Repetitious Dialogue Tags

When you write a story, your probably going to need some dialogue tags so your reader knows who is speaking. Yes, I know, voice should make it clear, but there are times when it is necessary to place those tags. So, how do you make them non-intrusive for your reader? How do you make them so they aren’t repetitious? Do you tag action onto them or leave them as ‘he said/she said’?

Good question. It is one of those things that really depends on the genre, author voice and other factors. I won’t get into those minor debates as really it depends on the piece. Here are some ‘rules’ I stand by:

1) Don’t repeat/echo what was said in the dialogue: “This looks great, Nash,” Beth complimented. She had complimented him with ‘looks great’, you don’t need to insult the reader by ‘telling’ them that she is complimenting him.

2) Don’t get repetitious with the whole ‘said’ thing: “Wow,” she said. “Yeah,” he said. “I like it,” she said. “Me too,” he said. You slow down the text in cases where you have too many dialogue tags. Depending on the situation, you may be able to reduce the tags from four to none. If not, then one. You don’t want to lose the reader, at the same time, you don’t want to bore them and slow things down.

3) Switch it up: “Wow”, Beth said. “Yeah.” He nodded. “I like it,” chimed Alice. ”Me too.” Beth walked to the fridge. If you have to use tags as there are many characters in a scene and they can’t be taken out or ignored somehow, mix it up so it doesn’t get boring. Add to the scene. Mix up the ‘said’s, mix up the names and actions.

4) Careful with adding action: “Oh my God!” she screamed and backed herself against the wall. In this case you could argue that the action has been weakened by being tacked onto the dialogue tag. We know because of the exclamation mark, that there is some action happening. Let’s let the reader into the story by removing the dialogue tag. How about: “Oh my god!” She backed against the wall, her face drawn tight. (You are showing more and allowing the reader to interpret emotions, etc and thereby allowing them involvement in the story.)

5) Avoid adverbs: “She ran away with him,” she said quickly. How about: She blurted, “She ran away with him.” (Adverbs weaken. Reminder: adverbs end in ‘ly’ and explain the verb (doing word).)

6) Drop the tags when you can. (Self explanatory and touched on in #2.) Where you can, allow the dialogue to flow without interrupting by stating who is saying what. If it goes on for awhile, make sure you break it up with some action or slide in a reminder on who is who.

7) Don’t get too fancy: “She ran up the hill,” she blurted. “Why’d she do that?” he yelled. “Because she was running from Jack,” she explained. “How come?” he queried. If you have replacements for ‘said’ becareful you don’t have too many in one place as they slow down the reader (saids are so popular because readers can skim ‘said’ without slowing down to think about who is saying what).

Those are some basics that will keep you on the right track. Good luck.