Watch Your Language: Does Adding Slang to Your Novel Slay?
by Elizabeth Solar
Language is a fluid, living thing that changes with the times. Feeling groovy in 2025? Not so much. Grody to the max? As if.
Using colloquialisms in your WIP can be risky business. Drop in a tired, outdated phrase, and you risk losing credibility with readers. Just chill is out. Next level and That’s what she said? Way out. Amazeballs? How did that even enter the lexicon?
Words, like fashion and music, go in and out of style. Some sound dated; others are downright grating. (Synergy, vibe curator, wassup: I’m looking at you.)
Several famous novelists have warned against leaning too heavily on slang. Hemingway advised limiting it to dialogue, and even there, sparingly, because it tends to ‘go sour in a short time.’ Orwell favored clear, precise language and avoided clichés altogether. I agree, unless they came from the mouth of a folksy or ‘colorful’ character. In narrating a story, try to avoid cliches at all costs.
That said, you can’t argue with Mark Twain’s regional slang in Huckleberry Finn, Dennis Lehane’s gritty Boston Street talk, or Alice Walker’s indelible voice for Celie in The Color Purple. Used judiciously, slang, and regional or cultural/ethnic phrases, can bring authenticity, ethos, and a vivid sense of time and place.
My novel spans two decades. Cultural, political, and entertainment references, fashion, and yes, slang, all shift with the years. Technology changes even faster. Characters in my story who once searched for pay phones would now scroll on their smartphones. Women who once ‘shut the F up’ in disgrace, losing jobs and standing, have since their #MeToo stories. Come to think of it, even the phrase #MeToo has been voted off the island. Linguistic and cultural shifts aren’t just background: they’re the story of how people, and the language they use, evolve.
Slang can slay; or it can date your novel faster than a Myspace profile. if used with intention and in service to your story, the right words in the right character’s mouth create a world worth visiting. Used carelessly, they’ll limit your story to the shelf life of low-hanging fruit past its expiration date.
