Finding the Right Voice - Post from Sharita L

Good evening!

Still here at Goddess Fish. I'd like to thank everyone for the comments so far.

2 of my muses have spoken today, and I'll let them close out the posts this evening but I wanted to talk about my experience of finding the right voice to match my story.

When a writer speaks of their voice, they’re not talking alto or soprano.*laughs* In my opinion, they’re speaking of the style in which they write. Every author has a different style so no 2 authors should be the same. Sure, we have similarities. One may be a lot more sensual as opposed to the other that might be a lot more erotic.

Now, imagine the author having to do this with his or herself. *raises eyebrow* The voices that speak to you in certain kinds of stories may clash between pennames. You find your sensual writer has now become you more erotic writer. Maybe your snarky one as made your more long winded and eloquent voice more of a bad ass. *shudder*

I confess, I’m a newbie so I still struggle with this. In certain stories, Michael might pick up BL’s style of smart ass and Rawiya might sound more like Michael. Is this okay? Erm, in some instances yes but not always. The key is making it work for a particular story or character.

In short, Michael Mandrake writes long winded, eloquent, stories about people in love. If humor comes into his tales, it’s more of a dry humor, yet, my latest story, A Second Chance, has a character that would typically be a BL type of man. Captain in Training, Daniel DeClerc. He, along with his new partner, Farris are both smart asses, but because the story is about 2 cops who are facing the challenge of loving after losing a partner in the line of duty, it works.

Can you imagine being gay on the homophobic police force? In order to avoid scrutiny, you must keep yourself closeted. Because they have to deal with this fact, both men settle into personalities where they have to keep themselves laughing to avoid crying.

The characters make a lot of snide remarks, especially Daniel since he’s the one in charge. *snicker* But it works because if he were more of the dry humor type that Michael would usually write then you wouldn’t really connect with Daniel or feel what he is feeling.

In the next story, The Power of Muse, Michael is his eloquent self once again. Since his MC is an author, he's very proper in his speech and so I wrote the story as if the writer was doing a speech. Perhaps something like an English teacher. 

Make sense? Hope so.

So in closing, if you’re a writer with penames or even an author with one or your own name, have you found your correct voice? This, I’m sure, takes time to master and I haven’t done so just yet, but I know as I get better, they might not clash as much. However as you can see, sometimes that works.

Here is a bit from The Power of Muse and Inspiration from XOXO publishing. Coming very soon.

Booktrailer

Blurb: No such thing as vampires!

William Chatterley is an up and coming author looking for a partner after many dead end dates. Finally, he believes he’s found a suitable mate in Andrew and they see one another.

The vampire Jude is weak from being without love in his life. When he sees the author, he desires him right away but his companion is a stumbling block.

How will he get passed it and when he does, will the mortal want to be his partner? What will he choose? Will Jude convince him to become his eternal lover?

PG Excerpt

“Yes, yes, come to me my child!” Jude lay his head against a dead tree. He sensed two virile young men he might like to enjoy for a double entree. Since he couldn’t have love why not fill up his belly with young blood for nourishment. He waved his long fingers and opened his eyes, gazing around the open field till he caught sight of the two he’d seen in his mind’s eye.

As always the faces were skewed when he looked deep within to see his prey but now that they’d come into view, he noticed one he didn’t want to destroy.

“Wha…I…” At a loss of words was Jude, gawking at the handsome man running away from another. “My, I’ve never seen in all my years a more gorgeous sight.” That moment the old immortal felt his muscles strengthen and his face tightening. A new feeling of love and inspiration came over him.

A mortal, so lovely and beautiful, the desire to live started to return.