Hey all! When I write in limited third, I sometimes like to incorporate what a character is thinking at a given moment. Now, especially when they'r econfused or unsure about their feelings, I will do that in the form of questions, like "Was this really the place?". For me it sounds better than "He was not sure if he had arrived at the right adress". But, recently I was told by an editor that writing like this with too many questions is bad style. The scene in particular had 4 of them in the span of 2500 words, so it's not like it was a question every 2 sentences. But still, I wanted to ask: Is this a general consensus that you shouldn't use questions or just a personal thing? I'd like to add that this was for a story written in German, so maybe the conventions differ?
I see. I personally don't mind questions, and I feel like in some instances it's a good way to show the POV isn't sure about what they should think/do. Now, I also got the comment several times, where I didn't use questions in the thoughts and then people be like "Why is he/she so sure about this?" And I'm thinking to myself: He/she's not, but I'm not allowed to use questions! GG
this is where sometimes a bit of telling can solve the problem "jack was unsure if he was in the right place" or dialogue "Is this the right place" Jack said. "Fuck if I know" Jill replied or you might use a thought tag. Am I in the right place, jack thought
I don't mind the occasional question especially if it's needed or adds something but sometimes the question reveals a fault in the surrounding prose and it's not that the question is a fault but the paragraph or pace hasn't been sufficiently written to eliminate the questions.
I've seen advice (don't recall exactly where, possibly on careerauthors.com) to the effect that questions in internal dialogue should be avoided. I suspect they come across as contrived. I myself use them very, very sparingly.
IDK I typically use questions for dialogue only. Extremely rare that I would use them in either 1st or 3rd POV internal thoughts.
You're allowed to ask questions, but here it's kind of like telling vs. showing and is basically just having your character tell the reader what they're feeling. And you can't just have your characters announce how they feel, that makes me feel angry. Try showing them acting uncertain instead and when asking questions maybe try avoiding rhetorical questions and instead use questions the reader has already been given the answer to. This not only boosts reader engagement, but also occasionally gives them an unsolicited hit of dopamine as reward for paying attention (you clever smarty pantses) and can be used to create situations of "Dramatic Irony!!!"™ So instead of saying: Ted pulled up to the driveway. Was this really the place? He was uncertain. Try something like: Ted pulled up to the driveway. He sat there for a minute squinting through the windshield searching for a house number in the glare of the headlights. Six forty three... or maybe it was six forty eight. He paused a moment. Was he looking for a forty eight, or was it a forty three? He re-ran the phone call over in his head. He did that... and that... got the gold... and that... But when it came to the address the only thing he could remember was smugly thinking to himself, "No need to write it down. I'll remember it. I couldn't possibly forget something as important as this." Idiot.
These sort of things can come across a bit jarring and pull the reader out of the narrative. It can feel right when we're writing and like it flows, but I've found that such things should often be removed during the editing process. I'm not saying you should never include something like this, but doing it once can end up having a more dramatic effect than doing it four times.
