My experience on the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme: Month 7 

Hello again. Welcome back to my series of insights into what it’s like to undertake the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme.  

Month seven – ooh, my lucky number – and it’s all about voice and style.  

Oh no. Groan.  

Come on, admit it. You rolled your eyes a little bit too, didn’t you? It can’t just be me. But why the big sigh? Well, because this is nebulous stuff. Knowing what voice and style means when it comes to deciding what goes on the page – being clear enough to actively control it, with deliberate choices, avoiding my foibles and leaning into my strengths – all of that is hard. 

This said, however, we all know a good writing voice when we read it. Pretty much every literary agent will, at some point, talk about the ‘fresh voice’, or wax lyrical about how the voice was ‘so clear, so identifiable, so unique’ it bagged whichever author it belonged to an automatic yes. From what I can see, ‘voice’ is what drives a lot of publishing deals – so I need to get better at understanding what mine is. I daresay a lot of us do. 

But how to identify voice? At first it all seems so diaphanous, like harvesting fog. But it is possible. It is! All things artistic and creative have technique underpinning them. There’s work you can do. Practical ways to get better at producing great voice and style.  

Look, this is how I like to think about it – finding your writing ‘voice’ is just like falling in love. 

When you were younger, did you ever ask a grown-up in your life about love? How would you know when you’d fallen in love? Whether they were the right person? Did you listen to love songs, watch romantic films and wonder – is that love? Did you search for it in books, too? And what answer did that grown-up whose wisdom you sought give you? I bet it was something along the lines of “You’ll just know it when you find it.” 

And then one day you actually do fall in love – and yes, it feels wonderful and vivid and alive, just howall the Hollywood directors painted it. But it also feels messy and difficult and sometimes like really, really, hard work. Which is weird, you know, because does that mean you are doing ‘love’ wrong? Isn’t it all supposed to feel easy and magical?  

Well, writing to my own voice and style feels a lot like that too: a big leap of faith and a lot of graft, most of the time.  

But underneath the “you’ll just know,” is the practical reality that love is created by small practices, daily habits and many, many choices. There’s some research* which shows clear correlation between a couple’s ability to react to requests for attention and the quality and longevity of their relationship. Which means that if my loved-one points out a pretty bird on the fence post and I immediately stop, look and take notice of their delight and join in with them, I’m performing a loving act and therefore creating more love. 

The author’s voice little bird equivalents are ‘vocabulary’, ‘sentence structure’, ‘tone’, ‘point of view’ and ‘syntax’ (to name the main ones). Complicated little birds, sure. But still knowable, still definable. 

My tutor on the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme has been encouraging me to notice these ‘birds’. Not just to nod vaguely when they turn up, but to pay close, close attention to them. The course is encouraging me to become an active loving, soulmate to my writing. Out of this will come a clear, confident authorial voice and style.  

Learning to show up for myself more and more – to write aloud the inner whirrings of my heart, to reproduce them as accurately as I can, without too much social conditioning or negative judgment getting in the way – helps me inhabit myself more fully, so my writing becomes a little more powerfully me each time. 

This has been the hardest blog to write for the simple reason that voice is such a personal thing. My pursuit of developing ‘voice’ takes me deep inside, to personal corners that my ego fears ought not to be mined. But then, why else go to the whole bother of writing a novel? What else is this act of weaving a great arc of story about, if not to put my feelings, perspectives, and questions into it? Whose novel is it if it is not fully rendered in the author’s voice?  

It’s hard writing a novel, any way one looks at it, but I reckon it’s harder if you’re trying to be someone other than who you are whilst doing it. You’re going to need lots of help along the way – maybe even a tutored course or two. In the meantime, I hope these words suffice, little birds that they are. 

Until next time… 

*The “bird test” comes from the Gottman Institute’s research on “bids for connection,” where one partner makes a small request to connect, and the other partner responds by “turning toward” them. 

The Ultimate Novel Writing Programme (and its little sister, the Novel Writing Course) run twice a year. Our most intensive tutored courses, they offer writers more personalised, one-to-one support than is available through any other online writing course. To find out more about either, or to apply to be part of our next cohort, visit the Ultimate Novel Writing Programme or the Novel Writing Course web page. You can also contact us at any time to chat about your writing journey and explore which, if any, of our courses or services could help you. We love to chat with authors, and we will never sell you a service that we don’t think is the best fit for you – so don’t be shy!

Rachel Davidson is a long-term Premium Member of Jericho Writers prior to joining our Writer Support Team, Rachel loves helping hopeful writers, such as herself, to solve their problems and take a step or two closer to achieving their writing dreams. Rachel has previously self-published a trilogy, the first of which achieved bestseller status in fourteen Amazon categories in the UK, US, Australia and Canada and is now seeking her traditional publishing debut with her latest manuscript. You can find out more about Rachel via her Instagram @RachelDavidsonAuthor.