Writing--An Evolving Craft Is Still Subjective

My critique partner and I talk about writing and what we like and don't like about particular techniques. Not too long ago we were discussing dialogue in general and tag lines (attribution) specifically. We noticed that more and more writers are omitting "he said/she said" and using either action, body language, or the POV character's thoughts in place of an attribution tag. Jeanmarie and I prefer this method. I believe the story flows better and is more natural, pulling the reader into the scene. That's why I was surprised when a couple of writer friends mentioned they don't like this method. They believe "he said/she said" is invisible to the reader and prefer pared down scenes with as little description as possible--and don't care to read body language at all. Another multi-published friend mentioned that action such as "she nodded," "he shrugged" annoys her. She prefers an adverb such as "she said menacingly," but tag lines like that annoy me.

Writing for publication constantly changes and evolves. Spelling changes, comma use decreases, and so forth. Keeping up requires study and flexibility. It appears that no matter how much a writer studies craft and technique, personal likes and dislikes shape his or her writing. Even though being a writer changes the way a person reads for pleasure, each of us was a reader before he or she became a writer. What an author enjoys reading shapes his/her perception of how he/she should write. Keep reading good books!