The Writer Will Take Your Questions Now #346 -- Internal Monologue

How do you folks handle internal monologues? Any tips? 

That's a great question. And it's a standard that has changed over the years in the publishing business.

My preferred method is to make it as invisible as possible, such as:

Everyone laughed at Susan. She was never going to trust these people again. No way.

If I do first person internal monologue then I use italics, but I try to avoid that. It seems visually jarring to me, as below:

Everyone laughed at Susan. No way I am never going to trust these people again.

And my least favorite (though I'm guilty of it from time to time) is the "it seemed to Susan that.." or "Susan realized that..." These seem to draw the most attention to the mechanics of the writer, at least to me, as in:

Everyone laughed at Susan. She released she would never trust these people again. No way, she thought.

As with any kind of writing technique, I prefer the one that interferes with the story the least, and draws a little attention to the writer as possible to pull readers out of the adventure itself.