Something has gone missing from Writer's Resources

[Eldridge]

I am not 100% sure who actually wrote the article (I think it was Whispersecret?), and what it was called, but it showed total clutzes like me how to do proper punctuation and such. It was probably the most valuable article ever written (perhaps slightly exxagerated..)!
It even gave those helpful little "try these yourself and see how you do" test sentences.

However, I have looked upside down sideways and under throughout the whole Writer's Resources section, and the article just isn't there anymore

And ofcourse, right now is when I needed to find something...

Does anyone know what happened to this article? Do articles fade out over time from the Writer's Resources section?

Perhaps I can ask my question here... In my story I'm writing about this guy answering a phone, and showing some of his dialogue in talking to the person on the other end of the phone.

Now, I know that if one person speaks in one paragraph, and if he continues on in the next paragraph, you do not end the first paragraph with quotes. (right?)

However, would that still be valid here in this case? The reason I'm wondering is because he is not, strictly speaking, talking all by himself. He is actually having a conversation with someone else, it's just that the reader doesn't see the other part of the conversation. Does that make a difference?

Just because I'm sure I'm not making any sense at all, here's the few lines of text that are confusing me.

Any help would be GREATLY appreciated, and please forgive my forwardness in just putting this up and asking for help...

-----
Ken laughed as he got up, ignoring her vengeful glares and her unspoken promise of revenge. He walked to the telephone and answered it.

“This is Ken…Hey Bobby, what’s up?” Ken said into the receiver, grinning as he watched Lisa scramble herself into an upright position, giving him a very appealing view of her tight ass as it moved around.

“What?!” He said loudly, frowning as he listened to the voice on the other side of the line.

“Ten o’clock? You guys had said eleven! Fuck, alright, yeah I’ll be there…

“Yeah don’t worry, I’ll jump into my car and be there in ten minutes. Just be sure that they wait for me!” Ken yelled at the phone as he disconnected it, then turned towards the naked goddess sitting on his bed.


------

As you can probably see, my question would be the sentence where it says "Ten o'clock?" etc.
Does this sentence need to end with quotes at the end, or is it good the way it is?

(there are more sentences like these where I'm confused about it, but they are basically similar to these ones, so once I get this one sorted out I should be able to figure the other ones out too.)

Thanks very very much in advance for any help you can give me

Eldridge.

 

[wildsweetone]

in my opinion

i'd write it like this...

***
Ken laughed as he got up, ignoring her vengeful glares and her unspoken promise of revenge. He walked to the telephone and answered it.

“This is Ken…Hey Bobby, what’s up?” Ken said into the receiver, grinning as he watched Lisa scramble herself into an upright position, giving him a very appealing view of her tight ass as it moved around.

“What?!” He said loudly, frowning as he listened to the voice on the other side of the line. “Ten o’clock? You guys had said eleven! Fuck, alright, yeah I’ll be there… Yeah don’t worry, I’ll jump into my car and be there in ten minutes. Just be sure that they wait for me!” Ken yelled at the phone as he disconnected it, then turned towards the naked goddess sitting on his bed.

***

now for my incredible lack of knowledge of theory, here's why i think it should be like this...

because it's the same person talking. the dialogue is merely a continuation of a single speech.

it would be different if Lisa interjected, or if the narrator squeezed in a little along the lines that Lisa had moved again.

 

[Madame Manga]

Since the lonely line of dialog is a one-sentence paragraph, and since the next PP is also short, putting them together as a single PP as WSO suggests is a good idea, IMO. The ellipsis (...) tells the reader that he is pausing to listen to the person on the other end of the line, but in this case it's only a momentary pause and doesn't really call for a new PP.

I tend to avoid open quotes when possible. They are ambiguous for the reader, IMO. The only time that breaking up one speech into separate PPs makes sense to me is when it's a very long speech, or some significant action interrupts or otherwise butts into the talk. If someone is telling a rambling story or making an extended rant and only pauses for breath, then of course you leave the quotes open at the breaks.

The only correction I'd make:

“What?!” he said loudly, frowning as he listened to the voice on the other side of the line.

Don't capitalize "he"; this is all one sentence even though "What?!" has closing punctuation. And BTW, combining "?" and "!" is not necessary here; you tell us he said it loudly, so leave off the exclamation point. (Of course, it's not formally correct to use double punctuation, but sometimes it's good for comic emphasis, I think!)

MM

 

[KillerMuffin]

You'll love this place:

http://webster.commnet.edu/grammar/index.htm

 

[Eldridge]

Thanks for all the great advice everyone!

Eldridge.

 

[BigTexan]

Okay, I'll try my hand at it. Just to give you another, probably worse, way of writing it.

