Can You Ever Have Too Much Voice?

Last week I talked about the novel Sunshine, by Robin McKinley. I liked the story, but found the rambling, digressing, and occasionally convoluted nature of the writing distracting to the point where I occasionally skipped passages – which I almost never do. Why? Aren’t we told, over and over again, that we must have “voice” in our writing? What is “voice” anyway, and can you have too much of it?

Voice can be two things: One is the author’s way of telling the story, such as the tone (lyrical, humorous); the language they use (short, choppy sentences or long and complex with longer words – i.e., syntax), vocabulary, the point of view they take toward the story and the world.  

The other is the voice of the characters, specifically that of the protagonist. The more close-in the third person point of view, the more we hear the character’s “voice” clearly. In first person, it’s all about the voice. It has to be immediately engaging, sweeping us up in the story, making us care about what happens to that character. 

Consider the beginning of one of my favorite novels, The Game of Kings by Dorothy Dunnett:

“Lymond is back.”

It was known soon after the Sea-Catte reached Scotland from Campvere with an illicit cargo and a man she should not have carried.

“Lymond is in Scotland.”

It was said by busy men preparing for war against England, with contempt, with disgust; with a side-slipping look at one of their number. “I hear the Lord Culter’s young brother is back.” Only sometimes a woman’s voice would say it with a different note, and then laugh a little. 

Or The Hobbit, by J.R.R. Tolkien:

In a hole in the ground there lived a hobbit. Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to to sit down on or to eat; it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort.

Or Douglas Adams’ The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy:

Far out in the uncharted backwaters of the unfashionable end of the Western Spiral arm of the Galaxy, lies a small unregarded yellow sun. Orbiting this at a distance of roughly 98 million miles is an utterly insignificant little blue-green planet whose ape-descended life forms are so amazingly primitive that they still think digital watches are a pretty neat idea.

You can hear the authorial voices here – they are instantly recognizable. And we know exactly what kind of story we are getting with each. An author may keep the same, recognizable voice throughout their works (think Hemingway) or they may change it according to the story they are telling. I think of this is the storyteller’s voice: the one who is telling us the story.  

When it comes to character voice, what we really want to convey is their interiority – what is going on in their mind. 

One excellent example of deep third person is Scarlett O’Hara from Gone with the Wind. In fact, that book became a classic mainly for her inimitable character (now it’s considered reprehensible for other reasons, including the exaggerated voices of the Black characters) but we hear her voice right up until the last line: 

She could get Rhett back, she knew she could. There had never been a man she couldn’t get, once she set her mind upon him. “I’ll think of it all tomorrow, at Tara. I can stand it then. Tomorrow, I’ll think of some way to get him back. After all, tomorrow is another day.” 

Or, in first person point of view, the famous first line of Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger:

If you really want to hear about it, the first thing you'll probably want to know is where I was born, and what my lousy childhood was like, and how my parents were occupied and all before they had me, and all that David Copperfield kind of crap, but I don't feel like going into it, if you want to know the truth.

Again, we can hear these people clearly, right? Just from those brief paragraphs, I’ll bet you could come up with some adjectives to describe their characters, and come pretty close, even if you haven’t read the books. 

Now on to a passage from Sunshine:

I half expected to wake up and find myself lying in a little pile of ashes, when the black vampire shirt disintegrated underneath the touch of the sun’s rays; I more than half expected to wake up having had a long, labyrinthine dream about Con with a background to match – labyrinthine, I mean. No again.) Although I remembered when I‘d last woken up in my bed and hoped that what I remembered about something-strange-with-Con had only been an embarrassing dream. It hadn’t been a dream that time either – and the things-that-weren’t-dreams were by this showing getting more embarrassing. Speaking of patterns I wanted to break soon.) 

In this passage, we definitely hear Sunshine’s voice; in the entire book, in fact, we hear nothing but her voice, with many stream-of-consciousness asides just like this. 

The thing is, voice is a great thing to have. It shows our character’s take on the world through what they focus on, what they think about it, the vocabulary and syntax they use… when done well, the reader can even know the difference between what the character is telling themselves, and what is really going on (as in an unreliable narrator). 

Voice draws readers in, and the more distinct and full of a particular personality the voice is, the better. In fact, you are far more likely to not have enough voice than to overdo it. If your character sounds bland, like they could be anyone, of any age, from anywhere, then that’s a problem. Voice – conveying a character’s thoughts and emotions, including inner conflicts – is what makes that character leap off the page. 

It is possible to overdo it, however. If the voice is stream-of-consciousness meandering, it may confuse and annoy the reader. If it’s too snarky, the character may be unlikable. Some readers complain that all MG/YA girl characters have the same “sassy” voice now, and I see their point (although I think that is, for better or worse, what many agents and editors are looking for, because it sells). 

Just like any other aspect of your writing, your character’s voice, and everything we hear in their minds should have a purpose and meaning. No, it’s not like that in real life. And if you really want to do the stream-of-consciousness thing, go ahead; just realize you have to have a cracking good story to go along with it. 

To get your character’s voice, you might try writing journal entries as them. Even if your book is in third person, try writing some extra or background scenes in first, from their voice. 

Also think about: 

What are they most passionate about? 

What do they absolutely despise?

What do they believe about life? (it isn’t fair, people are generally good; only the strong survive, etc.)

What is their age? Education level? Occupation? Gender? How do these things affect how they express themselves? 

What is their best memory? Worst memory?

Now try:

Write a scene where they are trying to express love.

Write a scene where they are angry at someone.

Write a scene where they have a secret they cannot tell.

Write the scene that is their most embarrassing moment.

Show us who your characters are, and what they think and feel about their world, but never forget you are there to tell us a story.