"Nothing engages a reader more than realistic dialogue and nothing disgruntles a reader more than a phrase that is contrived, clichéd and unnatural; it will pull a reader away from your lovingly crafted prose quicker than a flat character or a thin plot could ever do." ~Whoosh! Editing
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I've been critiquing and editing for a long time. Even before I came to Wattpad. Let me be absolutely honest with you: whether it's here, or elsewhere, I always end up fixing the SAME THINGS. So if I could give all of the 18 million users on this site/app only one tip, it would be how to write proper dialogue.

Dialogue is the monster under Wattpad's bed.

Tag everyone you know. NOW! Just do it. Please, don't make me beg, because I will...
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Hopefully you aren't going to deny your fellow Earthlings a shot at incredible dialogue... I'm assuming you have a beating heart that will allow you to let them in on some really good advice here...
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Section I
How to format dialogue

This is a big one. Know how to write basic sentences correctly, so when it's your character's turn to take the wheel, you won't be running into any trees on the freeway (yes, freeway, a place where there should not be trees unless you've veered completely off the road). 🌲🌲 💥 🚗

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"Success does not consist in never making mistakes but in never making the same one a second time." ~George Bernard Shaw
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Da Rules:

1. Enclose the spoken words with double quotation marks.

"I love it when that happens."

2. ⚜️Dialogue tags (the he asked/she said portions) stay outside the quotes and get separated by a comma.⚜️

Sam said, "I'll never do that again."

"Don't be a sissy," said Bill. "Let's get back in line and ride this beast again."

⚜️Note: When dialogue ends in a question or exclamation mark, the words that follow start in lower case.⚜️

"What's new?" she asked.

3. Actions that occur before or after the dialogue go in a separate sentence. For example, If Cindi screamed and then spoke, you write it this way:

Cindi screamed.

"Oh my God!"

On the other hand, if Cindi screamed out the words, use a comma instead of a period (so that it's all part of the same sentence).

Cindi screamed, "Oh my God!"

4. 🏆If the dialogue ends with an ellipsis (...) do not add a comma or any other punctuation inside the quotation marks.🏆

"I guess you'll go back to running your company and I will..." her voice drifted off.

5. If you have to quote something within the dialogue, use single quotation marks.

Bill laughed, "When that ghost jumped out and said, 'Boo!' you screamed like a little girl."

6. Start a new paragraph every time you change speakers. If the speaker performs actions linked to the dialogue, keep everything in the same paragraph. Why? Readers easily lose track of which character is speaking. A new paragraph helps readers by signalling a change.

"Did he hit you?" Deanna asked, looking at the cut and bruises on Laura's face.

"No. I hurt myself." Her brain scrambled to invent a story. "I, umm, fell."

"That bastard!"

"No. You don't understand. It was my fault."

"Battered women always say that." Deanna shook her head. "Please come with me. I don't think you should be here when he comes back."

7. ⭐️If an action interrupts a sentence in the dialogue, use lower case on the first letter of the second fragment.⭐️

"I know," he lowered his voice to a whisper, "what you said."

8. If the same speaker talks long enough to require a new paragraph, place opening quotation marks at the beginning of each paragraph. However, closing quotation marks are placed only at the end of the final paragraph. 👇👇👇
<><><><><>
Tom explained the details. "The thread is a remarkable silk-wool blend, a new fabric named Allurotique. Some people compare it to the most expensive commercially available silk, Pashmina Silk; but that comparison is off base. Pashmina silk is made by weaving wool from pashmina goats with a silk produced by worms that eat only mulberry leaves.

"Allurotique is blended, not woven. And it's made from the most expensive silk and a exotic wool spun into a fabric with extraordinary qualities.

"The silk in Allurotique is muga silk, which has a natural shimmering gold color. It absorbs water better than other silks, making it more comfortable to wear. It's has a number of other nifty features: it's more durable than other silks, it's almost impossible to stain and it gets shinier with wear.

