"It's an epic essay about dialogue," he said.

"I hope the abundance of 'said' won't interfere," he said.

"Nope," she said. "'Said' is a neutral word, it'll recede into the page. Don't worry about it."

"Oh."

"The only purpose of 'said' is to distinguish who is speaking. Although you never really need to use it unless there is more than two characters in one scene."

"Hey, what's going on?" Asked a cat who just walked in.

"Another thing," she said, "'asked' is very unnecessary in dialog, since the question mark already establishes that the statement is in the form of a question."

"Nothin' much, yo," he replied calmly to the cat.

"Ah, there's another thing. Adverbs don't belong after the person who is speaking," she said. "That will come across as lazy on the part of the writer to the reader."

"Sorry," he said shamefully.

"I was wondering if someone could. . . ." the cat began.

"Actually, if someone is interrupted a dash is used," she said, " you use eclipses when--"

"Okay," he said, "here's what I've got so far:"

"But you promised. . . ." Jill said.
"I told you I'd let you know," Bob said.
"Now, look you two, maybe you should, ah--" Larry said.
"You stay the hell out of this," Jill said.

"How's that?" he asked.

"Uh, actually, you used dashes were you should have used eclipses and vica versa, and you tagged your dialog with 'asked' again," said she, "oops, that should be flipped,"

"God damn it!" he fumed.

"Huh? You can't fume words, nor can you smile them or laugh them or glare them or grimace them," she frowned.

"Alright, I think I got this now. How 'bout this?" He said.

"Where do you think you're going?" my mother said.
"I'm going to church," I said.
"Wait, I'll go with you," she said.

"Well," she said, "I think that can be broken up with 'I told her I was going to church' rather than a quote."

"Daymn."

"That's known as eye dialect," she said, "I wouldn't recommend it."

"um, alright. So, ah--"

"Hey, dialog shouldn't totally emulate real speech," she said.

"F--"

"No language. Especially from you. Linguistic shock is long dead, my friend,"

"Poop."

"Wait a sec," she said, "we never established the setting when this dialog began! How is the reader supposed to imaging this scene?"

They were in the middle of nowhere.

"Better."

"Here goes:

"Hello," they said--"

"Stop." she said. "If people are speaking in unison, you've lost."

"Oh." He said.