Pause-fillers

As I’ve said before, dialog isn’t a transcript of the way people talk. It’s a stripped-down model that takes out the majority of verbal pause-fillers that don’t add meaning most of the time, such as “um,” “er,” “you know,” “like,” “uh,” “well,” etc. The catch is that a) sometimes these words do communicate meaning in real-life conversation (as when a character needs to say something, but doesn’t want to say what they actually think), and b) when they don’t mean anything, they often act as a way of giving the speaker a bit more time to think of what to say (hence the name “pause-fillers”).

In fiction, there are at least four ways of handling these effects: first, if the writer is using an omniscient viewpoint or is focused on the viewpoint character, the writer can give the character’s thoughts and/or emotions instead of trying to imply them through dialog:

“I know! Let’s go to the bar,” Susan suggested.

Sam and Peter glanced at each other and shrugged. “OK. You coming, Ruth?”

“I”—don’t like Sam, don’t want to encourage Peter’s crush on me, and am sick of always being the designated driver—“think I’ll stay home and binge ‘Bridgerton.’ You all have fun.”

Second, the writer can put in the pause-fillers:

“We should blow up the bank,” Jennifer told them. “I have a leftover bomb in the basement. What do you think?”

“Good idea,” Marcus said. Rachel nodded enthusiastically.

“Um,” said Henry.

Henry is not on board with this idea, especially knowing there’s an actual bomb in the basement, but he doesn’t want to say so when the other three like it. The easiest way to convey this is to put in an um, er, or similar non-word that his companions will interpret as agreement (or at least non-objection), but which the reader will interpret as “oh, god, how do I get out of this?” If Henry is the viewpoint character, the writer may also want to put in some of his internal thoughts, in which case the “um” becomes more of a characterization element, implying not only that Henry is not on board, but that he doesn’t think on his feet as fast as Ruth did in the previous example. (“Um,” said Henry. How had he gotten mixed up with people who kept bombs in their basement and casually suggested blowing up a bank to liven up a boring weeknight? More important, how was he going to get out of this?)

Third, the writer can use punctuation or speech tags to indicate the kind of pause that would, in real life, be filled with “um,” “I mean,” “er,” and so on:

Henry paused. “I … don’t think that is a good idea,” he stuttered. “Aren’t there—Don’t banks have security? Cameras and…and alarms, and…other stuff?”

Henry has a bad case of nerves. In real life, his dialog part would probably be something like, “I, um, d-d-don’t think that’s a-a good idea. I mean, aren’t there—Don’t b-banks have, er, security? Like, um, cameras and, um, alarms, and, oh, er, other stuff?” In fiction, that much stammering, stuttering, and groping for words can be hard to follow and annoying. The version I gave in the example is right at the maximum edge of what I’d use, and I wouldn’t use it very often, even for a character as insecure and frightened as Henry.

Fourth, the writer can use stage business to indicate a break in dialog that someone is using to think:

“That’s true.” Rachel frowned down at her manicure, not meeting Jennifer’s eyes. “We’d have to find out what’s there and make a plan. Boring.”

Marcus pursed his lips. “And did you say a leftover bomb?” He narrowed his eyes at Jennifer. “How long has it been in the basement? Does it even still work?”

As is almost always the case, a mixture of techniques usually flows most evenly. Using a single method—whether that’s stage business, or speech tags, or even the POV character’s internal monolog—every time quickly becomes obvious, and moves on to being annoying shortly after. Many writing techniques work best when they’re something readers only notice if they’re really looking for them. This is one reason why writers have developed multiple techniques for doing more or less the same thing: we want readers to read the story, not roll their eyes every time a characters dialog, thoughts, actions, or emotions are presented in exactly the same way.