I'm working on a story and part of the dialogue between characters is via text message in a group chat. My question is: what is the best way to format texts within prose? Right now I just have the character's name next to the text in a different font to separate it visually and also clue in the sender, but it seems a bit clunky and out of place. Any tips?
That's how I do it. Though I'm writing Gaslamp Fantasy... so it's letters and not text messages. I use a different font, center-justify, and double-space the passage from the exposition or dialogue.
I actually just write it as if it were a normal conversation. I don't see a point in drawing a big distinction between that and any other conversation, because the medium is so ubiquitous in that case as to be irrelevant. The only difference would be that a conversation in text messages would be rendered without any description of what the second party is doing, since the first party can't actually see it. Maybe I could see a chat room being a different situation, since there could be more than two people involved? But I doubt I'd go out of my way to render it differently.
I've always formatted it exactly like dialog: "Hey," she typed. Then a winky face. Always a winky face. The three dots appeared below her message. She waited. The dots went away. Nothing. She stared. What was he waiting for? What didn't he want to send? She held her breath. The reply came back. "What's up?"
