Hi, I'm new here *waves*

I'm about half-way through my first attempt at a novel, and I've just noticed that in some places I have 7-10 pages of continuous dialogue in places without any wordy bits inbetween.

These are where I have to explain events that have happened in the past; would it be better to do flashbacks or a prologue rather than have characters explain everthing all the time?

Thanks.

There's nothing wrong with an excessively lengthy piece of dialogue, but I personally always try to break it up a little bit. Have something going on in the background that can be described little by little after every so many lines of dialogue or something, or reflect the thoughts going through the minds of the characters involved in the dialogue to break it up a bit.

That said, I tend to avoid lengthy pieces of dialogue altogether, as I tend to get very deep and philosophical very quickly, and while I'm prone to questioning the meaning of existence and the validity of humanity, I'm not entirely sure if such thoughts should be intruding on my writing...

I read somewhere recently that the prospective book-buyer flips though to see how much dialogue there is, apparently wanting lots of it. How true this is I've no idea - I've never done that myself.

I'm not too keen on pages of dialogue when reading - it has to be just right; true to the character and signposted enough (so that you know who's speaking and don't have to read back), but not excessively (very annoying).

So on the whole I agree with Insane that it shouldn't go on tooooo long.

And welcome!

Cheers for the replies

I think there is some truth in the reader usually wanting lots of dialogue; I used to have the habit of skipping lengthy paragraphs in books and going straight to the dialogue, still I will try to break it up as suggested.

I have just uploaded a mainly dialogue driven short story adapted - perhaps badly - from a short film script I wrote. If is in Fiction two and called Where Wolf. Don't know it may give you some ideas

Hello there, I think as long as your dialogue does exactly what you need it to do, that's what matters. If it's pages and pages of really good stuff, it can be thrilling to read, and because, if it's well written, you can read it quickly, the length of it could well go unnoticed.

Interestingly, Mills and Boon novels (I know, they're not exactly the height of literature but two and a half billion women can't be that wrong) demand a certain percentage of dialogue in their novels. I think this is because 1) it takes up more space on the page so word count can be less to fill the 189page standard form, 2) it looks less intimidating to the reader and 3) it makes the storyline really current and zippy.

People use a different vocabulary in written and spoken speech (umm tautology?) and often good dialogue really gives you a sense of the character, as well as conveying whatever information your protagonists are conveying. So I'm a big fan of dialogue, and it's quite robust in terms of being split up by short descriptive paragraphs, or long paras, or pauses or self-reflective thoughts... as long as the speakers are readily identifiable.

Take one of Becca's favourite tips, and try reading your piece out loud (to a receptive friend if possible) and I think you'll soon see what works and what doesn't.