One of writing’s toughest elements for me to grasp is the concept of voice. It’s been a mountain to climb to develop it, particularly when I didn’t quite understand what it was and how it affected story. It’s not all that easy to pin down–unless you read a story that shouts of it.
What I’ve come to discover about voice is that its primary attribute is honesty. Sadly, I see that the best of my writing has been when the voice is given its force from the depths of memory of my own living. Enhanced, of course, and often as not, played down a bit to mask the sometimes-too-real emotion or event that acts as base.
So, while all is fiction, all fiction has a grounding in reality. What can and should be gleaned from recall is the feeling, the reaction, the caring or change that came out of an event. Then, the event can be recreated into something else of similar import if not occurrence, and the voice is what will carry the story.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology