Author’s Note:
-I know it’s a lot of dialogue. If there’s a way to help it, please let me know! Any other suggestions are appreciated. And please remember the man is nameless and faceless for effect and so I am not accused of libel.
“Tell me about your youth,” the interrogator asked, leaning forward. “Just give me the archetype. Two brush strokes of imagination.” He laced his fingers together, then flattening his hands onto the table.
“Well, I was born and raised in a classic, middle-class American suburb. My mom worked part time as a secretary at my school while my dad worked as a manager of a branch of a store.”
The interrogator scribbled down the man’s words. As soon as he finished, he asked, “Did you have any siblings?”
“A sister,” he said, shuffling his legs. “Two years older than me.”
The interrogator looked at him, ready to write. “How was your relationship?”
“We were close up until I left for college,” he said. “I went into politics at Yale and she went into social justice at Har-vaard.” He smirked. “I applied to Har-vaard, but my SAT scores weren’t good enough. My sister’s though, were.” He shook his head; his smirk melted into a frown. “I could never get over not getting in, knowing that she did. I tried, but it just never worked. She never criticized me; in fact, she was happy for me. But I never was.”
The interrogator again hastily wrote his words on the paper. Once he finished, he cracked his knuckles before asking, “How did your parents feel about your different career paths?”
“My parents supported both of us, though my dad was always more supportive of me. He didn’t understand why someone as brilliant as my sister went into social justice.” He looked at the ceiling, then back at the interrogator. “To tell you the truth, I don’t even know!”
The interrogator finished writing, nodding with interest. “At Yale, who did people see you as?”
“I was one of those well-rounded bastards. I did everything.” He shuffled his legs. “I was always looking for some new field to do something in. To win them over.” Pause. “I always wanted to be a leader, no matter where I was. I liked the power of that.”
The interrogator began to laugh. The man’s eyebrows furrowed. “Winning people over was just a value I grew up with. My mom didn’t wanted to be respected at the office, and my dad wanted customers to keep coming in. My sister wasn’t too into that, though. She always just wanted to be respectful of other people.”
The interrogator’s laugh grew, echoing in the room. “So were you taking monetary bribes at the lunch table from the budding businessmen? That must have been good experience to have!” The interrogator’s laugh faded, and instead he looked with melancholy at his papers. “Of course you weren’t until you met Turtle-face,” the interrogator replied, flashing his teeth. “That’s when things got ugly.”
Comments
Hi Kitty. This is exciting, gripping reading. You manage the suspense brilliantly and I look forward to more. I am usually a harsh critic of people using dialogue. I do not profess to understand the "laws" relating to it. I have just finished reading Fyodor Dostoyevsky's "The Idiot" and he uses huge amounts of dialogue. It is a brilliant book. I think why his use works and the same applies to the piece above - it doesn't read like a play script. The dialogue is adding to the narrative, rather than distracting from it. I am no expert and have not formal training in this area, so I will leave it to those more qualified than me to comment. I do enjoy your writing style - it has real talent and keep at it.
'His smirk melted into a frown' is fabulous. Some of your word crafting is excellent and your description is gripping. Keep it coming. Your dialogue is actually working well. You break it up with description of what people are doing, how one man in reacting to the other which is why it works. You also avoid either making speeches and that's also very good.
I would make a couple of suggestions to increase the atmosphere. Try describing the room, the two men- what do they look like, what are they wearing? We have some of this with knuckles cracking and so on but you could ramp up the menace in one and the attitude of the other. You give a bit of detail about the lighting....i would have more of a play with that....what kinds of shadows is it casting for example? That will build atmosphere.
I'm not too sure how the interrogated man is reacting or behaving or even what his attitude is. He tells us he didn't get into his sister's school and that suggests he is resentful of her for that. You capture that in the tone of his speech. Perhaps you could also play around with his body language and describe that as he tells the interrogator. He could, if you wanted, exhibit contradictory body language which would really increase the tension.
Who do you want the reader to empathise with?
It's excellent writing Kitty and these are just suggestions. I leave it with you. I look forward to the next instalment.