How do you show someone has butted in?

Amberly · Jan 8, 2012

hi all,

In my wip i have a teenage mc and at a few points there are arguments and people butting into or cutting off other people's sentences.

Here's how i have punctuated it, is this right?

[FONT=&quot]His keys click in the lock then he hesitates. “Are you going to move?” [/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] Toying with him I climb slowly to my feet. “That depends –”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “No.”[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot] “But, I didn’t –”[/FONT]

And when someone butts back in i start their sentence with a dash. This example's not in my wip, just and ie. I do this so i don't have to use a lot of dialogue tags but hopefully you can tell where the sentence is beginning and ending.

"Amber can you please - "
"What are you doing here?" Jack butts in.
"- get me a drink?"

Thanks for the help guys

KatieJ · Jan 8, 2012

I think this works the way you've written it. My rule of thumb is if someone gets interrupted it's shown by a dash, if they trail off it's an ellipsis (...)

The reason I brought up the trailing off is that your first example seems more like it should be [FONT=&quot]“That depends... ” Maybe because you say "climb slowly to my feet" just before the dialogue.

Just my two cents!

[/FONT]

Brutal Mustang · Jan 8, 2012

I second KatieJ.

Susan Coffin · Jan 8, 2012

Katie has it down.

Amberly · Jan 8, 2012

hmm, thanks that's a good point

cheers

Fallen · Jan 9, 2012

Because 'that depends' is quite frequently used as trailer "Well, that depends...", it's natural that it feels awkward when seen as broken dialogue. But as it's the dialogue that's broken by interruption, it's not wrong.

Maybe if you took it a little farther:

'That depends on--'
'No.'
'But, I didn't--'
'What?'

Can I ask as well about your spacing of the Em Dash. Is that the usual presentation your end (with the spaces)?

Both American and British American usage have no space with interruptions (British does with parethetical usage, American doesn't). But that's not saying that you do, just curious.

absitinvidia · Jan 9, 2012

Just make sure you're using an em dash (two hyphens) rather than an en dash (space hyphen space, which is what it looks like you're using in your original post).

Architectus · Jan 12, 2012

Fallen has it done properly, no spaces on either side of the em-dash, unless you write a screenplay, then there is a space on both sides.

How do you show someone has butted in?

Amberly

KatieJ

I think I'm back....

Brutal Mustang

Loves interplanetary chaos.

Susan Coffin

Tell it like it Is

Amberly

Fallen

Stood at the coalface

absitinvidia

A bit of a wallflower

Architectus