One of the ironic twists of being a writer who works alone at a desk making up imaginary things is writing dialogue. You know, a conversation between two or more people when it’s rare you’ve spoken to another person, out loud, about anything interesting for days at a time.

While your real life skills may be rusty or centered on small talk, conversations about the kids, work, and what’s for dinner won’t help when you’re plotting dialogue about murder, betrayal, elemental magic, or taking over the world (although if that’s your dinnertime conversation, I think we need to swap households).

So how do you develop the dialogue skills that will enhance what you’re writing? Simple, you have a lot of imaginary conversations.

Practicing some witty banter while keeping your face neutral and head nods to a discreet minimum takes skill. Not to mention the restraint hand talkers will need to…