Writing "said" repeatedly in creative writing projects isn't necessarily bad. "Said" can be an excellent tool to support the flow of your prose. It can function like picture frames on a wall. It adds to your manuscript, but your readers may only read the whole dialogue tag occasionally.
Still, there can definitely be times when "said" gets used too many times in a row. Descriptive dialogue tags can add tension, variety, and depth to crucial moments in your manuscript.
Need a creative boost? Here's an extensive list of dialogue tag options besides "said."
Acknowledged
Added
Agonized
Agreed
Announced
Apologized
Approved
Articulated
Asserted
Babbled
Backtracked
Bawled
Beamed
Began
Blubbered
Blurted
Bubbled
Called
Chattered
Cheered
Chimed in
Chortled
Chuckled
Commented
Communicated
Conferred
Congratulated
Complimented
Considered
Contended
Cried
Crooned
Declared
Denoted
Drawled
Elaborated
Emitted
Ended
Enunciated
Exclaimed
Expounded
Expressed
Giggled
Greeted
Grinned
Groaned
Gushed
Interjected
Jabbered
Joked
Laughed
Mentioned
Moaned
Mumbled
Noted
Observed
Orated
Persisted
Praised
Predicted
Pronounced
Quipped
Recited
Reckoned
Rejoiced
Related
Remarked
Repeated
Replied
Responded
Sang
Screeched
Shared
Slurred
Stated
Smiled
Snarled
Spat
Suggested
Swore
Thanked
Tittered
Told
Trilled
Urged
Uttered
Yammered
Yelled
Vocalized
Voiced
Need more inspiration? Here are a few other sources you can check out:
350 Other Words Than Said
Different Words to Use Instead of Said
500 Dialogue Tags Examples
You don't have to! Conversations often happen in all genres of creative writing without constant dialogue tags. Once you establish who's saying what, you can format a conversation like this:
"You don't know what you're talking about," Joe said.
"Of course I do," Lucy replied, rolling her eyes. "I only got a Ph. D. in Chemistry."
"From one of the worst universities in the country."
"It's still accredited."
"Your thesis advisor was just arrested for academic fraud!"
"And yet I still passed all my finals."
You can keep up with who's saying what and the tone behind their voices without a tag for each line of dialogue. I wouldn't recommend doing that with every conversation (especially extensive ones) but you can take a break from tags if people are talking rapidly back and forth or if you just want to take a break.
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You'll know how to handle dialogue tags and descriptors as you practice. Reading your manuscript out loud can also point out when they're clunky or unnecessary. There's a necessary balance to making tags that you'll find more easily with each draft!
I'm the one who ruined me: I did it myself
No Longer Human // Ask Polly: Help, I'm The Loneliest Person In The World! // Franz Kafka // Sue Zhao // Fingertips - Fortesa Latifi // Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoevsky // Juansen Dizon // The Garden of Eden - Ernest Hemingway // On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous - Ocean Vuong
Amazing and Heartbreaking
It's the spooky season...! To celebrate, please enjoy this 7-page horror comic featuring Brook that I made for "WHAT LURKS BENEATH", a One Piece horror zine full of incredible talent. After sales are only open until the end of October so please consider checking it out and grabbing a digital copy absolutely PACKED with amazing art & stories, and some of the nicest merch I've seen from a zine!
E.A. Deverell - FREE worksheets (characters, world building, narrator, etc.) and paid courses;
Hiveword - Helps to research any topic to write about (has other resources, too);
BetaBooks - Share your draft with your beta reader (can be more than one), and see where they stopped reading, their comments, etc.;
Charlotte Dillon - Research links;
Writing realistic injuries - The title is pretty self-explanatory: while writing about an injury, take a look at this useful website;
One Stop for Writers - You guys... this website has literally everything we need: a) Description thesaurus collection, b) Character builder, c) Story maps, d) Scene maps & timelines, e) World building surveys, f) Worksheets, f) Tutorials, and much more! Although it has a paid plan ($90/year | $50/6 months | $9/month), you can still get a 2-week FREE trial;
One Stop for Writers Roadmap - It has many tips for you, divided into three different topics: a) How to plan a story, b) How to write a story, c) How to revise a story. The best thing about this? It's FREE!
