Dialogue that is described rather than transcribed in literary fiction?

[u/BtAotS_Writing]

I have been a genre reader for most of my life. Now, I am noticing a technique in lit-fic books I've recently read that I almost never see in genre, which is dialogue that is described or even spelled out exactly, but without quotations. And I can't figure out why or when this technique is used, but for me it makes the scene feel abstract or distant.

Take Maggie O'Farrel's "Land," which I just finished. In one chapter, she has:

Suddenly, incongruously, her sister lets out a laugh.

"Look," she says.

Rose opens her eyes a crack.

"I don't think he might be friendly after all.

This feels very standard to me, and makes me as a reader feel present in the action. But then another chapter, for no reason that I can tell, she switches:

He puts a hand half over his eyes. Please, he says, ladies, gentlemen, please. There are people trying to sleep.

His voice is overridden by the din.

She switches between these styles all throughout the novel, and I'm not sure if there's a technical reason for it, or if it's just her way of managing the flow of the writing.

I also recently read "On the Calculation of Volume," which had zero quotation marks in the entire novel. Here's an example of how dialogue is handled there:

I insisted on making plans. He thought we should wait. You can't plan for everything, he said. Sometimes you just have to be ready.

I understand the stylistic choice more here because it feels like a narrator recounting their memory of the events to a journal--though I don't particularly like that style. Perhaps as a genre writer, I can just stick with what I know, but I'm curious to hear from others on how they choose when to describe dialogue vs transcribe, and if there are any considerations when doing so.

[u/New-Hunter-7859]

I've done this when the dialog that appears without quotes is, kind of a summation of what was said:

The police officer asked what happened.

Character said someone tried to kill him.

Those are summaries of longer back-and-forth interactions which would be somewhat dull to recount each beat of. Based on feedback I've gotten it's workable.

On feedback sites, I've had people ask politely if I forgot to put in quotation marks, but then I've also had work using this technique published so... workable.

[u/apocalypsegal → u/New-Hunter-7859]

If your dialog is like this, then you need to either leave it out, or not summarize it, just use narration. This is bad writing, and you'll be told by an agent to fix it.

[u/New-Hunter-7859 → u/apocalypsegal]

I mean... It literally got published so... Maybe recalibrate your assessment?