How to Write Dialogue?

Writing and Publishing

Most textbooks newspapers, academic papers, and don't use dialogue (conversation) in them. This is why most of us don't learn proper punctuation and grammar for writing conversations. As an author trying to write a novel it's very important to write dialogues correctly. If your dialogue structure or punctuation isn't right then regardless of how great your book is you will be considered an amateur. Punctuation is a mechanism for the reader to separate spoken words from other parts of the sentence.

What if your English teacher reads your amateurish book someday? Wouldn't she be shocked? This is why I have collected a bunch of basic tips on how to punctuate dialogues. Though I am no grammar expert the below tips will immensely help you in framing dialogues. Pay attention to my yellow highlights.

What is a DIALOGUE and a TAG LINE?

Example: "I would like to go to the library tomorrow," she told him as they left the building.

Dialogue is the words spoken by the speaker - I would like to go to the library tomorrow.

Tag Line are words that identify the speaker like he told/she told - she told him as they left the building

Type of sentence: A single line of dialogue that has ONE tag line.

Example: "I would like to go to the library tomorrow," she told him as they left the building.

Punctuation Method: Put a comma after the dialogue ends and before the closing quotation mark. End the sentence with a period. Also, the tagline (she told him as they left the building) doesn't begin with a capital letter since it is part of the same sentence. This is why the letter s in she is not in capitals.

Type of sentence: A single line of dialogue that has NO tag line.

Example: "He hated you like hell."