A book from my childhood

There was one particular book I would not stop reading as a kid - Mick Harte Was Here, by Barbara Park - and when I look back on it, it's sort of weird and morbid that the book I read over and over again was a book about death. A short, middle grade book about a girl whose brother dies in a bicycle accident when they're in middle school. I just reread it last night, and I realize now that one of the reasons I probably loved it so much is the voice. It feels like a friend talking to you, like someone you know and care about, so you want to hear their story, however sad it may be.

But when I was doing an assignment recently for class, I ended up writing about how I often felt creatively cursed by my relatively easy childhood, because I didn't have some huge catastrophe or deeply emotional experience I could call upon as a muse when writing. Only now am I realizing that I probably wrote about death so much in my stories because, for such a long time (truly a blessing), no one close to me had passed away. I was scared of when it would happen, because I'd had no experience with it, so I explored it through writing. And books, I'm realizing - I was drawn to Mick Harte Was Here because it explained how someone dealt with death, one kid to another.

So I'm wondering, has this happened for anyone else? Have you found yourself zeroing in on certain topics or themes in your writing and the books you read because a specific relation they have to your life - even without you realizing it?

And if you can get your hands on that book, I recommend reading it - it's a quick read and full of heart, even so many years later.

A "Screaming" Voice

Whichever part of my brain decides which book I read next deserved a high five a couple of weeks ago. I was contemplating voice, and what it means for a novel to have a strong voice. Sometimes this seems so simple to me - voice is just... the author. Two writers can take the exact same conflicts and plot and will not write the same story. The difference between the two, among other factors, is their voice.

It's one of the things I can't come up with a tangible explanation of...voice is just...voice.

Which was why questioning what voice was and if my writing had it was so frightening. Until I read two books in a row that screamed - yes, screamed - voice.

First I read Simply from Scratch, by Alicia Bessette, which I actually won over on her blog by telling one of the worst baking disaster stories (who knew it would benefit me someday!).

Then I picked up Cracked Up to Be, by Courtney Summers, from the library and read it in a couple of days - meanwhile telling every one that I was tired because the book I was reading was too captivating to put down.

That's the word I'd use to describe the voice in both of these books: captivating. The narrators felt so real and unique I couldn't stop wanting more.

In the midst of my "voice crisis," if you will, these books confirmed for me that voice isn't easy to adequately explain, but it is very easy to spot.

These two novels are in first person present tense, which I think is difficult to write but also lends itself to a strong voice. When I read books in that style, the narrator seems to come alive quicker for me. However, voice is still often well executed in other styles, these just both happened to be in the same one. Although Simply from Scratch had some sections in the third person point of view of a minor character, and those sections had just as strong of a voice for me.

Now Simply from Scratch is Bessette's debut novel, and Cracked up to Be is the only Courtney Summers' book I've read, but I'd be willing to bet that their other books have similar captivating voices that are still distinct to each of the main characters.

I think that for me, voice is the difference between a well told story and a story that comes alive, existing beyond the page.

But since I was having such a hard time coming up with what exactly voice is, I looked for some help and found these quotes... 

"A writer's voice is not character alone, it is not style alone; it is far more.  A writer's voice line the stroke of an artist's brush- is the thumbprint of her whole person- her idea, wit, humor, passions, rhythms."  Patricia Lee Gauch

"A good style should show no sign of effort.  What is written should seem like a happy accident."  W. Somerset Maugham

"It is the aspect of the novelist's work that asks to be read out loud, which appeals not to the eye, like most prose, but to the ear; having indeed this much in common with oratory....The story, besides saying one thing after another, adds something because of its connection with a voice." - E. M. Forster, Aspects of a Novel

How do you define voice? Have you read either of those books, and did they "scream" voice to you?

The pictures are linked to their source - their Amazon page.