In writing, dialogue should do one, if not all, of the following:
1. Reveal the characters’ relationships with one another.
2. Move the story forward.
3. Increase tension.
Regarding how to write dialogue properly:
1. Use quotation marks around the words which the character says:
“It’s sure cold out here, “ Mark said.
2. Begin a new paragraph each time a different person speaks – this can help to cut down on the number of dialogue tags required.
Remember to indent the beginning of each dialogue paragraph, just as you would in any other type of writing.
3. Only the exact words of a person are in quotation marks. Also, when splitting a quotation with a dialogue tag, do not capitalize words which do not begin new sentences.
4. When several sentences are quoted together to form a paragraph, put just one set of quotation marks around the whole quotation. (except for dialogue tags).
5. Periods and commas are always placed inside the quotation marks.
6. An exclamation point (!) or a question mark (?) is placed inside the quotation marks when it punctuates a quotation, but outside the quotation when it punctuates the main sentence.
