What is The Writer's Voice?

In our last writing class Janet discussed our tone and voice as writers and I found what she said very interesting. I looked up the voice of a writer on Google and checked out some not only descriptions but also ways to finding your unique voice. 

First I should put down the actual definition of the writers voice and then I will talk about ways to find your own.  


According to Wikipedia: 

1. The writer's voice is the individual writing style of an author, a combination of idiotypical usage of syntax, diction, punctuation, character development, dialogue, etc., within a given body of text (or across several works). Voice can be thought of in terms of the uniqueness of a vocal voice machine.            







Now, what does all this mean when it comes to finding your voice? Well, the answer is it's the style on which you write.


Maybe your style is a lot of detail and description, or maybe you like your dialog to be very realistic. Maybe you like to skip a lot of words and have sentences that are not complete but get to the point.


Usually it stems from what you like to read and how you read too. It will have other components that will drive it, such as genre, but whatever it is your voice is unique to only you.

For example, I like stories that don't give away everything in the first chapter so when I wrote Fable I wanted the reader to wonder what was going to happen next to Stevie. I wanted them to go through it with her. Now some consider that slow, but I like a build up and that's how I write. I am driven by suspense and patience.


I also like details of my characters so I will see through their eyes, so I wrote more detail about them. But every writer is different, mainly because everyone reads and enjoys stories differently.

I believe the way to find your voice is to ask yourself what you enjoy reading. What pulls you into a story and holds onto you? Do you like your stories to have action right off the bat? Or maybe you like working into the conflicts. 

Do you enjoy a lot of romance, or prefer very little? These are the questions you could ask yourself when you begin to tell your story, but make no mistake, you should set the tone of your book from the very beginning so as not to fool or confuse the reader.

We will get into tone on the next post, but for right now, look to yourself and who you are and what kinds of books stand out to you. There is where you will find your voice.


There is a blog post I will link on here for steps you can use to finding your writing voice. 10 steps to finding your voice

But in the mean time, realize your voice is your own unique way of putting words to paper. One more thing though, make sure you revise and use your creative writing skills and a professional editor. If you plan to publish your book then you should do this for your readers. 

If you have any questions or want to add how you found your voice in writing please leave me a comment. I love hearing from you!
Until next Friday, I hope everyone has a wonderful weekend! 

Love, Lisa