Tag: creative writing

How to write like someone you’re not – and still sound authentic

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This might be a little too obvious. [Photo by Emil]

 As a copywriter, I might be selling waterproof work boots to truckers one day, and giving makeup tips to fashionistas another. Maybe both in the same day. But if I’m not familiar with my audience, I have to get familiar before I write anything. You may have the same problem.

Say you’re writing about a character who is wildly unlike yourself. Maybe they’re an extreme version of some part of yourself (as all characters tend to be), but their background and lifestyle demands a manner of speaking completely different from anything you know. How do you master a voice that’s not your own?

Start by writing down everything you know about the character whose voice you need to create. Personality traits, occupation, hobbies. Then, prepare to research. You must immerse yourself in the voice you seek to emulate, much like living in a different country to learn the language. Here’s how:

 

Online communities

My number one resource for getting into the heads of my audience is the Internet. You can find a blog or forum for just about any group of people – I have stumbled across communities for everything from anorexics to Satanists, to Jews who love bacon (those all purely by accident). Look up social websites centered around your narrator’s profession, hobbies, even medical or psychological conditions. Do this by Googling your subject with words like blog, forum, community, online support group, tips, terminology, handbook, dictionary (i.e. “spoon-collector’s forum” etc.). Take it a step further by asking yourself what products your character would buy, then find the Facebook page of a company that sells said product, and read the fan comments. Google the definitions of terms you don’t know. Bookmark the sites you find and reference them frequently.

Books

Probably the most obvious way to familiarize yourself with a voice is to find a book narrated by a character who is like yours, or at least one that has a lot of dialogue by a character like yours. Type out a few pages of the narrative/dialogue to help give your fingers and your brain a feel for the flow of the language. Reach outside fiction, too – read the memoir of a real person who is similar to your character. If you’re writing period fiction, read something that was actually written during the time period in question.

 

Movies & TV

Can’t think of a book that has your character type? Try thinking of a movie or TV show that does. Find some quotes from that character on IMDB – and again, type them out to get a feel for the voice.

 

People watching / eavesdropping

Find a public place where you’re likely to find the type of people you’re writing about. If you’re writing about a college student, hang out in a coffee shop by the closest college campus. If you’re writing about a factory worker, eat lunch at a diner close to a factory, or check out a nearby bar at happy hour. If you’re writing about children, offer to baby-sit your sister’s kids, or hang out at the playground of your local park (just bring a friend with you so people don’t think you’re a creeper). Shop at stores your character is likely to shop at. Visit a church or synagogue they might frequent. Listen to snippets of conversation around you, and surreptitiously write them in a notebook.

 

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Where do you find the voices of your characters? Tell me in the comments!

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Dates for Voice Week 2012!

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Yes folks, Voice Week is back—and we’ve got less than two months to get ready for it.

 

What is Voice Week?

Voice Week is the time the InMonsters (and anyone else who wants to join in) all step outside the voices we are used to and try writing something new. We’ll each write five different 100-word pieces—each piece told in a different voice. We’ll post a piece a day, Monday through Friday, in the first week of October. Then we’ll hop around to each other’s blogs, reading, commenting, learning, and offering constructive criticism. There’ll also be a prize or two awarded to randomly-selected voice writers (exact prize(s) to be announced soon).

 

What is voice?

Voice is the personality infused into your writing—from the words you choose, to the structure and rhythm of your sentences, and other little details, like whether you add accents or grammatical errors on purpose. Different narrators have different voices. An old man will choose different words and arrange them differently than a teenage girl will.

 

Why do I need a unique voice?

Your voice sets you apart from every other writer. Voice is the quickest way to help your readers get to know your narrator—and it’s more effective than exposition. Voice is one of the biggest ways you show (don’t tell) your narrator’s personality. An intriguing or amusing voice can keep readers reading even when not much is happening with the plot. 

 

Why do I need to practice different voices?

Your voice may change depending on the story you are writing. Maybe your novel is a brooding literary piece, but you’re also writing a short adventure story that requires a whimsical wit. Even if you don’t cross genres, your protagonists may be different. A boy or a girl, an adult or a child. An angel or an alien. A person from the seventeenth century or the twenty-seventh. They all require different voices. The more unique and authentic, the better.

 

But what if I write in third person?

All narrators have voice, whether they are characters in the story or not. Think of your favorite third-person writers and how different they sound from one another. Is the tone dark, or light? Clean and sharp, or thick and introspective?

 

How do I become a part of Voice Week?

  1. Leave a comment telling me you’re in! Be sure to include a link to your blog so I can add you to the Voice Week blogroll.
  2. Write something about 100 words long. You can use an InMon prompt, a Voice Week prompt, or even a piece you wrote a long time ago. HINT: It might be easier if it’s in first person, but it’s up to you.
  3. Rewrite that piece four times. Change the personality of the narrator each time. The goal is to write with five different voices. The benefit of using the same story/scene/situation is that we can focus on the difference in the voices. Whether you simply change the personality of the same character five times, or write the same scene from five different characters’ points of view, or only write similar situations happening to people in five different centuries—it’s all up to you.
  4. Come October 1, start posting, and link back to the Voice Week homepage with each post.

 

I’m confused.

Check out the rules

See answers to frequently asked questions

 

I need examples. How did Voice Week go last year?

