After my fairly extensive post on voice a few days ago?
Here’s a link to a post (from last year) of Nathan Bransford’s on the same topic that makes a great starting point for thinking about voice.
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I’ve been thinking about voice a lot lately, since I started (just three days ago!) a new story in a voice I’ve never tried before. It’s first-person, a little noir-ish, told from the perspective of a 28-year-old ghost who was a lawyer when he died and became something of a private investigator afterward. His voice is the strongest I’ve ever heard, and it makes for some pretty awesomely compelling writing. (I don’t know if it’s as fun to read as it is to write, boy is it fun to write.) Possibly influenced a little by THE HUNDRED THOUSAND KINGDOMS, which I picked up for a reread shortly after I read your post on voice, but that’s a good thing; I don’t know if I’d have tried first person otherwise, but for this story it’s a perfect fit.
Have you read A CERTAIN SLANT OF LIGHT by Laura Whitcomb? It’s a fabulous story with a ghost as the protagonist; I bet you’d enjoy seeing how somebody else does the ghost thing.
I bet, if it’s fun to write, it’d be fun to read!
I have not! I am planning another trip to the library this weekend, so I will put it on my list. ;)
You’ll love it. Seriously. I think it may be on my all-time top-ten list.
Not that I want to raise your expectations so high the book’s a let down, though, so I probably shouldn’t have put it quite that strongly.
But it’s really good!