On a coolish autumn night in New York's Lower East Side...

A reading. In front of an audience--that, let it be said, contained only two friends of mine. Only two people I knew from before that night. Everyone else--and it was a pretty solid crowd--was a stranger or had been until an hour or so earlier.

The crowd.

#atozchallenge: Voice

"Voice is the je ne sais quoi of spirited writing. It separates brochures and brilliance, memo and memoir, a ship's log and The Old Man and the Sea."
~ Constance Hale, Sin and Syntax

Voice. The je ne sais quoi of spirited writing. I love that. (This book, by the way, is the core of a writer's joie de vivre. If you haven't read it, get it now. Nothing will ever be the same.)

But what is voice? What is that je ne sais quoi? Is it just language and syntax, how a writer chooses to put sentences together? Does it have to do with subject matter? With characters? With the writer's vision of the world?

All of it? None of it?

Undefinable as it is, voice is the most visible quality in writing. And nowhere is that more apparent than in an anthology of short fiction.

2014: A Year In Stories
A twelve-volume anthology published by Pure Slush Books

He thinks it's time now to find a cab or a hotel but the crush of bodies around him becomes greater, another throng of people swept up in religious fervor. This is what he wants: ecstasy and spectacle, animal sacrifice and widow-burning and fire-walking. This is why he has come to India, after all. Isn't it? 

~ Azure, by John Wentworth Chapin (2014 March Vol. 3)

BTW I was thinking, maybe you might want some assistance, just to speed the editing up a little, because it's taking a little longer than it would normally, probably because summer has hit you early and that red pen can get a little slippy and slidey all over the page.

~ Schöne Grüße aus Tirol, Sally-Anne Macomber (2014 March Vol. 3)

Jump out of bed. Shower. Blow-dry hair. Apply makeup. Put on mom costume. Walk down hall to kids' rooms. Wake them for school. Same thing, Monday through Friday, August through May. Rinse and repeat. This is your life on motherhood.  

~ Rinse and Repeat, by h. l. nelson (2014 March Vol. 3)

As Stevie reaches into his backpack he weighs what he dislikes about Rick, starting with the fact that he knows it was Rick--Rickie back then--who stole his Star Wars lunchbox in the seventh grade. It was not from the new series either; it was vintage, from the original ancient series from his parents' wonder years.

~ No. 2 Pencil, by Michelle Elvy (2014 April Vol. 4)

It isn't baseball weather. Grey and forbidding, with a misting rain falling out of low, angry clouds, it's soup and blanket weather for most, but just another early season day in another city for us. Nobody wants to play--not the sparse group of diehard fans huddled under cover; not the umpires, huddled inside until the last possible moment; not the ground crew warming their hands over the hot dog steam; and certainly not the players, conscious of the fragile bodies they are compensated so well for using. 

~ Fourth Inning, by Michael Webb (2014 April Vol. 4)

Do you have a favorite author? Could you recognize their work among others'? What do you think makes a writer's voice unique? Is it only writers who have it? What constitutes style? Is it something we're born with, like blue eyes or brown? Or is it something we can cultivate?

~ * ~ 

Yes, I realize V day was yesterday for the rest of the A-to-Z world. Seeing as I haven't behaved this week, I'm giving up my day off tomorrow and posting W then. Sorry :(

Thanks for the visit!

#atozchallenge: One Night Only

I've nothing against having sex for the sake of sex; it might even be (speaking purely hypothetically here) a healthy pursuit. How do you feel about one-night stands? Have you ever had one? Would you? (And if you did, would you admit it?)

2014: A Year In Stories
A twelve-volume anthology published by Pure Slush Books

But are one-nighters really about just sex? Or is that another gender-biased subject--men being allowed (or perceived to be allowed) more sexual freedom than women, as Barb commented on yesterday's post)?

Want a taste of January?

In Carmine, by John Wentworth Chapin (2014 January, Vol. 1), Charles picks up Tony (or, rather, Maybe-Tony) at a bar, and they go back to his place. Instead of sex, however, they end up talking all night.

In Michael Webb's 2014 story cycle, Mark Hamilton tries to have a one night stand once, and considers it one other time. Athlete families are notorious for infidelity, and it is not uncommon to hear about "understandings" between couples that allow for dalliances, as long as no unwanted consequences, either paternal or microbial, taint the family unit. Mark is of two minds about it--he loves his wife, but it is hard to be away from her for so long, and especially when their phone calls are concerned with family business and not anything intimate. He feels entitled, sometimes, as the breadwinner, to get what he wants when he wants, but he almost always feels too guilty to follow through with it.

Stephen, from Stephen V. Ramey's cycle, grew up believing in free love and disconnection between sex and emotion. Only he was too insecure to ever initiate or even participate in such things. He was one of those guys who goes to a strip bar and tries to meet the stripper's eyes. He would never join a club that would have him as a member. Since marrying Anne, he has not even considered an outside affair. Whatever else you say about Stephen, he is loyal. Even as his marriage is dissolving beneath his feet, he turns a blind eye to outside opportunities for love and sex. Which is why Rose is such a surprise to him, mainly because he's never considered the possibility that Anne might be jealous of another woman. In his thinking, Anne has been putting up with him out of pity for the last several years. He can't imagine that she sees anything in him worth her love.

And of her character Nadia, Mandy Nicol says, "One night stand? Given the opportunity and a few strong drinks Nadia would certainly be up for one, or two. A bit of fun with no commitment or responsibility? Sounds perfect for her. But she'd better do it out of town or there will be talk."

Memoria de Mis Putas Tristes

There's that gender thing again. Why does the girl worry about "talk" when the guys don't?

Gabriel García Márquez left this world today, and left it--unlike 99.99% of the population--a much better place than he found it. In honor of that, and of the sheer marvelousness of him, we'll give him the last word:

“Sex is the consolation when love ends.” 

― Gabriel Garcí­a Márquez, Memoria de Mis Putas Tristes 

Why is it that we so often confuse the two?

~ * ~ 

Thank you for the visit, and happy A-to-Z-ing!