Read last year’s voices

Read my summary post

 

I can’t wait to get started!

Comment below, and…

Get your Voice Week badge!!!

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Stay tuned: in the weeks leading up to Voice Week, we’ll be digging deeper into voice, what it is, and how to find yours.

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The Diamond-Buyer’s Guide to Writing a Literary Gem

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Photo by Steve de Polo

When determining the value of a diamond, gemologists look at four factors, collectively known as the Four Cs. By a convenient coincidence, all four coincide with important points of writing. So here are a few pointers on writing a novel that shines.

Carat – the size or weight of the diamond.

Do your plot and characters have enough weight to carry the story? Does enough happen to your hero, not just physically, but emotionally, that the story is worth writing and worth reading? If so, proceed. If not, it isn’t worth the cost. Dig deeper.

 

Clarity – how many inclusions (little black dots) are in the diamond.

Unclear wording slows down your reader – and thus the story, and keeps the light from shining through. Bummer. Look back at 47 ways to find and eliminate inclusions in your writing.

 

Cut – If a diamond is cut too long, the light will bounce sideways off the lower facets. Too short, and the light just falls through. But just right, a la Goldilocks, and the light reflects off the lower facets directly into the eyes for optimum sparkle.

Just so with editing. “They” say to cut anything that is not necessary to the plot. But a novel cannot live on plot alone. Character is just as important. Check every scene to ensure it contains two or more of the following elements:

  • Establishing character
  • Advancing plot
  • Foreshadowing events
  • Braiding in subplots

If you find a scene that doesn’t have two or more elements—and you can’t manage to work a second element in—cut it. If there was anything important in that scene, extract it and work it into another existing scene.

                       

Color – the purer white it is, the more iridescent the shine.

In writing, that pure whiteness is honesty. Yes, you are writing about made-up people in made-up situations, but you still must be emotionally honest. About how you see the world. About what keeps you up at night. What you fear. What you long for. What hurts most. And why you keep on fighting. When you’re writing that first draft, don’t try to be eloquent. Don’t try to impress your readers. Don’t preach at them. Just climb into the head of the character who’s telling the story. Then reach into your gut and vomit your feelings on the paper. The worst and the best.

That’s when the precious gem emerges; when you’re not trying to create a feeling, but to express one. As Ray Bradbury says, “when a man talks from his heart, in his moment of truth, he speaks poetry.”

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Flash Fiction: Time Crunch

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Meant to post this last night. Whoops.

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I realized I haven’t posted any of my real work in a long time, so I thought I’d try out one of my own prompts. Glad to know what you think.

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Time Crunch

It stood in the center of the garage. A puzzle of greenish copper gears and cranks with worn leather handles. A metal mess the size of a Volkswagen Microbus. And, from somewhere inside it, a faint ticking.

            “Where’d you get it?” I asked.

            “Stole it.”

            “How’d you move it?”

            He took a long drag on his Kool. He wasn’t going to answer.

            I stuck my hands in my armpits. My fingers were itching to pump some levers and tickle some toggle switches, but this was no time to play around. Both our futures—or rather, our pasts—were at stake. Imagined scenes sped through my head, a thousand should-have-beens. He’d have finished school, graduated with honors, gone on to college. Met some girl and married her. Maybe I’d even be an uncle by now. It was funny; most of the ideas I had about how much better our lives would be were about him, not me.

            “So how does it work?”

            He shrugged.

            “You couldn’t steal a manual, too?”

            “We’re not gonna use it.”

            I almost hurt my neck, I turned my head to look at him so fast. I knew he didn’t steal it for me. He stole it so he could get back six years of working at the plant to keep me alive and in school. So with so much on the line for him, and with the job half done, why was he backing out now? He had the hard look in his eyes that always scared me, but I was too mad to keep my mouth shut.

“Then what the heck are you gonna do with it?

            He threw his half-smoked cigarette on the ground and mutilated it with the toe of his boot.

            “No,” I shook my head when I realized what that meant. “We finally have the chance to bring them back. You can’t just—”

            “They were my parents, too.”

            “So why can’t we try? Look, you probably just pull that—”

            He smacked my arm back and I yelled so loud we could hear it shake the garage door.

            “I already stopped it,” he told me. “I already went back. I already saved them.” Something weird and distant in his voice made my gut turn.

            “So they should be here with us right now, right?”

            “You were riding your bike that day. Just up the street.”

            “So why aren’t they here with us right now?”

            “I changed it back.”

            “You what?”

            He closed his eyes. “I tried it a million different ways, and it always happens the same. Either the truck hits them,”

He paused, because his voice cracked on the word hits. The knot in my gut spread to my chest as he swallowed before finishing the sentence.

“Or it hits you.”

            All of a sudden my legs were like paper, crumpling under me until my butt hit the concrete floor. He turned around and started searching Dad’s old workbench. I felt sick when he hoisted the sledgehammer.

            “Why’d you pick me?”

            He stopped and looked at me. “The same reason I never let them ship you off to foster care. What, are you stupid?”

            He turned around again, raising the hammer over his shoulder like a baseball bat. I pushed myself to my feet and stumbled through the door into the house. Before I’d even closed it behind me I heard the clanging crunch of the metal as the machine caved under the love of my brother.

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