Writer Room

Having a Voice

For nearly thirteen years I was a reporter with The Associated Press in Florida. I covered all kinds of news, from the Trayvon Martin case, to executions, to alligator attacks, to the Pulse shooting, the Parkland shooting, and other tragedies. Before that I worked for a bunch of other newspapers and covered very similar topics.

I'm no longer a reporter now. I left the AP in March of 2021. I've written twenty books, most of them romance novels. All of those romances are here on Wattpad. I also write mysteries under the pen name of Tara Lush, and those are published by Crooked Lane Books.

I'm introducing myself and my background now because the new Creators program was just launched, and I figured it was a good time to do this and say hi to all of my new readers and fellow writers. 

I wanted to tell you a story about why it's important to push through criticism.

In the late 90s I worked for a paper in Burlington, Vermont. This was long before I started writing fiction. I was young and hungry, and eager to prove myself as an excellent journalist. I tried so hard to break stories and write them in a way that was engaging and interesting.

The reporting came easy to me. I enjoyed talking to people, and I liked finding out people's secrets. I also enjoyed uncovering the secrets of government, and found out that the governor of Vermont gave secret tax breaks to a Canadian company. Not sexy stuff, but important to the people. My reporting led to a big award.

One day my editor at the newspaper pulled me aside, shortly after the award. She knew how hard I was working. I felt proud of her words, and then she said something that was incredibly devastating, and stayed with me for the rest of my career.

"You're not the best writer in the newsroom, not by a longshot," she said.

I was crushed. I'd been trying so hard. This was back when the whole concept of narrative nonfiction in newspapers was just gaining steam. I wanted to write engaging, beautiful prose.

Would I ever become a good writer? According to my editors — and editors I've worked with since — great writers are born that way.

I took my editor's words to heart. For years and years, for most of my career actually, I felt like I wasn't a good writer. I'd attend seminar after seminar about how to become a better writer.

My editors would say one thing to me: just write with authority. Maybe you've heard that. Maybe an editor has told you that. Maybe you've read it in a craft book.

I had no clue what it meant. Write with authority?

I puzzled over it for years. Did it mean less attribution? More attribution? Lots of declarative sentences? I wasn't sure.

The feelings of being a subpar writer plagued me at my next job. I feel like I never measured up. Major imposter syndrome! But I kept at it. My anger at being told I wasn't a good writer fueled me for years, and I didn't give up.

So how did I become a better writer? How did I find out what writing with authority means?

I became a better writer because I started reading and writing fiction. I had always read fiction in high school and in college. But then when I became a journalist I started to focus more on non-fiction. I read narrative nonfiction books and devoured newspapers in the New Yorker and things that were considered good journalism writing.

And don't get me wrong. You should absolutely read quality narrative nonfiction. It is inspiring to see what great writers due for news outlets. I recommend The New Yorker, The Atlantic, The New York Times Sunday Magazine.

But reading a lot of fiction — a lot of good fiction and bad fiction — helped me immeasurably. It made me learn that great writers aren't born that way. 

Lots of practice, hard work, and reading can turn someone into an amazing writer. 

Albert Camus said, "Fiction is the lie through which we tell the truth." Fiction opens worlds and pathways in our creative heart and it makes connections in our brains.

Reading fiction, especially mass-market fiction like romance novels, thrillers, and science fiction stories that are for the masses, can help you with your writing in so many ways. When you read fiction, you learn to tell a story. You learn how to incorporate the five senses into your writing. You learn about world building. You learn about snappy dialogue. Plot, pacing, characterization — it's all there.

For me reading fiction was the biggest thing that helped me become a better journalism writer. And then once I started writing fiction, I became an even better writer overall. I also discovered what it meant to write with authority.

Here's what it means: to have a unique writing voice.

Let's break that down. In literature, voice translates to the author's use of vocabulary, tone, point of view, syntax, phrases, sentences, and paragraphs. It's how all those things flow to create a story.

Of course, some of this does start when you're plotting and crafting a book. When you're thinking of your book, your short story, or your chapter, consider the details. Pay attention to the five senses. How does the air feel for your characters? What is your main character's tone? When do they speak, and when are they quiet, and what greater truth does that hold?

You might not put everything you know on the page. It's like an iceberg — the tip above water is what readers will see. But the more you know, the more you can write with clarity and the stronger your unique writing voice will shine on the page.

My biggest regret is that I didn't start reading and writing fiction earlier in my journalism career. I didn't listen to the creative side that desperately wanted to have a voice. Use your experiences, your impressions, your opinions and your senses to create a story that's unique to YOU.

I'm going to end with a long quote by author Joan Didion to hopefully inspire you.

"I'm not telling you to make the world better, because I don't think that progress is necessarily part of the package. I'm just telling you to live in it. Not just to endure it, not just to suffer it, not just to pass through it, but to live in it. To look at it. To try to get the picture. To live recklessly. To take chances. To make your own work and take pride in it. To seize the moment. And if you ask me why you should bother to do that, I could tell you that the grave's a fine and private place, but none I think do there embrace. Nor do they sing there, or write, or argue, or see the tidal bore on the Amazon, or touch their children. And that's what there is to do and get it while you can and good luck at it."

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