Every genre has a relatively unique signature or style that readers come to expect, known as voice and tone, which make it possible to identify the genre within a few pages. Voice is like the personality of your character leaping off the page, and tone is how you want people to feel when they read your book.
Nailing your genre’s voice and tone will not only make sure you’re meeting readers’ expectations, but it can increase your chance of publication. We’ll explore what these two terms mean, with illustrations from contemporary fiction.
VOICE EMERGES FROM CHARACTER
Voice has become something of a buzzword that you might find confusing, but in literature, it refers to the mixture of vocabulary, tone, point of view, and syntax that makes phrases, sentences, and paragraphs flow in a particular manner.
Voice is also an amalgam of the tastes, interests, terrors, and desires that shape the personalities of your characters.
Nailing voice is more than just writing great sentences; it’s getting to know your character, how they think, and how their experiences have shaped them at their deepest level.
Take this example from Ocean Vuong’s On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, an epistolary novel written from a son to his mother as he explores their traumas. (CONTENT NOTE: This section refers to an act of child abuse).
The first time you hit me, I must have been four. A hand, a flash, a reckoning. My mouth a blaze of touch.
The time I tried to teach you to read the way Mrs. Callahan taught me, my lips to your ear, my hand on yours, the words moving underneath the shadows we made. But that act (a son
