Happy birthday!

Subject: Happy birthday!
Author: Lilac Lielac
Posted on: 2012-07-02 22:53:00 UTC

I've heard of David Eddings maybe once, in passing, and I've never read his works, but speech not being clearly marked as someone's drives me up the wall. If it starts out like so:

"Hey Alice," Bob said as he stuck his head into his flatmate's room, "what do you want to eat?"

Alice waved her hand at him without looking up from her book. "Eh, food."

Where not every line has 'said' or a variant preceding/succeeding it but it's obvious because the action tag is relevant to the line of dialogue that shares its paragraph, that's ok, but if it eventually turns into:

"No preferences?"

"Not really."

"So... takeout still ok?"

"If I have to eat one more dinner courtesy of McDonalds' I'm going to puke."

"That is a preference! And anyway, I don't see what's so bad about their stuff."

"No, you wouldn't."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing."

etc etc etc it gets darn aggravating, because I have to check back up to when the dialogue was attributed, then count down every other line to see who's talking now and that knocks me out of the story like WHOA. Is that what you mean, or am I totally off base?

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And I'm Seventeen by SingingTheThunder on 2012-07-02 22:03:00 UTC Reply

And now I can drive and stuff. It's been a surprisingly boring day, got rained on, ate ice cream, watched most of my Game of Thrones box set and brought the first book of the Talmuli by David Eddings (I've read the Elenium). (They're the ones with Sparhawk.)
Anyway, I was wondering if anyone else was a David Eddings fan and if you find having to figure out who is speaking by the context of what they're saying annoying?

Happy Belated Birthday! (nm) by Cyba Zero on 2012-07-04 19:27:00 UTC Reply
Happy belated birthday! (nm) by SeaTurtle on 2012-07-04 02:59:00 UTC Reply
Have a Mark IV K-9! (nm) by Tawaki on 2012-07-03 21:06:00 UTC Reply
Happy Belated! by Antigone68104 on 2012-07-03 19:24:00 UTC Reply

Hope it went well for you.

I enjoy Eddings, but I thought Tamuli seemed a little weak compared to Elenium. I've never really had a problem keeping track of who's saying what.
Happy belated birthday, Thunder! by AnnaBee on 2012-07-03 15:02:00 UTC Reply

Many happy returns. Have a miniature, lilac-colored lobster.
Happy Birthday! by OpinionedAngel on 2012-07-03 13:37:00 UTC Reply

Here, have a triple chocolate cupcake (chocolate with chocolate icing and chocolate chips)!
Happy birthday! by Cassie on 2012-07-03 10:23:00 UTC Reply

Have a sack of pebbles, a sling, and a basket of Bleeprin-berries. :D

Oh man, David Eddings~ He's one of my favourite writers - I got another PPCer into his stuff recently and she's got hooked. Blitzed her way through the Garion books and she's finishing up the Elenium now.

I find figuring out who's speaking isn't especially hard, but then I've read and re-read these books for years and have worked it out already, so my bran just reminds me who's speaking. Or maybe it's part having worked it out, part recognising the characters' personal verbal idosyncracies. Or something like that.

*muffles self before a full-blown Eddings-fantalk can ensue*
Happy Birthday! by TheMadHatteress on 2012-07-03 03:55:00 UTC Reply

Have a very ostentatious birthday hat for your special day! I can't say I've ever heard of David Eddings; is he good?

Eddings by SingingTheThunder on 2012-07-03 19:08:00 UTC Reply

Thanks for the hat. *Puts it on at a jaunty angle and it promptly falls off again*
Eddings is reasonably good. His stories are pretty formula, but have attractions such as witty banter and reasonably interesting variants on generic characters. I prefer the Elenium to the Belgariad and don't really like The Dreamers, mostly due to a lot of very literal Deus Ex Machina.

Happy Happy Birthday! by ThatOne on 2012-07-03 03:47:00 UTC Reply

And no, I've never read anything by David Eddings. What genre does he write?

David Eddings writes... by Cassie on 2012-07-03 10:34:00 UTC Reply

what's sometimes known as high fantasy; knights in shining armour, chivalry, magic of various sorts, and a hero who has to save the world with his motley companions.

His books' fans tend to like them because the story is an easily recognisable one, the character archetypes are so strong they're almost parodies, and there is a lot of banter. Snarking it up is almost a prerequisite for an Eddings character, and even after ten years of re-reading his stuff it gets giggles out of me. :D

His fantasy books start with The Belgariad (five-book series) and The Malloreon (also five-book series) focusing on a boy called Garion who has a Destiny. There are two prequels, Belgarath the Sorcerer and Polgara the Sorceress, focusing on two of the other central figures in the series. Best to read the main books before you read them, though, as there are a lot of references to things from the main books.

The second lot of books focus on a knight named Sparhawk; they are two sets of three-book series, The Elenium and The Tamuli.

There is also a standalone book named The Redemption of Althalus, about the unusual life of a thief named Althalus (surprise :P ).

I personally recommend them; the Garion books get off to a slow start, but they're no less enjoyable for that.

[[[UNPARSABLE SUBJECT LINE]]] by Cassie on 2012-07-03 10:35:00 UTC Reply

Argh, I had to go and bugger up the coding somewhere, didn't I?

