The great thing about NaNoWriMo is that you very quickly learn your strengths and weaknesses as a writer. I learned very quickly last time around that I am terrible at writing dialogue. The reason for this is that all of my formative writing experience was writing academic essays in university. I probably didn’t write a word of fiction at all between 2004 and 2009. This means I can formulate an argument well, but I can’t for the life of me write three characters having a conversation without it turning into:
“____” he said
“____” she said
“____” I said
Dreadful.
Continue reading “Lessons from Last Year: Narrative Mode and Voice”