How to Build Unique Character Voices

by Stephanie Morrill

Stephanie writes young adult contemporary novels and is the creator of GoTeenWriters.com. Her novels include The Reinvention of Skylar Hoyt series (Revell) and the Ellie Sweet books (Playlist). You can connect with her on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and check out samples of her work on her author website including the free novella, Throwing Stones.

As I talked about last Monday, if you've been hanging around the writing world for very long at all, you've likely heard about the importance of having a strong author voice.

But you've also probably heard about the idea of characters having their own unique voices, that you don't want all your characters to sound the same. Especially if you're writing your story in multiple points of view. Books like The Help by Kathryn Stockett and The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver are praised for how each character has a unique sound. How even if the author didn't say the character name at the start of each chapter, you would still know who it was because the character voice is so strong.

So how do all these voices—author voice and character voice—work together?

Creating strong and unique character voices is a quality of being a good writer. While it seems like character voice would steal from your author voice, somehow it doesn't.

I bet you can even think of an author you love who you would say has a great voice, but who has also written several different books with strong character voices. Let's use Jane Austen as an example. She has a unique author voice, and yet Elizabeth Bennet from Pride and Prejudice sounds nothing like Emma Woodhouse from Emma.

As we talked about last week, your author voice is something you can influence and work to develop, but it's also something that's inside of you, rooted in your unique view of the world.

Character voice, however, is something you build completely from scratch. Here's how you do it:

1. Start with their position in the story.

By this I simple mean, who is this character in the story. How old are they? What kind of money do they have? Where do they live? What kind of people are they around?

I'll use two of the male characters from my Ellie Sweet books, Palmer and Chase, as an example. I'll just pick a few items that influence their voice, and I think you'll get a clear picture of how you can expand on this:

Palmer:

Palmer is a new kid at school: This means, particularly at the start of the story, he will still be in the "impression management" phase during conversations. He's building a new life here, and he wants to look like a cool guy.

Palmer is seventeen and from Kentucky: For my California born-and-bred main character, she'll notice the different way he says words, even though I chose not to go very heavy on dialect in my book. And being seventeen means he'll talk different than he would if he were twenty-seven or ninety-seven.

Palmer is somebody Ellie has a crush on: While at a glance it may not seem like this is something that influences Palmer's voice, it certainly does. As an author, it means that I need to figure out why Ellie likes being around him. So I designed Palmer in a way that Ellie liked talking to him. He's flirtatious and charming and (mostly) makes her feel special when they talk.

Chase:

Chase has never moved: Chase has an established reputation. This means his dialogue is built around protecting the image he has.

Chase is also seventeen, and he's from a rough part of town and a family that's had trouble with the law: With two older brothers who made life miserable for the school administration, Chase is used to teachers/classmates expecting nothing but trouble from him. A lot of times I noticed that this developed a bitter tinge toChase's dialogue. He feels like he was never given a fair chance by anybody and it impacts how he talks.

Chase is somebody who scares (and confuses) Ellie: While Palmer is a master and smooth talking girls and often says "the right thing" or what Ellie expects, I wanted Chase to unsettle her. His reputation already has her on edge, and then conversations with him never go the way she thinks they will.

(If you want to get a feel for how these two different characters play out on the page, you can read the first chapter of The Revised Life of Ellie Sweet on my website. Or you can grab the whole book for just .99 on your Kindle.)

Again, these are just three facets of Palmer and Chase's voices. You'll want to think through their education, what part of the country they live in, their religious beliefs, their favorite books, and all kinds of things to get a broader scope.

2. Think through the character's primary motivator.

My agent had me do this with a manuscript of mine when my characters were reading a bit "scattered." Ask yourself, "What is it that motivates this character through the story?"

A character like Palmer, who's eager to make a splash in a new environment, is going to act and talk differently than a character like Chase. Chase, with his tough-as-nails reputation will act different than a character who wants everyone to like him. Make sense?

3. Define your characters  in one word.

As talked about in this post, it can be really helpful to find a word that your character would use to describe themselves. The words I chose for my example characters are:

Palmer: "In control" If you pride yourself on being in control, how might that color the way you talk? You'll be careful about what you reveal, won't you? Palmer keeps conversations light and tries to always position himself so that he's showing his good side.

Chase: "Bad news" Chase's view of himself as bad news means he doesn't mind saying things that might make Ellie uncomfortable or angry.

(Let's ignore that neither of those descriptors are one word!)

4. Delve into their back story.

This is where writing magic happens, I swear. 

Our personal back stories heavily influence how we interact with people and determining your characters' histories is how you'll develop a lot of the subtext in their conversations.

My favorite method is to use character journals, which I learned from James Scott Bell. I do this by picking a character (not my main character) and then I spend time free writing in first person.

Start by picking a question that's a good springboard for rambling. The one that's most effective for me is, "Tell me about your family."

And then you just write.

I've heard my mother was once beautiful, but a marriage to a cruel man left her looking old long before her time. I guess that's why I've never really believed in marriage. All I've ever seen is how it destroys.

I'm often surprised by how long I can go on for. Pages and pages, especially if I'm nailing down the backstory of an antagonist.

I think the reason this works so well is that you're getting deep in their head and figuring out why their bad choices make sense to them. Even if what you learn during the character journal process is never actually stated in the story, knowing it will help you create a consistent, logical character.

5. Write their dialogue (and/or their point-of-view chapters) as best you can from what you've learned.

Once you've done some of those exercises, it's time to write the story to the best of your ability. In a first draft, I wouldn't worry too much about if the character voices don't seem quite right. I seem to hit my stride with the characters somewhere around the midpoint, and I try to not let that bother me, It can be fixed in edits.

6. Refine their phrasings and word choices in edits.

Inevitably, when I'm editing I come across a piece of dialogue or a joke that just doesn't suit the character. By now, I've spent so much time with these people that I usually recognize it right away. If I don't, though, my critique partners will find it.

For fun, name one of your favorite characters from literature who has a strong voice. The first one I think of is Martyr from Jill Williamson's Replication.