《How to Write Stories People Will Love》31. Find Your Voice - Part 2
Advertisement
Finding one's voice is not a requirement for good writing, but it helps. A good story can stand on its own, but a good voice will make it memorable. In my opinion, it's what pushes a reader from "like" to "love."
So how do you find your writing voice? Here are some suggestions I've found that might help you:
For example, I might say I'm clever, genuine, and sometimes snarky. Our personalities are complex and nuanced, but forcing ourselves to only select three words helps to boil it down to the bare basics. It's easier to get our writing to reflect three adjectives than an entire personality.
One of the easiest ways for "voicey" writing is to simply type the way you talk. My brain tends to spew thoughts in spurts, so you'll find lots of sentence fragments in my work. I find it very suitable for writing young adult stories, so I stick with it. (Tangent: I write how I talk in my head. For some reason, my mouth does a poor job of expressing my thoughts, so what actually comes out is never as great as how it sounds in my head.)
Think about the stories that you've enjoyed most, or the bloggers that you love to follow. We often admire the thing we want to be. What is it about the writings of these other people you like most? How do they convey their ideas? Do you see yourself writing that way?
If it feels like pulling teeth trying to write a certain way, then maybe you weren't meant to write that way. I'm not saying you can't, but if it doesn't feel natural to you, then that probably isn't your voice.
Note that when I say "your voice" here in this chapter, it can be interchangeable with "your character's voice". When trying to nail down your character's voice, try describing that character in three adjectives, and think about how this person speaks. Then try to capture those things in words as you write the story from that character's perspective.
Advertisement
Additional note about voice: Many best-selling authors have kind of a bland voice. This probably helps their stories appeal to a broader audience. With this in mind, it's okay if your story isn't "voicey". But like I said in the first paragraph, many stories that I've liked have very little voice, but my all-time favorites--the stories that I love--drip with voice.
Advertisement
The Best Title!
Benjamin Stone is a normal teenager with nothing outstanding, even worse is his lack of ambition, something uncommon in young men his age. Watch how his style of life, is being completely turned around after he is thrown into a world of unspeakable horrors and wonders, will he grow to hate this new world full of surprises? or start to enjoy it and it's inhabitants?
8 94UnKnown
One hated for having a villains quirk other loved for having a hero's quirk, both unknown to the people around them, only having each other until one day they broke.
8 80Agalma
Farron the son of a great philosopher ,mathematician, and astrologer that is long dead is captured by the very same Android who killed his family friends, and acquaintances. Valued as a high slave he is guarded with the utmost care. His "Guard" Gwendolyn is a fully automic mech-roid of elite stature. One thing leading to another and his status erupts from prisoner status to nobility in the very same hostile faction the massacred his people. While Gwendolyn ends up becoming his Literal Knight, from there relationship blooms into something much greater then ever imagined.
8 194A Wheel Inside a Wheel
Two brilliant young me, Reinhard von Musel and Yang Wen-li, are forced to flee the countries of their birth and become refugees on opposite sides of a century long galactic war. While they both struggle to adapt to their new lives, their obvious talent propels them to the forefront of the war. Their choices will shape their adoptive homelands forever, and their clash will decide the future of the galaxy. This story is broken up into volumes, each following one half of the conflict. You can read them in chronological order, or you can follow just Yang or Reinhard. See individual descriptions below. Part One - Speaking in Tongues When Yang Wen-li’s father dies, the only thing that he inherits is a mountain of debt, which can only be paid off with fifteen years of his life. Wanting to escape that indentured servitude, Yang flees his homeland and takes up a false identity in the Galactic Empire, a hyper-stratified society where stepping out of line is punishable with imprisonment or death. Yang enrolls in the Imperial Officers’ Academy to study history, but despite his unusual and unmistakeable talent as both a tactician and a scholar, his classmates resent him for being a visible outsider. When tensions at the school boil over and several of Yang’s classmates attempt to murder him, Yang finds an unlikely ally in the top student in the class: the aloof Oskar von Reuenthal. But Reuenthal and Yang both have secrets, secrets which could destroy both their lives and their newfound friendship. [70k words, complete] Part One (Alternate) - Talking Without Speaking When Oskar von Reuenthal enrolls at the Imperial Officers' Academy, he doesn’t expect to make real friends. The IOA is a competitive place, and Reuenthal has never been well liked. But when a foreign student shows up to challenge him for the top spot in the class, Reuenthal can’t look away. [77k words, complete] Part Two - Life out of Balance When Reinhard von Musel's mother learns that her husband is about to sell her daughter to become the concubine of the Kaiser, she takes her two children, Reinhard and Annerose, and flees to the Free Planets Alliance, where the three of them must start a new life. [129k words, complete] Part Three - Servants of the Pharaoh Now an officer in His Majesty's fleet, Yang Wen-li struggles to maintain his principles in the face of everything that is expected of him. When he's unwillingly drawn into the politics of the court, he has to use all of his talents to keep himself and his new friends out of danger. [173k words, complete] Short - Whatever It Takes to Keep the Body Warm After their falling out, Reuenthal and Mittermeyer are both posted to the brutal wasteland of Capche-Lanka. It's difficult to hold a grudge when you're just trying to survive. [23k words, complete] Short - Keep the Home Fires (Burning) Three soldiers. Two bodies to be buried. One haunted house. [33k words, complete] Part Four - Lighting Out for the Territories While his sister has joined the fierce Rosen Ritter regiment, Reinhard's fame has earned him a post stuck on Phezzan. Instead of getting to fight, he's caught up in a web of secrets, including the shelter and care of a mysterious refugee from the Empire. Separated from everyone he cares about, Reinhard is forced to make some unexpected allies, and make connections with old friends. [147k words, complete] Part Five - Serpent's Mouth, Serpent's Teeth After having sacrificed his freedom to save his best friend's life, Yang must figure out how to win, and not just survive, the largest civil war in human history. [In progress] Part Six - Lightless Labyrinth [forthcoming, TBD] Part Seven - Silent Spiral [forthcoming, TBD] This story is crossposted on ao3 at bit.ly/wheelinsideawheel
8 276Star Passenger
Nick is an ordinary youth with a passion for astronomy, who has dreamt of the stars his entire life as he works a customer service job. One day he picks up a signal from the stars that turns his life upside down - little does he know at the time that the fate of Humanity depends on how he deals with the discovery! Goose, who is not at all happy to be named Goose, has travelled across the Galaxy as a data signal only to be woken to life inside a virtual machine. Together with Nick's sister Sae and their friend Rashi, Nick and Goose set out to explore the mysteries of the Universe and to find out what has happened to Goose's people. However; before they can succeed on their quest, they must outsmart a relentless detective backed by a sinister government that are doing everything they can to stop them. Caught between forces as ancient as the Universe, Nick and his friends uncover secrets that will shake the foundations of the very fabric of time and reality.
8 123Quick Transmigration : System Let's Take Revenge
𒆜 Oᑎ-GOIᑎG 𒆜System: Host you just need to take revenge on the FLand complete task and your mission will be a success.Liza: Just these come on let's do it. ~~~~~after completing some worlds~~~~~Liza: system chan~~ How the hell is this demon following me everywhere like a curse ?!System: ..he..he..he.......congratulations host you have successfully completed the hidden mission .😊😊Liza: Abort mission I won't do it .A certain person: Since you have entered my heart don't you dare think of running.●○•° 《 Extremely slow updates😥 so please🥺 be patience 》°•○●
8 200