their words drive the story forward.
After all, that’s what all authors are after—creating that forward movement. It’s what keeps readers coming back for more!
With Apple Hair: A Boy Band Fantasy Novel out in the world, I can proudly say that I’m happy with the dialogue that Van, Corrin, Kaden, Seiya, and David vivify. My hope is that they’re pushing on the reader’s expectations each time.
Like with every tool we have in narration, we can go overboard. At the same time, we need to hone it. Let’s practice our dialogue! Let’s make it natural yet engaging. Captivating yet grounded in reality.
Thank you very much for joining the CANON this week. What would you like me to discuss in the next post? Comment below. Or jump into my Chat or on one of my Notes, and I’ll be happy to hear your input. Let’s continue to write, read, and watch stunning dialogue this week!