Book Chat: Finding Your Writer’s Voice

Welcome to a new Book Chat on the Dunham Literary Blog! Jennie and Anjanette use these posts to share our thoughts from the industry insider perspective on books we read. Our most recent read is FINDING YOUR WRITER'S VOICE: A GUIDE TO CREATIVE FICTION by Thaisa Frank and Dororthy Wall.

Summary from the publisher:

An illuminating guide to finding one's most powerful writing tool, Finding Your Writer's Voice helps writers learn to hear the voices that are uniquely their own. Mixing creative inspiration with practical advice about craft, the book includes chapters on:

Accessing raw voice
Listening to voices of childhood, public and private voices, and colloquial voices
Working in first and third person: discovering a narrative persona
Using voice to create characters
Shaping one's voice into the form of a story
Reigniting the energy of voice during revision

Our Thoughts:

According to Thaisa Frank and Dorothy Wall in FINDING YOUR WRITER’S VOICE: A Guide to Creative Fiction, voice “has to do with sound, quite apart from meaning.” And like a musician learning a new instrument, a writer must focus on hearing and identifying their unique voice, and then exploring what it can do.

Throughout the text, the authors encourage readers to try exercises that are designed to unlock the elements of their writing voice that contribute to accessible, engaging, and original prose in fiction. This is something that is difficult to quantify and takes years of practice, but is often cited by agents and editors as what makes or breaks a manuscript.
The book is broken into four sections:

• Voice

• Story

• Revision

• Keeping Voice Alive
   

We’ve used this structure and ideas proposed within the book below to share our own thoughts on voice and why it is so important. We hope it provides some insight and encouragement as you tackle this nebulous area of writing craft.
 
VOICE
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• The authors describe “voice” as what comes out when you “don’t have time to be elegant.” They say it’s different than “style” and cannot be imitated. It’s as unique as every writer. Is that what we think of when and what we mean when we talk about the author’s voice as literary agents? 

Jennie: Yes. To me voice is the part of communicating that comes from the unconscious. It's hard for a writer to describe or even to identify their own voice. It becomes noticeable when compared to someone else's voice. People from an area sound similar, but each person is unique, so voice is a sort of fingerprint of communication. When someone's voice is affected, they're taking on qualities of someone else's voice. They're purposefully trying to sound like someone with a different identity.
 

• Is a consistent voice essential? Or does voice change over time? Project by project?

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Anjanette: We all have authors that we love and will read no matter what subject matter they are tackling. There's "something about their writing" that we gravitate to. While it's certainly true that we may be drawn to skill, we're also resonating with the author themselves - their "voice." That voice shines through whether they are writing fiction or non-fiction, and no matter which character's head they are in. They are throwing themselves like a ventriloquist, but it's still them. I think it's important that authors lean into that part of their writing voice that is organic and unique to them, and even though it may mature over time, I think readers will be able to recognize a consistent voice versus the voice of an author who it still trying on the voices of other writers.
  
Jennie: It’s important for voice to be consistent in a single book. The exception to this is that voice can change over the course of the story if that is part of the artistry, but that’s an ambitious undertaking. Voice doesn’t have to be the same from book to book unless the books belong to a series. There are advantages to a consistent voice – having a distinct and recognizable voice across books helps build an author’s brand.


STORY

• How can voice be used to guide pacing in a novel?

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Anjanette: I love that the authors of this book point out that stories came long before “craft.” We can analyze stories after the fact of writing them and identify elements like character and plot, but the writing comes first. And writing (a lot) is also the prerequisite task we have to commit to before we can manipulate individual elements of story like pacing. Think about storytellers in real life – an elder in a rocking chair or campfire story-sharer vs. an excited middle schooler or fired-up activist - some people have a natural pace. And sometimes pace can be paired with voice to create urgency or an atmosphere of contemplation. A character's "voice" can tell us about their personality and motives just like it tells us about the author in real life.
 

• Do we prefer character, plot, or vision-driven stories?

 
Jennie: I enjoy stories which balance character and plot. While meeting a new character on the page is interesting, the character is most engaging and memorable when facing challenges and conflicts. What a character says with a gut reaction at the height of conflict reveals voice just as internal thoughts in reflective moments reveal voice in another way.


REVISION

• During self-revision, how do we spot “imposter voices” and why is it important?

Anjanette: Read out loud. We sometimes put on slightly different voices when we are, say, on the phone with the bank, or diffusing a tense situation. The book uses the example of a psychotherapist or parent of a teenager using the “What I hear you saying is…” line. Those voices can feel out of place in fiction and can leave readers feeling like the story is didactic or stilted. Reading aloud can help you spot them. If the places that just aren’t meshing are in the narration, can you modify them into into dialogue? Is it really a character trying to speak, and it feels like an imposter voice coming from you (the narrator)?
 

• How many revisions and what kinds do we recommend before querying? Submitting?

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Jennie: There’s no single right answer to this question, and the number of revisions an author needs to make varies by project and author. An author may need to revise multiple times, but it’s important to strike a good balance so that the scenes aren’t overworked which can flatten voice. Perhaps a more important issue is who will read and provide feedback because it’s wise to wait until after receiving feedback from multiple sources before beginning to revise. Another question is how many rounds of readers giving feedback which lead to revisions are helpful. It’s wise to get a sensitivity reader regarding characters whose identity don’t match the author’s identity.

• What’s our advice when authors don’t agree with suggested revisions?

 
Jennie: Art is subjective. What is important or meaningful to one person might not resonate with someone else. When I disagree with an author about something in a manuscript, I evaluate the issue with regard to the artistic integrity of the whole story. Is my suggestion truly crucial to the success of the story, or is it just an opinion? Would 99% of acquiring editors agree with me? If the story holds its artistic integrity without my suggested change, then it’s just opinion which means an editor might agree with the author.

Anjanette: Agents can be wrong! And much of high-level editing is subjective. But we read a LOT, so please take our thoughts into consideration when we share them. We want your book to find a home with a publisher so that it can go out into the world and everyone can get paid! We also want you to be happy with the final product, so don't hesitate to speak up and disagree after you've mulled it over! Again, we can be wrong!
 
KEEPING VOICE ALIVE

• When agents and editors are no longer “resonating” with an authors voice, what kinds of questions can the author ask themselves about why things aren’t working?

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Jennie: The first question to ask is: is one agent or editor having this reaction, or, is there a trend to the responses I’m getting from agents and editors? One response is an opinion, but several responses that say the same thing indicate a wider opinion in the market. Beyond that, it’s worth noting that voice shifts over time as an author adds life experiences and grows, and it would be surprising if this didn’t show up on the page. Take a step back and assess if the tone has shifted. If it has, the tone may not align with voice in the story well.
 

• How can an author nurture their voice strategically to support their career goals?

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​Anjanette: Because your voice is an extension of who you are as a person, it can pay to be a little bit vulnerable and let your readers see the real you in a public way. Social media, interviews, essays, and public speaking engagements can foster a connection with your audience that actually enhances their reading experience. They are smart enough to synthesize what they've learned about you and what they are reading from you on the page in a way that won't distract them but will give them deeper context for what you are saying between the lines. This is where an author's VOICE and BRAND intersect, and embracing the connection can be very fulfilling for an author.