I love House. (And I’m not talking about HGTV — this is a show about a doctor that has just about the best dialogue on the planet). I love House because he (and the other characters, like Wilson) say things that make me howl, stop the Tivo and beat the sofa in hilarity.

Clearly, the writers of House have let their characters off their leashes, allowing them to say all sorts of crazy things, and create sparks that are delicious for the reader.

Fighting words, I call them.

And that is my super secret Susie hint to writing great dialogue.

What are Fighting Words?

Interruptions: “Hey Susie, we don’t have enough days –”
“Can’t you see I’m in the middle of a post here, Rachel?”

Name-calling – “Maybe you don’t have snow in your brain, Florida Girl.”

Sarcasm: “Oh sure, because the sun doesn’t actually make it all the way up here in the north, so it is a little difficult to see the difference in days.”

Accusations: Good grief, Rachel, do you know how long it takes to warm my fingers up to type every morning?

(Caveat – okay, seriously, Rachel didn’t even MENTION to me that we were short on days, I TOTALLY MADE THIS UP. So, just in case you’re thinking, wow, Rachel, totally get off her back already, or conversely, Susie, sheesh, you’re so sensitive…It’s all fiction. In my head….or rather now, in the blogosphere…)

Back to Fighting words…in short, they are anything that makes the dialogue sound real – (only not real because like I said, no one really has the guts, or perhaps was raised with the social decorum to know that they shouldn’t say these things to their best friend).

AVOID – long narrations about information the readers already know.
AVOID – giving a history lesson. Let us infer it from the dialogue

One helpful technique – find the “hook” or the zinger in every sentence, and have the characters react to that…sort of like a snowball, picking up pieces of snow as it finally hurtles down the mountain.

Here’s a couple variations:

“I don’t feel like going to school today,” Sarah said, the covers pulled up to her chin.
“School? Where DO you feel like going today, huh? Maybe the Mall?”

“I don’t feel like going to school today,” Sarah said, pulling the covers over her head.
“Yeah, well I don’t feel like going to work, either, but that’s life. Deal with it.”

I used two different hooks in each sentence, and gave each a different direction for the dialogue to go next.

But what if we don’t have a big fight scene? How can we make that resonate?

You can create tension in any scene…you just have to dig for it.

Let’s take yesterday’s dialogue. (Last time, I promise)

“I think she’s off one of her days,” Rachel said just above a whisper to the MBT audience.

Yeah, Susie could hear her, but really, did Rachel always have to point out that she was losing her mind? “So today is Thursday, and I might have thought yesterday was Tuesday, which makes me wonder what I was doing on Monday, but that just means that I’ll post my hint to great dialogue on FRIDAY, and our excerpts on Saturday, or Monday, so just calm down, Florida Girl.”

Can you find the zingers? There are two, possibly three, depending on if you count Rachel’s pov.

Here’s a hint:

Accusation – Rachel
Sarcasm – Susie
Name calling – Susie

Fighting words don’t have to be used in EVERY conversation, but they add spice, and hopefully make your reader howl with delight.

We’re opening a Dialogue Conversation at Voices – post your dialogue, and show us them fightin’ words!

See you all Monday with the dialogue excerpts!