"The wool in Allurotique is harvested from vicuñas, a South American animal related to llamas. Vicuña wool is softer, lighter and warmer than any other wool in the world. Since the animals can only be sheared once every three years, it's rare and outlandishly expensive."
<><><><><>
A special thanks to First Manuscript for this extensive guide. Check out their site for more incredibly useful tips:
http://firstmanuscript.com/format-dialogue/

Section II

Wow! That was a looooooong section! Better make sure you know how to format correctly before you carry on to the next biggie:

Believable and Effective Dialogue

All hail the king and queen of writing! 👑 👑

It is dialogue that can make or break a story. If your characters sound off, it won't matter how gorgeous the rest of the book is. They'll always wonder if you, the writer, are messing with them. The same goes for any script, and perhaps that is the best way to look at dialogue. It is a script. Your characters are the actors. You, my friend, are the director and screenwriter.

So, the very basic of believable dialogue that is effective at conveying the correct emotions from the reader and the character speaking is this: does it sound right?

No. It's not a dumb phrase. As much as it sounds like one...

What I'm getting at is something much deeper. Does it sound right to have a four year old spew out words that came directly from an encyclopedia? Should an elderly man speak like a hipster teenager? If it is the twenty-first century, where is the logic of writing conversational dialogue that came out of Shakespeare's works?

Generally, the answer will be a big fat NO. Four-year-olds aren't well-educated. Elderly people talk from a different era, and rarely throw in the "like, um, lol, lmfao, cool af" symphony that charms the hipster crowd. Shakespeare came from the 16/17th century, so that's about another 400 years before the "modern man" plagued the earth.

Now that you have a general idea of the incorrect way to write dialogue... what about the good stuff?

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"I've found that good dialogue tells you not only what people are saying or how they're communicating but it tells you a great deal - by dialect and tone, content and circumstance - about the quality of the character." ~E. O. Wilson
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I love this quote. It truly speaks to writers, and inspires great characters with genuine characteristics. If you struggle with this, I've got your back. Without further ado, I give you...

THE TOP 10 DO'S OF EFFECTIVE DIALOGUE:
One: Listen to how people talk.
Two: Use dialogue to move the story forward (not as a filler).
Three: Break up dialogue with action.
Four: Vary the use and placement of speech tags (she said/she said).
Five: Give each character a distinct voice (when everyone sounds the same, the reader loses focus and gets confused quickly).
Six: Be aware of pace (in urgent situations, dialogue is quick and frenzied; however, to slow the pace or build suspense, use monologues and longer sections of unspoken narration).
Seven: Read widely (if you don't have the time to read, you don't have the skills to write).
Eight: Test dialogue by reading aloud. Do it with friends if you can. If your dialogue is right, everyone should sound like a different person when speaking their character's lines.
Nine: Avoid excessive slang, stereotypes, and Ah/Erm/Uh/Ummms! (These distract and even alienate 👽 the reader if they can't understand or relate)
Ten: Keep tags simple (it is very tempting to replace 's/he said' with 'he roared, whimpered, gushed, barked, and screeched,' but this is a distraction rather than an aide). Strong dialogue, not excessive tags, will keep the reader engaged.

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"Dialogue is a necessary evil." ~Fred Zinnemann
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"Crazy crisp dialogue. Incredibly tight plotting. Big Emotion." ~Joss Whedon
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"Genuine dialogue, not rhetorical bomb-throwing, leads to progress." ~Mark Udall
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I hope this has cleared up dialogue issues, and inspired your characters to develop their own unique voices.

I want to take a poll, so vote and comment your happiness below using one these emojis to tell me your level of satisfaction:
😁😄😊😐☹️😡

Or use your own! 

PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE TAG AS MANY PEOPLE AS YOU CAN HERE! THERE'S A LOT OF WATTPAD FOLKS WHO NEED THIS!

Thanks for reading!!! For further help, feel free to contact me. Or leave your questions in the comments!!