Fiction Factor - Dialogue Packets

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Dialogue Packets
by Shawn Scarber

One of the things I've always liked and used on occasion is the dialogue packet. This is something that I think was originally sort of thought out by Dwight Swaine. However, I'm sure it was used by many of the early pulp authors to insure balance and style.

Dialogue packets are built of something called motivation and response units. You'll see a lot of crime and western writers use these to great effect. Writers like Elmer Leonard, John McCord, and even Nora Roberts use these in their writing. They help keep the reader on track without having to resort to overblown tags. I've even noted that John McCord will go entire chapters without once using the tagline 'said'. He will instead use action to attribute the dialogue.

So how do these dialogue packets work? According to Dwight Swaine's book, Techniques of a Selling Writer, the following is an explanation of a dialogue packet, however, I believe this version of the packets might be a little dated.

The writer starts with some outside stimulus to affect the character.

_The red sedan screeched to a halt in front of the police station._

Then the POV character responds with Feeling + Action + Speech.

_Jack was nervous. He pulled his revolver and aimed it at the driver of the car. "Get out with your hands in where I can see them."_

These motivation and response units are supposed to continue throughout the scene to the end.

Not a bad system, but as you can see it does sound a little like something from the pulp era days. I think I prefer the Jack Bicham method. He was a student of Swaine's and took the same writing system a step further.

According to his book, "Scene and Structure", Jack's system is very basic. Stimulus + internalization + response. This is the system you find more often in modern genre fiction.

_The red sedan screeched to a halt in front of the police station._

_Jack had seen the sedan before. Last Saturday night down by the pier it had sped off after his partner's death. He pulled his revolver and took aim for the shadowy figure behind the wheel. "Get out with your hands where I can see them."_

Okay, those are some cheesy examples, but I think you can probably see how these dialogue packets work. Notice their was no need for the word said.

You don't always have to include internalization, but it's best to clear any confusion. This is a pattern that you might want to take advantage of when dealing with describing an action scene or something needs to move a little faster than the typical M&R Unit.

The Bait and Hook pattern

The next area is an exceptionally complicated pattern, but works well when you want to evade the subject, or have a reader quickly get drawn into a scene and asking questions. The basic pattern is formed in this manner:

Within the framework of the document, preferably within a paragraph or two, you introduce certain questions or puzzles. These are things that will make the reader ask a question.

Puzzle 1 (hook)
Other material
Puzzle 2 (hook)

Puzzle 1 (answer)
Other material
Puzzle 3 (hook)

The concept is that this pattern can actually overlay a Motivation and Response (M&R) Unit.

First Section

M&R 1 = Puzzle 1 (hook)
M&R 2 = Other Material
M&R 3 = Puzzle 2 (hook)
M&R 4 = Puzzle 1 (answer)
M&R 5 = Other Material

As you can see, this pattern can continue far into the development of the scene. The point in using this pattern is to capture the reader and hold their attention. This is a good device for presenting information without moving into an exposition dump.

Resources
- Scene and Structure by Jack Bickham

- Techniques of a Selling Writer by Dwight Swain

You can meet Shawn Scarber here: http://rebrax.blogspot.com