TSS067: Quick Ways to Heighten Dialogue with Description and Movement

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I’ve you’re going to have descriptions, the best way to get it in there is to insert it, within dialogue or within movement.

— Taylor

This is part three of our series on massaging a scene that was sent in by a listener who was anxious to hear Taylor’s thoughts on a point of view (POV) problem within the scene. You can listen to parts one and two by clicking the appropriate links.

In this week’s episode, we insert description that had been standing alone into dialogue and movement, then dig into the POV issue that was the source of the original email from the author to Taylor.

Here’s the original material we begin with today:

The man stubbed out his smelly black cigar and reached into a drawer to pull out another, which he quickly lit with a match that stank up the room nearly as badly as the foul smelling cigar. He blew out the flame with a cloud of smoke and tossed it in an ashtray full of butts and burnt matches.

Taylor breaks this section of description into the three “beat” placeholders we added in the first week of this series.

Beat 1 – The man stubbed out his black cigar and tossed it in an ashtray full of butts and burnt matches.

Beat 2 – He reached into a drawer, pulled out another, lit it with a match and blew out the flame.

Beat 3 – The cloud of smoke stank up the room, nearly as badly as the cigar.

When the three description and movement beats are added to the dialogue we worked on earlier, we get the following:

“Yeah, gorgeous, a biggie. You don’t listen.”The man stubbed out his black cigar and tossed it in an ashtray full of butts and burnt matches. “You don’t get to do that until you’ve gone platinum.” He reached into a drawer, pulled out another, lit it with a match and blew out the flame. The cloud of smoke stank up the room, nearly as badly as the cigar. “I been trying to help you and you don’t do a damn thing I say. Oh no, its gotta be your way!”

The rest of the show examines the changing point of view issues that troubled the author and Taylor’s solution for getting the information to the reader without the need to change the point of view in the middle of the scene.

Taylor’s schedule, which was discussed early in the show.

LINCOLN, NE:
October 15 2016, 10:45am
Nebraska Writers Guild Fall Conference
Info on the entire conference lineup, attendance, etc. can be found at this link.

LINCOLN, NE:
October 15, 2016, 7:00pm
Indigo Bridge Books
701 P St #102, Lincoln, NE 68508

OMAHA, NE:
October 16, 2016, 1:00pm
The Bookworm
2501 S 90th St #111, Omaha, NE 68124

DESOTO, TX:
October 22, 2016,
Dallas Area Writers Group
DeSoto Civic Center
211 East Pleasant Run Road, DeSoto, TX 75115.
This is an all-day event. My teaching slot is 2:00-3:30
This link has all the information on times, locations, attendance cost, etc.

Thanks so much for joining us again this week.

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