Today I’m happy to be part of the Daemons in the Mist Virtual Blog Tour. Author Alicia Kat Dillman has a wonderful post about finding her “character’s voice”. Alicia is also giving away an ebook edition of Daemons in the Mist to one lucky commenter!
Thank you for stopping by For What It’s Worth today Alicia.
Lending a voice to the Imaginary
Kat here, to help you infuse your stories with fantastic character voice.
Lots of aspiring authors seem confused by the difference between author voice and character voice. Aren’t they the same thing? Isn’t the character’s voice just the way I have them speak in the story?
Well yes, but not exactly. Author voice is the way you write, the way you tell the story, the way you choose to describe things. Character voice is the way in which your character speaks. But that’s really a simplified definition, it doesn’t help you a whole lot with the actual creation of believable characters. This is probably because character voice isn’t just how your character speaks. It’s in everything they do. The decisions they make, they way they react to the situations they’re put in, and the way they interact with those around them. It also extends to the way they problem solve, the way they dream, the way they feel. But how do we get to that point where the people inside our mind take form?
First off you have to stop thinking of your characters as actors on a stage that you are directing around. And start thinking about them as real living breathing people who you are following around like some literary PI. And if that comes easy to you, take it a step further and feel along with your characters. Feel that heaviness in your chest when they get rejected by the person they adore. Or the giddiness they feel when they’re out dancing with friends. It’s like method acting but in your head.
Around this point you may be thinking ‘wow, Kat this sounds really hard.’ But if you think about your characters as being real people. That you’re not creating their dialog but instead just overhearing their thoughts, it becomes easy. Which, of course, makes me sound a bit crazy. But what author isn’t, really?
Basically, character voice comes down to this,: if even you can't believe that your characters are real, then no one else ever will.
About Alicia Kat Dillman Indie author & illustrator Alicia Kat Dillman is a lifelong resident of the San Francisco Bay Area. Kat illustrates and designs book covers & computer game art by day and writes teen fiction by night. The owner of two very crazy studio cats and nine overfull bookcases, Kat can usually be found performing, watching anime or hanging out in twitter chats when not playing in the imaginary worlds within her head.
Daemons in the Mist
Seventeen year old Patrick Connolly has been hopelessly infatuated with Nualla for years but he is all but invisible to her. Until, that is, he rescues her from a confrontation with her ex. Little does Patrick know he’s just set off a dangerous chain reaction that will thrust him into a world of life altering secrets and things that shouldn’t exist, because the fog and mist of San Francisco is concealing more than just buildings. Website | Book Link | Goodreads
Book Trailer:
GIVEAWAY! This giveaway is open to international entrants and is for an eBook edition of Daemons in the Mist in the winner's choice of Kindle, Nook or PDF format.
Please leave a comment and a way to contact you if you win.
Giveaway ends Saturday June 23rd at 11:59pm ET. Winner announced June 24th
Sounds awesome!
ReplyDeletemaibyers at gmail dot com
Ooh, lovely trailer! That is very eye-catchy and super-artistic. :-)
ReplyDeleteI like that--you have to be a literary PI, trailing behind your characters. That's a really good way to think of it (and NOT how I thought of my characters in my novel, which now resides in a trunk. For good reason.). Excellent post!
ReplyDeleteIt sounds interesting and I liked the trailer. the art looks amazing. I checked out your site, very nice. I saw the art page was under construction, I def bookmmarked it cuz I want to see your work. Thanks!!
ReplyDeleteArtesia at comcast dot net
Everytime I see this cover, I think it's so pretty!! I saw the other illustrations on her site and they are all great!
ReplyDeleteWhat a beautiful cover
ReplyDeleterock_royalty666@hotmail.com
Nice cover. The book sounds good.
ReplyDeletebn100candg(at)hotmail(dot)com
Trailer's beautiful and the book sounds fantastic.
ReplyDeletequeendsheena@hotmail.com
I like the advice :) makes sense
ReplyDeleteGreat post ^_^ I agree 100% if the author doesn't think their characters are real then readers are just going to see them as 2D cut outs and no one likes that.
ReplyDeleteI never really thought of the difference between character voice and author voice, good post :)
ReplyDelete-K8
http://froze8.blogspot.com/
(I already own my e-copy! :) )
Sounds interesting.
ReplyDeleteluvs2read4fun@gmail.com
Karen- Thank you again for being such an awesome host. And thanks all you awesome peeps for stopping by her fab book blog.
ReplyDelete=^.^=
Kat
BTW your "blogging assistant" is adorable! My studio cats totally approve =^.^=
ReplyDeleteFigment (the assistant) isn't helpful....at all....but I love him! lol
Deletethat was a different book trailer than what I saw :) creative.
ReplyDeleteemail: ariannecruz07.blogspot.com
THIS GIVEAWAY HAS ENDED.
ReplyDeleteTHE WINNER IS AMANDA RAY