Writing the Paranormal Novel: Techniques and Exercises for Weaving Supernatural Elements Into Your Story. (40 page)
Authors: Steven Harper
Tags: #ebook, #epub
Did Diver think in those terms? I'm imagining her sitting at her key-board, brow furrowed, finger hovered over the Delete key. “Oops,” she mutters. “Used too many prepositional phrases in this section. Need to cut out a few.”
I doubt it. More likely, Diver (and Rice and Butler) did her best to think like her main character, learn how to speak like her main character, and put her main character's words on paper. The words came out that way because Diver (and the others) knew her character so well, she could speak in the character's voice.
A unique voice evolves from creating a unique viewpoint character and then getting to know the viewpoint character from the inside out. You know how some married couples can finish each other's sentences? That's the kind of relationship you need with your main character. That deep understanding will allow you to develop the voice.
And no, you don't need to have that understanding before you start writing. Your first draft is all about getting to know your main character (or characters). As you progress through the draft, your knowledge of the character will deepen and the voice will strengthen. Then, when you go back for revisions, you'll be able to catch inconsistencies and change what the character or narrator says so the voice becomes consistent.
There's certainly a voice for third person novels, too. It's sometimes called the
author voice or narrator voice
. It's not that different from a first-person voice — the person is a narrator who's telling the story, and this narrator has a voice. The narrator may or may not be the author of the book. Usually it isn't. The narrator voice is oft en similar to the viewpoint character.
Naomi Novik demonstrates a mastery of third-person voice in her Temeraire books. She uses two distinct narrator voices, one for the dragon Temeraire and one for Will Laurence. It's easy to tell them apart at a glance. This passage from
Victory of Eagles
comes from Temeraire's point of view. The young dragon has been imprisoned for treason:
[Temeraire] was quite sure he and Laurence had done as they ought, in taking the cure to France, and no-one sensible could disagree; but just in case, Temeraire had steeled himself to meet with either disapproval or contempt, and he had worked out several very fine arguments in his defense. Most important, of course, it was just a cowardly, sneaking way of fighting; if the Government wished to beat Napoleon, they ought to fight directly, and not make his dragons sick to try to make him easy to defeat; as if British dragons could not beat French dragons, without cheating.
Compare that to this passage a few pages later from the point of view of Will Laurence, imprisoned for the same crime:
There had been no defense to make, and no comfort but the arid certainty that he had done as he ought; that he could have done nothing else. That was no comfort at all, but that it saved him from the pain of regret; he could not regret what he had done. He could not have let ten thousand dragons, most of them wholly uninvolved in the war, be murdered for his nation's advantage.
In these two passages we have the same event told from two different points of view, and two different voices. The narrator who tells Temeraire's story speaks with Temeraire's voice, really. Novik injects a naïve arrogance into Temeraire's point of view. Temeraire also thinks about the cowardly sneakiness of using plague in warfare. Laurence, on the other hand, speaks with an older, more cynical voice. Novik — or Laurence — avoids self-congratulatory language, and his thoughts wander to the fact that he had done the right thing but was still going to pay for it. Temeraire is outraged at their situation where Laurence is resigned to it, and it shows in their individual voices.
You don't
have
to switch voice whenever you switch point of view. However, different voices within the same book is one of those things that can distinguish a good book from a great one, or make it more memorable in the mind of an editor.
I was going to say that switching voices in a book will
always
distinguish a good book from a great one, but really, plenty of authors maintain a single narrator voice throughout their work. Terry Pratchett's voice never wavers in any of his Discworld novels, no matter what character he's writing about, and the style of humor is distinctly his own. Philip Pullman also uses the same voice whether he's writing from Lyra's or Will's point of view in
The Subtle Knife
. The real key is to make your voice distinct, which we'll talk about in a moment.
A few authors inject themselves directly into their books. They make it clear that they're telling a story by addressing the reader directly or using a narrator I. This usually shows up in books aimed at younger readers, since it creates the illusion that someone is telling the reader a story instead of the reader actually reading it. Edward Eager uses this type of voice in
Half Magic
:
Katharine was the middle child, of docile disposition and a comfort to her mother. She knew she was a comfort, and docile, because she'd heard her mother say so. And the others knew she was too, by now, because ever since that day Katharine would keep boasting about it, until Jane declared she would utter a piercing shriek and fall over dead if she heard another word about it. This will give you some idea of what Jane and Katharine were like.
Eager is talking to us. His voice is casual and uses the repetition common to oral storytellers. The last sentence clinches it — we're listening to a story, not reading.
