It is really difficult to get dialogue right and yet it seems such a good way of advancing a plot.

Never under estimate your reader, certainly not with dialogue, they can tell when characters talk about things they already know, or when the speakers appear to be having a conversation for our benefit. You never want one character to imply or say to the other, “Tell me again, Eddie, what are we doing next?”

Be careful you don’t date your book or story by using todays fashionable convedrsation. Ann Packer’s characters are so trendy the reader recoils. ” ‘What’s up with that?’ I said. ‘Is this a thing [love affair]?’ ” “We both smiled. ” ‘What is it with him?’ I said. ‘I mean, really.’ ” Her book is only a few years old, and already it’s dated.

Dialogue offers glimpses into character the author can’t provide through description. Hidden wit, thoughtful observations, a shy revelation, a charming aside all come out in dialogue, so the characters *show* us what the author can’t *tell* us. But if dialogue helps the author distinguish each character, it also nails the culprit who’s promoting a hidden agenda by speaking out of character.

An unfortunate pattern within the dialogue in “Three Junes,” by the way, is that all the male characters begin to sound like the author’s version of Noel Coward – fey, acerbic, witty, superior, puckish, diffident. Pretty soon the credibility of the entire novel is shot. You owe it to each character’s unique nature to make every one of them an original.

Now don’t tell me that because Julia Glass won the National Book Award, you can get away with lack of credibility in dialogue. Setting your own high standards and sticking to them – being proud of *having* them – is the mark of a pro. Be one, write like one, and don’t cheat.

*Ann Packer (1959) is an American novelist and short story writer, perhaps best known for her critically acclaimed first novel The Dive From Clausen’s Pier. She is the recipient of a James Michener Award and a National Endowment for the Arts fellowship.