How much dialog is too much?

[MadmanRB]

I cannot help but notice that my stories, no matter what my genre, are extremely dialog heavy.
It's still a habit I carried over from my short stories, as in there I didn't have the room for large inner monologues or descriptive paragraphs.
My stories tend to be character driven, and for me the best way to know a character is to let them talk.
Sure, I'm trying to branch out into internal monologues with my current work and cut down the dialog to the best of my abilities.
But still I find myself making chapters that are 80% dialog.
I mean, I do try to make my dialog interesting, using as many character tics as possible and inserting humor when I can, so it doesn't become boring.
Still, it's a lot of dialog to work with.

 

[greyblob]

But still I find myself making chapters that are 80% dialog.

split the dialogue and insert actions, descriptions, and body language till it's down to ~50%

 

[Maze_Runner]

Sometimes there isn't too much dialog but if it's just dialog then well, no one will want to read it. To fix that describe settings, actions, looks, etc to narrow down the dialog.

 

[Kitsura]

Depends on the scene, if every scene is dialogue heavy then there’s something wrong, if it happens occasionally there’s nothing to be concerned about

 

[Paul_Tromba]

If there is nothing but dialogue for an entire page then it's too much. As Greyblob said, try to aim for 50%. You can have more descriptions than dialogue but you shouldn't have more dialogue than descriptions except on rare occasions. Dialogue heavy scenes are okay as long as they are described well. Though this is just my personal opinion as to much dialogue will make it difficult for your readers to know what is going on.

 

[Deleted member 57675]

When it becomes a script. Joking half heartedly, I do not know. It depends on situation and what people like. It depends how you set up scene and characters.

Personally reminds me of when would get bored of drama scenes when dialogue is 90% taking 5-8 minutes long and no action yet.

 

[Ai-chan]

I cannot help but notice that my stories, no matter what my genre, are extremely dialog heavy.
It's still a habit I carried over from my short stories, as in there I didn't have the room for large inner monologues or descriptive paragraphs.
My stories tend to be character driven, and for me the best way to know a character is to let them talk.
Sure, I'm trying to branch out into internal monologues with my current work and cut down the dialog to the best of my abilities.
But still I find myself making chapters that are 80% dialog.
I mean, I do try to make my dialog interesting, using as many character tics as possible and inserting humor when I can, so it doesn't become boring.
Still, it's a lot of dialog to work with.

When half the page is filled with dialogue, that's too many dialogues. At this point, you need to start learning the concept of descriptive writing and applying it to your composition because if you have that many dialogues in the page, you clearly have not described the scene enough. It's not "Oh, different people have different styles", no. You really have not described the scene enough, because if you have, you would probably get like 30% dialogues, because scene description takes a lot of space. If your composition with mostly dialogue is 1000 words, adding descriptions would raise it to 3000 words. But then again, it could fall to 900 word as you summarize boring conversations that make your readers snooze.

But 80% is definitely too high. At that point you'd probably be better off learning screenplay than novel-writing. It will certainly be easier to learn for you, going forward. But of course, it doesn't help you much in being a novel author. So Ai-chan will help you out a little. Ai-chan will look at your story and... wait, you haven't published anything. Sorry Ai-chan can't help you then.

 

[Noel_Elitia]

maybe you can work on making POV's and give more space to character introspection, and you will know what suits your best. Just once or twice will be enough to know.

 

[BlackKnightX]

There’s no such thing as too much dialogue. I’ve read some novels a while back, and they were like 90% dialogues and still manage to be very captivating. A famous author like R. L. Stine writes a hell of a lot of dialogues in his books.

So, there’s no “too much dialogue”. If your readers criticize your story for having too much dialogue, then maybe it’s because you don’t provide enough context. The readers might get confused if you don’t give them any description at all. So, just mix in the dialogue with description, action, internal monologue, etc. Just don’t confuse the readers.

 

[SakeVision]

when it's not a novel anymore but a screenplay

 

[MadmanRB]

split the dialogue and insert actions, descriptions, and body language till it's down to ~50%

Eh, I could trim it down to 70%
After all, I'm juggling two main characters here who are close friends.

When it becomes a script. Joking half heartedly, I do not know. It depends on situation and what people like. It depends how you set up scene and characters.

Personally reminds me of when would get bored of drama scenes when dialogue is 90% taking 5-8 minutes long and no action yet.

Well, yeah, I am (mostly) translating this story from a script.
When writing for television, dialog is very crucial as unlike books things like internal monologues or scene painting are a rarity unless we are talking about Noir.

Still, I have many characters I need to set up in my first chapters, as all are vital to the story.
Not only do I have my MC's, but an ensemble of secondary characters who I need to establish somehow.
Again, my stories tend to be character driven, things like world building come a close second.
Since my story is in the third person, I have to do something for my other characters.
Just because they are not MC's doesn't mean they don't hold value to the plot.

 

[TheEldritchGod]

Easy.

Take the file, put it into Text Edit or something that can do text to speech. Have the computer read it to you. After the first 3 seconds, stop, fix it. Listen. Stop after 4 seconds. Then 5... 6... 7...

When you can get through the chapter without vomiting at how horrible it sounds spoken out loud, I promise you that you will have gotten rid of the dialog that is a waste. Trust me. Yes, You will hate it. When you hear your work read aloud, even by a computer, you will sit there and in your head go, ~No No... That sounds awkward. I should...~ And you will do that OVER AND OVER.

Nothing fixes a story faster than hearing it. When you read, your eyes will jump over mistakes and you will read it as you INTEND. The computer has no mercy. It reads what you actually WROTE.

 

[MadmanRB]

Thing is, I overall like my dialog. I feel it gives my audience good insight to my characters and feels a lot less clunky to me than inner monologues, especially when I have the characters talking to each other.
I mean, one of my main plots is the relationship between my two MCs and how they react to the situation they are in.
One is reserved while the other is more gung-ho.

 

[greyblob]

Eh, I could trim it down to 70%
After all, I'm juggling two main characters here who are close friends.

im not telling you to trim it. I'm saying you should try cutting it in pieces and inserting breaks inbetween.