Story Structure Database - The Story Structure Database is an archive of books and movies, recording all their major plot points;
National Centre for Writing - FREE worksheets and writing courses. Has also paid courses;
Penguin Random House - Has some writing contests and great opportunities;
Crime Reads - Get inspired before writing a crime scene;
The Creative Academy for Writers - "Writers helping writers along every step of the path to publication." It's FREE and has ZOOM writing rooms;
Reedsy - "A trusted place to learn how to successfully publish your book" It has many tips, and tools (generators), contests, prompts lists, etc. FREE;
QueryTracker - Find agents for your books (personally, I've never used this before, but I thought I should feature it here);
Pacemaker - Track your goals (example: Write 50K words - then, everytime you write, you track the number of the words, and it will make a graphic for you with your progress). It's FREE but has a paid plan;
Save the Cat! - The blog of the most known storytelling method. You can find posts, sheets, a software (student discount - 70%), and other things;
I hope this is helpful for you!
(Also, check my gumroad store if you want to!)
someone recommend me some good fantasy books that aren’t centred on a war, please, my crops are dying
Fic which focuses on Alfred’s reaction to Jason. He looks like he loves him and he feels like he loves him but when the chips are down Alfred does the necessary thing and walks over his dead grandson’s memory in order to keep his living son functioning. He judges and criticizes Bruce in the privacy of his mind but outwardly he comforts Bruce that there was never anything he could’ve done for the boy, he brought it upon himself. The living must move on peace must be upheld the hatchet must be buried. Alfred nobly grieves dishonestly, until he believes it too. (It’s not very hard.)
And then Jason comes back. He tears at the seams of Bruce that Alfred (and Dick and Tim) so nobly stitched back together. He says no the living need to look, this peace isn’t real, the hatchet is all we have.
And what can Alfred do except continue the lie? What can he do except continue to bury bury bury Jason in a distorted past? Jason is his grandson but Bruce was his son first. Bruce was here. Bruce. Takes precedence. He’s already made his choice. There is no way but forward. He can’t look back.
unsung benefit i think a lot of ppl are sleeping on with using the public library is that i think its a great replacement for the dopamine hit some ppl get from online shopping. it kind of fills that niche of reserving something that you then get to anticipate the arrival of and enjoy when it arrives, but without like, the waste and the money.
Naruto and Sasuke daily life
this is one of the best visual representations of classical music i’ve ever seen
As Google has worked to overtake the internet, its search algorithm has not just gotten worse. It has been designed to prioritize advertisers and popular pages often times excluding pages and content that better matches your search terms
As a writer in need of information for my stories, I find this unacceptable. As a proponent of availability of information so the populace can actually educate itself, it is unforgivable.
Below is a concise list of useful research sites compiled by Edward Clark over on Facebook. I was familiar with some, but not all of these.
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Google is so powerful that it “hides” other search systems from us. We just don’t know the existence of most of them. Meanwhile, there are still a huge number of excellent searchers in the world who specialize in books, science, other smart information. Keep a list of sites you never heard of.
www.refseek.com - Academic Resource Search. More than a billion sources: encyclopedia, monographies, magazines.
www.worldcat.org - a search for the contents of 20 thousand worldwide libraries. Find out where lies the nearest rare book you need.
https://link.springer.com - access to more than 10 million scientific documents: books, articles, research protocols.
www.bioline.org.br is a library of scientific bioscience journals published in developing countries.
http://repec.org - volunteers from 102 countries have collected almost 4 million publications on economics and related science.
www.science.gov is an American state search engine on 2200+ scientific sites. More than 200 million articles are indexed.
www.pdfdrive.com is the largest website for free download of books in PDF format. Claiming over 225 million names.
www.base-search.net is one of the most powerful researches on academic studies texts. More than 100 million scientific documents, 70% of them are free