: Re: Writing dialogue How much dialogue to use when novel writing? I find it so boring and unimaginative to write, but yet when I read I appreciate that it often provides key information for the

@Rivera824

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I'm sharing an answer but the answers you have are already very good.

In my experience, dialogue is key to a well-rounded story. Imagine any recipe. Imagine any sport. Imagine any business. All of these have multiple attributes that make them work.

If you remove dialog, you are removing an ingredient or aspect to your craft. You can do this. Some do it well. Feel free to do this.

But, you can also choose to learn to write dialog (in many ways.)

You might choose to see dialog as a tool that perhaps ... you simply have not yet ... mastered.

(I, personally, have not mastered any tools. :) Any. At all. Particularly character desire and motivation and 'hookiness.' I can describe the hell out of a street side cafe, and my dialog is passable. But my characters? Meh. Cardboard cutouts.)

Anyway, you can dispatch dialog like a bad rash. You can send it to the trash heap with the similes and metaphors that we all struggle to find like a lost set of car keys that went through the wash and so, won't work in this day and age anymore anyway. The non-cliches, the fresh new zingers, the way to really connect with the readers. You can throw it all away! Seriously, you can.

Or, just listen the next time you're out, and see how non-linear dialog is.

Non-linear. Think about that. Non. Linear.

Think about the vistas that open up with non-linearity. One character says one thing. Another character says an unrelated thing.

And it makes sense to the reader - because this is how we live our lives.

From The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy:

'Drink up,' said Ford, 'you've got three pints to get through.'

'Three pints?" said Arthur. 'At lunchtime?'

The man next to Ford grinned and nodded happily. Ford ignored him. He
said, 'Time is an illusion. Lunchtime doubly so.'

'Very deep,' said Arthur, 'you should send that in to the Reader's
Digest. They've got a page for people like you.'

'Drink up.'

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