Text messages in story?

[SexyGeek]

I am editing a story which has a trucker using text messages extensively.

How should they be indicated?

Regular quotes?

Dispatch texted me, "Lay over in Dallas."

Underlined?

Dispatch texted me:
lay over in Dallas

Italics?
Disptach texted me: lay over in Dallas

Capitalization and punctuation or not?

Suggestions?

 

[tanyachrs]

When I wite texts, they're usually one liners and I write them like dialogue. "I want you," she texted. Or inline, like this:
I looked at the text that popped up on my screen: I want you.

What I've seen in published novels where the text goes back and forth a few times is tagless italics.

 

[lovecraft68]

I use html on mine so they show up in italics on lit. I do that with texts and sometimes e-mails or letters, anything the character is reading

I outsmarted myself in my V-day contest entry there was role playing involved on line and I had to go through the tedious issue of a ton of HTML. That's what I get for being "clever"

 

[Setanta84]

I think it would be more interesting to focus on the character's reaction to the texts than the texts themselves. The texts themselves are rarely interesting to the reader and dispensable.

Think of how to write something like walking to a window, for example. Bad writers think detail is everything and will cover every step of that journey in an attempt to paint a picture with words. Do you really want to read that?

 

[sr71plt]

I've put them in italics (and the question was how to render them, not whether to use them).

 

[PennLady]

What I've seen in published novels where the text goes back and forth a few times is tagless italics.

I've used that myself a couple of times, and I find it's easiest, for me at least.

 

[grumpyg]

I use html on mine so they show up in italics on lit. I do that with texts and sometimes e-mails or letters, anything the character is reading

I outsmarted myself in my V-day contest entry there was role playing involved on line and I had to go through the tedious issue of a ton of HTML. That's what I get for being "clever"

Can you use HTML and send the story as a text file? If I want italics/ bold I usually send it as a Word .doc . I've used HTML occasionally, but any info/ link how to use it for Literotica would be really helpful.

 

[PennLady]

Can you use HTML and send the story as a text file? If I want italics/ bold I usually send it as a Word .doc . I've used HTML occasionally, but any info/ link how to use it for Literotica would be really helpful.

You cut and paste a word document into the box on the submission page, I do this when I submit stories. To get italics or anything else, I insert the HTML code as I go along. For example I would type:

Tom stared at the faces in front of him. <i>Get me out of here,</i> he thought.

if I wanted to see this:

Tom stared at the faces in front of him. Get me out of here, he thought.

 

[sr71plt]

That's what I do to. It's always worked.

 

[lovecraft68]

If you do this, especially if you're doing a lot of it, make sure once you paste your story into the box you hit review and look closely at the story if you miss a "shut off" you will get a long running section of italics.

 

[sr71plt]

When you cut and paste into the text box, your only next option is "Preview." Then, yes, do preview before the option of "Submit" comes up.

 

[lovecraft68]

When you cut and paste into the text box, your only next option is "Preview." Then, yes, do preview before the option of "Submit" comes up.

Right, preview...that's what I meant.

My contest story had three misses in it and was a bitch to go back line by line and find them, but better that than half the story being that way.

 

[grumpyg]

You cut and paste a word document into the box on the submission page, I do this when I submit stories. To get italics or anything else, I insert the HTML code as I go along. For example I would type:

Tom stared at the faces in front of him. <i>Get me out of here,</i> he thought.

if I wanted to see this:

Tom stared at the faces in front of him. Get me out of here, he thought.

Thanks, I'll give that a try.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Another vote for italics.

 

[masterandmargarita]

I've never done back and forth texts, just a single one at a time, so I just write them into the sentence:

Her phone vibrated with a text from John: <i>Want some dick?</i>

Italics in html work great for the story in a browser, the Lit app, however is a different story. All of my html formatting is stripped from the stories in the Lit app, I'll have to investigate how to format for the app, but that is a different thread.