Eager addresses the reader rarely throughout the book: just oft en enough to remind us he's telling us a story, and not so oft en that his voice becomes intrusive.
One of the harder voices to pull off is the
invisible narrator
. Sometimes called
transparent prose
, this is an author voice that tries to fade into the background. It's kind of the opposite of the combination first and third person above — the author tries to disappear as much as possible.
Brendan Mull uses this voice in
Fablehaven
, as we see here:
Seth set the mug on the dresser. Taking a calming breath, he silently prayed that the tarantula would be gone and the fairy would be there. He slid the drawer open.
A hideous little creature glared up from inside the jar. Baring pointy teeth, it hissed at him. Covered in brown leather skin, it stood taller than his middle finger. It was bald, with tattered ears, a narrow chest, a pot belly, and shriveled, spindly limbs. The lips were froglike, the eyes a glossy black, the nose a pair of slits above the mouth.
“What did you do to the fairy?” Seth asked.
Mull doesn't talk to the reader and doesn't adopt a particular point of view with his voice. He barely gets inside
Seth's
point of view, in fact, with only a single reference to what Seth is thinking or feeling. The advantage to this voice is that the narrator never gets in the way of the story. The disadvantage is that transparent voice can come across as dry. Writers who use it need to make up for the dryness by adding other color. Mull uses plenty of magic and action to keep his story moving so his readers don't notice the transparent voice.
EXERCISETake a passage from a book you love and change it into the voice of another book you love. You can't change the events — only the word choice. For example, take the opener of
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone
and retell it as if Neil Gaiman had written it for
The Graveyard Book
instead. For a real challenge, use someone like Shakespeare or Christopher Marlowe as one of the authors. If you're part of a writers' group or have other friends you share your work with, read it aloud to them and see if they can guess which author you converted the voice to. In a group setting, you could pick one book that everyone has read and have everyone convert the voice to a different famous author. Read the pieces aloud and see if everyone can guess whom the “new” author is.
EXERCISETake your favorite third-person narrative and convert a scene to first person. How might George from
Of Mice and Men
tell the story? Or Lennie? How might Cinderella tell her own story? What might her voice sound like?
As I said above, almost every agent or editor will say they're looking for fiction with a unique or interesting voice. Several say that a good voice will grab their eye above anything else. Why are they so keen on voice?
The reason is that a unique or interesting or quirky voice can really make a book. In chapter five, I pointed out that the hero's quest is nearly ubiquitous in paranormal (and a lot of nonsupernatural) books. A lot of other elements crop up over and over again. Regardless of what twist you put on your vampires, they're still vampires. No matter what new element you introduce into your ghost story, it's still a ghost story. One thing that
can
be unique, regardless of the story type, is the author's voice. A fascinating voice can get the reader to overlook other problems, or even fail to notice things like clichés entirely. Remember back in chapter five when we talked about reasons editors buy clichés even when they claim they don't want any? A cool voice is another reason an editor will overlook clichés and buy a book. The unique voice overcomes the tired clichés.
So you really do want to work on creating and developing a fascinating author voice for your book. It's your main selling point.
There's no one way or formula to finding a voice. This process is mostly a matter of experimenting, playing around until you find something that clicks or makes sense to you or just hangs together in a way that sounds great. Here are some things you can do to find that voice. Some are exercises, some are techniques.
Ray Bradbury, famous for both his supernatural and his science fiction work, once said that there are a million bad words in every writer — you just have to keep writing until they're all out of your system. So give yourself permission to write badly. Get those words down, even if they're crap. Don't judge what you've written yet. Keep going and see what you're going to say next. A voice will begin to emerge.
Bull-rush your way forward. Pound those words out and don't look back. Write quickly, even if it's nonsensical. Don't edit (yet). Write like you're writing journal entries or a letters to a friend under deadline — no time to stop. Maybe some quirky turns of phrase will come flying out of your fingers and develop into the voice you're looking for. Or maybe a character will develop in an unexpected and interesting direction. In any case, save the editing for later and see what you can come up with
now
.
Pretend you're the character and start typing in that character's voice, even if your novel is going to be in third person. Don't worry about developing the story yet — just let the character ramble at you while you write down what you hear. (And don't fret if you find yourself talking back, either. A number of my writer friends do it, as do I. In fact, you'd might be surprised at how many professional authors sit in little rooms talking to people who don't exist.) Write letters, journal entries, trial transcripts, sessions with the character's therapist, or what the character says aloud when no one is listening. You might develop a voice by becoming someone else for a while.