Comments on: Have you found your voice?

By: Jaleta Clegg

Jaleta Clegg — Wed, 19 Aug 2009 23:06:44 +0000

The more you write, the stronger you will find your voice to be. I’m amazed at how many people think, I’ve written a novel manuscript. Now I’m going to sell it. Tip from seasoned pros: write a million words (about 10 100,000 word manuscripts), THEN see how well you write. You might be publishable by then. Experience, in the “real” world and in writing, really does help define who you are and what stories you have to tell. Your voice will grow naturally out of the stories you write, if you let it.

That said, the analyzing bit can really help. I’d suggest getting some good friends to help out, some you trust to be brutally honest if necessary. It hurts but if you take it with an open mind, it can really help your writing.

By: Elizabeth Spann Craig

Elizabeth Spann Craig — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 18:50:18 +0000

Good points. And it’s important to stay true to your voice, even if you get rejected. It won’t be right for every publisher or agent, but there’s one out there that it IS right for.

Elizabeth
Mystery Writing is Murder

By: Eden

Eden — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 18:01:03 +0000

writers — not writer’s lol
the little edit button is missing today =)

By: Eden Tyler

Eden Tyler — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 17:58:34 +0000

Great advice!
Voice is so important and writer’s need to work through and find their own. Trying too hard, or trying to emulate someone great, never works.
And looking back at work from a couple months ago — I’m shocked at how I could have possibly thought I was a decent writer then lol!!
Authority and confidence are key! I have more confidence now after seeing how quickly and how much I’ve grown in a short amount of time, and that makes the words come out better the first time around.

By: Caroline

Caroline — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 13:55:58 +0000

I think you have given some really good advice. One thing that has helped me find my voice, as well, was to start with what I know. Then again, I don’t write fiction really. I have found that my life is pretty interesting. When I do write, I draw on what I know–be it my experience with unsavory substances, my brief (so far) acquaintance with marriage and motherhood, or my love affair with the law that began when I was in kindergarten and culminated in a law degree. I know these things, so I feel qualified to write about these things. If someone wanted me to write about the experience of raising five children while being a stay at home mother, I not only don’t feel I would have the voice to do so, I feel like I would do a vast disservice to mothers with more than one child, who do stay at home, because my own contrary experience and opinions would cast a negative light on my attempt to portray what I THINK being a stay a home mother of five would be like. Does that make sense? Probably not. And that would be my next bit of advice. Read back what you wrote. Does it make sense to you? Probably. Now read it more critically. Will it make sense to anyone else? Finding your own voice is all well and good, but if your voice resonates in no one’s ears but your own, chances are, you won’t have an audience to talk to. And where’s the sense in that? Sorry this got so long . . . off to turn it into my own blog for the day . . . .