How Do I Write a Dialogue!?

You have an idea for a story. You've brainstormed a few characters and maybe you even began the narrative. Things are going great, then you realize the world in your story is full of mute, non-interacting characters who just seem to know what the other people are thinking or doing because none of them, ever, speak. You have a cast full of players with no lines. WHAT TO DO!? We realize as readers that the characters need to make sense with what they say, otherwise we never see them as real characters. There needs to be actual thoughts and emotions behind their words and actions, but the idea of making that happen ourselves seems impossible sometimes, or scary, and we don't know where to begin. I found Questions are the best place to start.

In the creative writing process, there are a lot of challenges to overcome and depending on the type of person you are, you may have more difficulties with one story writing element than another. I include myself in the group of writers who dreads dialogue. When I began my first attempt at writing a chapter one for a book I had in mind, I realized in two separate versions of chapter one, I had not a single scene with any conversations between any of my characters. I knew there had to be some intriguing dialogue in the story or any potential for a building sense of intensity would ultimately fall flat, so I beat myself up about this and began to think that I was wasting my time. I almost gave up.

With no current conversation taking place in my story, I asked myself: What should they talk about? Who is talking about it? Why are they talking about it? When do they talk about it and how? Where? The most basic of basic questions, the five W's. It forced me to place myself in the scene like I was witnessing it unfold in front of me, rather than an outside observer dictating how it should proceed. I had a better sense of the scene I wanted the important dialogue to take place in, but I was still fairly unsure of how to go about the actual dialogue itself. That's when I remembered my thought process all started with a question, so I asked another.

My story is in the science fiction genre, and when I realized not every reader may know some sci fi terminology I thought to have Character A ask the question: "What is a ___?". Naturally, when a question is asked, if an answer is known, it is given. This meant that who ever character B was, would have to answer to the best of their ability. My story was supposed to have a sense of suspense and uncertainty in it's nature so it made sense that character B shouldn't know the answer, or at least, have only a half answer to offer. I began to panic again because I thought without having certain answers the dialogue would run into an abrupt stop and the story would die. But wait, if you don't know something, shouldn't you ask? Yes you should, and thats what I had Character B do. I came to realize the more questions are asked (verbally or implied) the more the conversation is steered by the person with all the answers, on the other hand, if both people are confident in their statements or knowledge they have to prove the other person wrong which often times leads to asking more questions as to why the other person thinks what they think, making for a debate which adds tension. In my story, I made my character sound unsure, I made him sound curious, I made him unaware, I made him human, and I did it all by asking questions.

That's really what dialogue in a story is. Don't over think the fact that you're making a believable trade of spoken words between characters or "people". If you find yourself stuck, ask yourself a question, or have the characters ask them for you. The story will write itself, and the conversation will speak for itself; all you have to do, is ask it a question.