-----
Ken laughed as he got up, ignoring her vengeful glares and her unspoken promise of revenge. He walked to the telephone and answered it.

“This is Ken…Hey Bobby, what’s up?” Ken said into the receiver, grinning as he watched Lisa scramble herself into an upright position, giving him a very appealing view of her tight ass as it moved around.

“What?!” He said loudly, frowning as he listened to the voice on the other side of the line.

“Ten o’clock? You guys had said eleven! Fuck, alright, yeah I’ll be there…

“Yeah don’t worry, I’ll jump into my car and be there in ten minutes. Just be sure that they wait for me!” Ken yelled at the phone as he disconnected it, then turned towards the naked goddess sitting on his bed.

------

Ken laughed as he got up. Ignoring her vengeful glares and her unspoken promise of revenge, he walked to the telephone and answered it.

“This is Ken. Hey Bobby, what’s up?” A wolfish grin spread across his face as he watched Lisa scramble herself into an upright position, giving him a very appealing view of her tight ass as it moved around.

“What?” He frowned as his attention snapped back to the phone.

“Ten o’clock? You guys had said eleven! Fuck, alright, yeah I’ll be there. Yeah don’t worry, I’ll jump into my car and be there in ten minutes. Just be sure that they wait for me!” Turning towards the naked goddess sitting on his bed he ...

---

What I have done is elliminate most of your speach tags and especially your speach tag modifiers. I hate them! "he said loudly" I can tell from the dialog that he said it loudly, or at least with energy. I also tweaked your sentences so that there was a little more variety in sentence length and structure. Me, I need variety to keep my interest.

Anyways, it's worth what you paid for it.

BigTexan

 

[Madame Manga]

You know, I had a dim thought about discussing speech tags and modifying adverbs in this excerpt (as in, don't use them except when utterly necessary) but for some reason, when I am in "grammar editing" mode, I leave "stylistic editing" by the wayside. You covered that part very well, BT.

This applies to editing my own work as well as other people's. I have to go through it twice, once in each mode, if I want to cover all bases. Maybe it's a left-brain, right-brain conflict. The grammar is all rules and logic-based, and the stylistic questions are purely aesthetic...or something like that. ;-)

Anyone else have that problem, if it is a problem?

MM

 

[TheEarl]

Eldridge: Try looking in the How To section. All of the Writer's Resources are in the How To section, but not all of the How To section is in the Writer's Resources.

Anyway, this is how I'd write that. Grammatically at least.

Ken laughed as he got up, ignoring her vengeful glares and her unspoken promise of revenge. He walked to the telephone and answered it.

“This is Ken. Hey Bobby, what’s up?” Ken said into the receiver, grinning as he watched Lisa scramble herself into an upright position, giving him a very appealing view of her tight ass as it moved around.

“What?” He said loudly, frowning as he listened to the voice on the other side of the line. “Ten o’clock? You guys had said eleven! Fuck, alright, yeah I’ll be there… Yeah don’t worry, I’ll jump into my car and be there in ten minutes. Just be sure that they wait for me!” Ken yelled at the phone as he disconnected it, then turned towards the naked goddess sitting on his bed.

I've removed the ellipsis as IMO ellipses should only be used for broken speech or thoughts or unfinished speech or thoughts. A pause should only be a full stop unless it's a really long pause, signifying a trailing off of thoughts.

Also IMO, You should never use more than one punctuation mark. The "What" is either excalmation or question; I think it's a bit comic book to use both. The "said loudly" shows the shout anyway, so the exclamation mark is superfluous. However this is just IMO, many people do this without a qualm.

I think that Ken's speech should be in two parts rather than four. The way you wrote it originally is grammatically correct (If someone is speaking and then continues speaking in the next para with nothing in between then the speech-mark is not necessary, although you can put it in if you want), but I see his speech in two sections. The first one is separated from the second by his admiration of her arse (good sentence btw), but the rest of it is all one thought IMO. However the key word is opinion, so feel free to ignore mine.

The Earl

 

[Eldridge]

BigTexan and TheEarl, thanks very much for both your inputs, they are very much appreciated, and have been worked into the section (and quite a few others I might add).

Thanks for sharing some of your thoughts and 'tricks of the trade' so to speak.

Eldridge.

 

[Whispersecret]

Eldridge, here's my article called "How To Make Your Characters Talk"

I skimmed over your passage. What stood out to me is that you have the tag and then an additional phrase tacked on.

Ken said into the receiver, grinning...

He said loudly, frowning...

Ken yelled at the phone as he...

This felt too repetitively rhythmic to me. I suggest that you vary your sentence structure.

If the same character talks over multi-paragraphs, but DOES something in between, you close the quotes.

I hope this helps. Oh, and thanks so much for the compliment about the article.