Next Big Recognition Contest

Round 28

Author's Note: Author's Note: I would greatly appreciate some feedback on my characters and how I could add some depth to them, not that I think they have no depth at all but whether or not they seem realistic through their dialogue, their actions and their thoughts. If not, how can I improve this? And if they are realistic enough, what should I continue doing that I already am doing well?

Genre: Teen Fiction

Rating: PG

Winning Comment:Hey there! Wow! That was an pretty good chapter. I skipped right past your blurb (I like doing that for NBR to see if you set up the first chapter good enough so I would know what was going on) and guess what? I understood what was going on! :) I was immediately brought into the world.

I really like how you developed the relationship between Harrison and Nina. They have this awkwardness about them that is really realistic. Like, how Harrison feels like he always needs to be holding her hand as if to tell other guys to back off. Cute! Also, how Nina is a bit uncomfortable being around her other friends when he is acting so protective. Very well done.

Personally, my favourite character was Parker. He just seems so sweet, and a lot nicer than Harrison. The whole scene with the "you've never been on a Ferris wheel?" was particularly adorable. Your dialogue was very well though out in that section.

Let's move onto the Comment Topic. Grrrrr. Voice. I've had to talk about that sooooo much in English recently......so I have experience! Woo! ;)

Voice is, I think, the way a story is told. Just as how the same piece of music sounds quite different if played on a violin versus a flute (or sung by a choir or a rapper), a story that involves that same plot, characters, world, etc, can still change a lot depending on the voice used to tell it.

For now, let's just consider stories told in third person, so we aren't complicating things by talking about character voice (which tends to encroach on "voice" more often in first person, but can still very much affect it in third).

Voice is what helps change a story from:

He saw his mother across the hall and took a deep breath. She was wearing the frumpy hat he'd always hated, the entire thing slumping about her head like a dissolving pink flower. God. He remembered the last time he'd seen her in it. He'd been in seventh grade and had been about to kiss Jessica Dowly right on the lips. The arrival of his mother and that atrocious hat had been enough to scare Jessica away from him for the rest of the school year.

To:

The first thing he sees when he looks across the hall is the dusky pink of his mother's hat. Almost immediately, it catapults him back decades—to hot Savannah summers, and home-made ice cream, and the year he was twelve, when he tried to kiss Jessica Dowly behind the playground and failed.

To:

His mother was across the hall. Pink hat. White dress. He shoved aside a rising memory of seventh grade, when he'd last seen her wear it.

These short excerpts are a bit too short to properly display differences in voice, but I think you can get the general idea! Voice is the lens through which the reader sees the story.

Voice is definitely something that can be developed. However, it is also something that is unique. Your literary voice is exactly like no one else's—and even though it'll probably change over time, whether on purpose or by accident—it will remain unique.

I don't believe that an author only has one voice. Everyone has certain writing habits, of course—certain ways s/he likes to phrase things, or describe things, or even just structure sentences. But many writers definitely match the voice of a book they're writing with the story they're trying to tell.