Happy birthday! by HerrWozzeck on 2012-07-03 01:52:00 UTC Reply

Here, have Happy Birthday as played on a musical saw:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbkN4kmehjY&feature=related
Happy birthday (nm) by StarShadow on 2012-07-02 23:47:00 UTC Reply
Happy birthday! by Lilac Lielac on 2012-07-02 22:53:00 UTC Reply

I've heard of David Eddings maybe once, in passing, and I've never read his works, but speech not being clearly marked as someone's drives me up the wall. If it starts out like so:

"Hey Alice," Bob said as he stuck his head into his flatmate's room, "what do you want to eat?"

Alice waved her hand at him without looking up from her book. "Eh, food."

Where not every line has 'said' or a variant preceding/succeeding it but it's obvious because the action tag is relevant to the line of dialogue that shares its paragraph, that's ok, but if it eventually turns into:

"No preferences?"

"Not really."

"So... takeout still ok?"

"If I have to eat one more dinner courtesy of McDonalds' I'm going to puke."

"That is a preference! And anyway, I don't see what's so bad about their stuff."

"No, you wouldn't."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Nothing."

etc etc etc it gets darn aggravating, because I have to check back up to when the dialogue was attributed, then count down every other line to see who's talking now and that knocks me out of the story like WHOA. Is that what you mean, or am I totally off base?

Re: Happy birthday! by SingingTheThunder on 2012-07-03 19:04:00 UTC Reply

Some bits can get like that, but mostly it's possible to work it out. So one character will be arguing a very different point of view to the other, the only times I've gotten confused was when I wasn't paying enough attention.

Aaah. by Lilac Lielac on 2012-07-03 19:10:00 UTC Reply

Yeah, when it's back-and-forth arguing it's not really too hard to figure out. I still think of it as... maybe a bit lazy? Not adding in some action tags to show what the characters are doing, that is. Even if you can tell who's talking it turns into talking heads and then faceless voices after a while, that's part of the problem.

Eddings by SingingTheThunder on 2012-07-03 19:24:00 UTC Reply

Typically what the characters are doing is riding along a road and engaging in banter or exposition. Pretty much the only thing someone is likely to do is move slightly in a saddle.

Re: Eddings by Lilac Lielac on 2012-07-03 19:45:00 UTC Reply

Eh. What's their facial expression, tone of voice, body language that can be expressed without confusing the horse? What's their horse doing while the characters talk? What's around them that catches their eye? Maybe this is down to personal taste because I know I avoid writing too many lines of pure dialogue without action just because I don't like to read it, but (speaking as someone who's only seen movies wherein people ride horses) there are a lot of things people can do and notice while talking to someone and also on a moving horse, and I think there are too many to allow more than a couple (herein meant 2-3, 4 is pushing it) lines of dialogue-only paragraphs before an action breaks up the chatter.

Re: Eddings by SingingTheThunder on 2012-07-03 19:50:00 UTC Reply

I agree, but I have a problem with using words like said. Normally, I describe an action, then have speech.
For example:
Alice turned smiling. "I wasn't expecting you back so soon, Bob."
Bob steps forward and drops a bag on the floor. "I didn't think it was that early."

This is probably a Bad Habit.

Re: Eddings by Lilac Lielac on 2012-07-03 19:56:00 UTC Reply

Nooo, no no no, that is an excellent thing. Certainly better than abusing the various 'said' replacements. Using a mix of '"I don't love you anymore," Alice said.' and 'Bob dropped his mug of fresh coffee in shock. "What?"' is best for variety, as is putting the tags both before and after the dialogue, but when I said 'action tags' I meant the things like what you do there and like what I had my Bob doing in this latest example.

Re: Eddings by SingingTheThunder on 2012-07-03 21:37:00 UTC Reply

What I meant was I don't used speech tags at all. None of my characters whisper, mutter, exclaim, babble, yell or even say.

Re: Eddings by Lilac Lielac on 2012-07-03 21:43:00 UTC Reply

Mmmm. Then that's something that you can work on, of course! I hear practice makes perfect, but it's a cliche proverb so I'm not entirely certain of its reliability.

Re: Eddings by SingingTheThunder on 2012-07-03 22:01:00 UTC Reply

I've started going back through my work and adding speech tabs. It's surprising how often you need them.
It's probably a good sign I've picked up that I do this, it's the things I don't know about that are the problem.

Re: Eddings by Lilac Lielac on 2012-07-03 22:11:00 UTC Reply

Well yeah. What's that line again... oh, right, "admitting you have a problem is the first step". You can't improve until you acknowledge you need to.

Addendum by Lilac Lielac on 2012-07-02 22:58:00 UTC Reply

It's also a bit shoddy, I think, to not have action tags.

Looking at that second excerpt I have an urge to add action tags... probably Alice snaps the book shut before the line about McDonalds' dinners, and there's a rolling of the eyes when she says 'nothing'... oh, and disbelief from Bob pretty much the whole way through, he's definitely surprised that Alice isn't making her choices known right off the bat.

Dammit, now you've got me interested in these two. They were only supposed to be an example...!