"Telling It Slant" Exercise
(2022/05/02)
The goal of this exercise is to tell a story and present two characters through dialogue alone. Write a page, or two — word count would be misleading — of pure dialogue. Only use the character's names (or A or B if you haven't decided yet). No stage directions. No character descriptions. Nothing but what A says and B says. Everything the reader needs to know about who they are, what they care about, and what's going on in the scene comes through what they say to each other. Ideally, there should be some sort of disagreement, tension, or crisis going on. If you need a suggestion, think of a two people in a crisis situation: the car just ran out of gas; the spaceship is about to crash; the doctor has just realized the old man she is treating for a heart attack is her father, etc...