Patterns

This post follows on from Monday's post last week on examining your voice in writing. I was really interested to see how people described my voice; it was all very positive, which was touching. Thank you :)

I’d like to build on the concept of voice a little bit today and talk about patterns in writing. I mentioned last week that I could tell who had written what from my CC friends, and if you take another look, you’ll notice that mostly what I referred to was patterns in their writing.

Voice – patterns; patterns – voice. Same thing? Maybe.

So what patterns can I see in my own writing?

First of all, characters. The friend who I quoted last post described my characters as mostly being softies with a core of steel. Let’s have a look at how that holds up:

Athara, from The Black Gates – Yup, definitely true here. Athara is forced into becoming her town’s Healer when her mother dies unexpectedly, and for a long while she’s overwhelmed by it all - and then she realises that no one is going to step in and solve the problem for her; she has to do it herself.

Callie from Magician's Thunder - she'd kill me if she thought I was calling her a softie, but really, she is. She doesn't want to get involved, using the excuse that the entire idea of magicians is stupid - but really, she's afraid. It's not until her little sister goes missing that she realises how strong she can be...

The original Jess from Jesscapades - A tricky one, here. Reading through the draft, she comes across softer than she ought to be. I'm working on that for the next draft.

And to round it out with the boys, Logan from Logan's Prize, the unnamed MC from Neighbourhood Watch, and Toby from Guns and Ostriches.


Also, a lot of my characters seem to be YA. I wonder if that's because that's truly what I enjoy writing more, or if it's my 'lack of life experience' (frog, how I hate that phrase) showing through.

Settings: Well, since I write urban & contemporary fantasy, we're of course going to list suburban and urban settings. But recently, also, schools! We have the Evil Overlord Academy, the Shard Academy, the Secret Breaker Academy, Fiddlefern Elementary, Olivia Batterby's school,

Themes: Redemption. Confronting your inner darkness. Making peace with yourself. Fighting for what's right. Making peace with your life.

Other Randoms: Souls. Glass and other shiny objects. Magic being tied somehow to colour; colour in general. Whenever I think of magic, I see an iridescent shimmery rainbow glow cast over everything. Animals, both made-up and real. Sisters. Demons o.O

So, how about you? What totally random things show up often in your writing?