My biggest problem in my book is character speech and sounds. It is primarily a travel book that focuses on several areas in the world such as India, Nepal, Malaysia etc etc. What I'm struggling to do is recreate the way people from these cultures spoke to the main character in their own pronunciation of English. I have no problem finding the required words when they speak in their own language but when they speak to the character in broken English I want it to be convincing. I am having particular problems with the area of Kashmir. I have actually emailed Kashmiri linguistic websites to gain some insight but thus far no response. I have in large parts done a Hemmingway and limited the conversation but this is not enough. Any suggestions....?
Are you really sure you need this? Having read David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas, I now have a policy of scanning through a book for pages of ridiculously difficult to read dialect before I buy. Most readers don't want to read an accent and my advice would be even when it's necessary it should be watered down as far as possible to just a few differences of expression and awkward phrases. Otherwise readers will skip ahead. Having never done that in my life before, the central section of Cloud Atlas suffered exactly that fate when I read it. Difficult to read eventually becomes dull.
it might sound strange. But have you tried searching YouTube for Kashmiri for examples of people speaking in Kashmiri dialect? It may help to take you back to when you visited to jog your memory?
I can't really offer any other advice. The most I've tried at the minute is writing the dialect from someone from Scotland or Yorkshire.
Posted this glad am I.
Now all I need is someone who speaks Kashmiri and I'm away!