Punctuation with Dialogue #2

Question marks and exclamation points are inside quote marks if they are part of the dialogue. If they are not part of the dialogue, they go outside. Simple enough, right?
“Are you coming tonight?”
“Get that straw out of my ear!”

Did she just say, “Go ahead”?
Then he rolled his eyes and said, “Whatever”!
Note how these two are sentences that are only partially made up of dialogue.

The same rule applies to commas and periods only if you are British. In American writing, commas and periods always always always go inside quote marks because it looks rather lame to leave a comma or period hanging outside like that:
The policy is “no exceptions”, which is fine with me. (British)
The police is “no exceptions,” which is fine with me. (American)

Punctuation with Dialogue #1

● The simplest rule is to separate the dialogue tag (“he said”) from the dialogue with a comma:
Joe said, “Let me in.”
“Let me in,” said Joe.

● Complete sentences that go before or after dialogue get a period as normal:
She nodded. “I know.”
“I almost killed you.” Her voice was sharp.
These sentences are not actual dialogue tags but function like them.

● You can combine these types:
“I’m hungry,” I said. “I’d like some more.”

● If you want to interrupt a sentence of dialogue with a sentence of prose, use em-dashes outside the quotes:
“I would like you to know”—he stood up—“that I am not left-handed.”
Even though the action is a complete sentence by itself, it is part of a sentence that includes dialogue, so it isn’t capitalized.

Punctuation: Hyphens

Compound modifiers are adjectives (describing words) that are made up of two or more words:
a 3-year-old child
a full-time job
a well-known person
a better-qualified person.

The compound modifiers are hyphenated because they describe a thing (a noun) that comes right after the description.

If the description comes after the noun, there is no hyphen:

The child is 3 years old.
He works full time.
It is well known.
She is better qualified. 

The exception is the word very and adverbs that end in -ly. These are never hyphenated: a very good time, an easily remembered rule, a continually barking dog.

Hyphens are also used to clear up ambiguity: a small-business owner. This clarifies that it is the business and not the owner that is small.

Suspended hyphenation can be tricky. It goes like this: the 3- and 4-year-old class.

Plurals of Names

As it’s Christmastime, this is a good time to cover the plural of names. Most names you just add s to:
Hammers
Bishops
Butchers
Jacksons
Carpenters

What if your name already ends in an s? Add es:
Williamses
Evanses
Lewises

Then there’s a few other forms:
Valdezes
Rileys

Wrong:
Hammer’s
Bishop’s
Williams’

For practical purposes, it’s probably easier to write “from the Williams family” rather than “from the Williamses.”

Trick to Remember
Plurals are formed by adding s or es. If you don’t sign your name with an apostrophe normally, then it will not ever obtain one. Apostrophes never ever ever make a plural.

Commas: Introductory Phrases

This is a very common use of the comma. It’s easier to learn by examples than technical academic terms:

Having forgotten to buy ingredients, I went out to dinner.
Because it was easier, we stayed in the for night.
At the conclusion of the meeting, we had donuts.

There’s a natural pause where the commas occur, so you’re pretty safe following your gut. If the introduction is followed by a verb (usually some form of is), however, there is no comma.

Walking next to the wagons were children.
Coming straight at him was the baseball.
At the conclusion of the meeting were donuts.

Trick to Remember
Look for the natural pause and you’ll be right most of the time.

Commas: Addressing

This is a very simple comma rule that gets missed a lot. It’s just this:

When you talk to someone, as is common in novels, their name gets a pair of commas surrounding it. It doesn’t have to be a proper (capitalized) name.

Yes, sir, right away.
Dad, can I have some money?
Stop it, Jim.
Hey, bro, help me out here.

This rule is only for direct addresses, as shown above, not for the following examples.

I asked Dad for some money.
I told Jim to stop it.

These are a different type of sentence.

Trick to Remember
If you’re talking to someone, their name gets two commas around it.
Is that helpful? That’s all I got.

Punctuation: Items in a Series and and Oxford Comma

Comma rules tend to overlap or intersect each other. Keep the rules separate and it’s easier to tell where you need a comma. A good rule to start with is the Items-In-A-Series Comma.

Commas are used to separate “items in a series,” which means a list. The lists can be simple or complex. It’s best to look at examples.

I need eggs, butter, cheese, and flour.
This is a simple list of nouns, easy to separate with commas. The first item of the series is eggs.

I need to buy gas, pick up the kids from soccer, make dinner, and pay bills.
Each item in this series is a verb phrase (a phrase that starts with a phrase). The first item is buy gas.

I’m going to print the reports, Dave is running for office, and Jill went home early.
Each item in this series is a complete sentence, but put together like this, it’s not a run-on sentence. The first item in the series is I’m going to print the reports.

The Oxford comma is a matter of debate. This is the comma before the and in a series. The Associated Press style is to not use it. Pretty much everyone else does.

My personal preference is to not use it when the items in a series are one-word items and then use it all other times. So in the above examples, I would omit the Oxford comma in the first sentence and keep it in the rest. But this may be too eccentric for practical use.