Are You Overusing “Said”? #AuthorTips

Recently, I had a discussion with a fellow writer about the word said. “Said is dead,” he told me, arguing that I should not attribute dialogue with said, which he thought to be overdone and outdated. While we agreed we should avoid adverbs in our writing, he felt said was a boring way to show which character was speaking, and suggested I “mix it up” by using other words.

Citing Stephen King’s On Writing, I disagreed, and shared why the word is still useful. It is part of the scaffolding of writing—when we use said, we give readers a cue about who is talking, but we don’t break the flow of reading. Nothing is worse than using a word that pulls your reader out of a story.

It’s easy to see how adverbs can break the flow of reading.

“You’ll never take me alive,” he cried bravely.

There’s a ridiculous amount of drama in that sentence, unless of course, the writing is meant to be tongue-in-cheek. However, you can overdo dialogue attribution even if you are avoiding adverbs. When you use overpowered words, you run the risk of turning dialogue into a soap opera.

“How could you?” he gasped. “I loved you.”
“I know,” she purred, “but I didn’t love you.”

Have I sinned in my own writing? You betcha. I caught my worst sin after a manuscript was published, and had to ask that the book be revised when a new edition was going to be released. The offending word? Coo. My character was raving about a pasta dish, and somehow the dialogue got tagged with the word coo. I don’t know about you, but I have never cooed over carbohydrates. An infant or a puppy, perhaps, but never pasta. I was mortified to see that kind of error in a published novel. The horror! Maybe I hadn’t yet mastered dialogue attribution, but I continue to refine my writing, revising my work with a critical eye.

If you still feel you must deviate from said, you can, to some extent. You can use shouted or whispered, among other words, to show how a person said something. If you show what a character is doing, you can sometimes eliminate dialogue attribution altogether, pairing the dialogue with action:

She cocked the gun and pointed it at the hostage. “Lower your weapon, or I shoot him.”
He placed his revolver on the floor and stood, hands raised to show he wasn’t a threat.
“Now kick it away,” she said.

See? No fancy dialogue attribution required. The first sentence puts the dialogue in context by showing what is happening, providing clues about how something is said.

The third sentence uses said to tag the dialogue without disrupting the flow. Said isn’t dead. Said is a valid way to tag dialogue.

Do you think that said is overused?