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I think Craig's answer is solid, but in terms of getting the balance right, one trick I use is to read the dialogue out loud. It works even better if you can rope someone else into reading one of...
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Source: https://writers.stackexchange.com/a/2717 License name: CC BY-SA 3.0 License URL: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/
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I think Craig's answer is solid, but in terms of getting the balance right, one trick I use is to read the dialogue out loud. It works even better if you can rope someone else into reading one of the characters, and treat your MS like a script. I don't usually do it for the entire book, just for a few key scenes until I have the character's voice in my head. After that, I still make sure that I 'play' the dialogue in my head, like watching a movie, but I don't generally have to read out the entire book. If I get stuck, then I jump back to reading out loud.