Voice

Two days ago, I had a conversation with my brother in which he inadvertently gave me a compliment. We were having a philosophical debate and in pointing out that I'm inherently biased on the topic, he said this: "If I picked up the first two pages of your book and didn't know ahead of time, I still could have told anyone that you had written it."

I'd have hugged him if we were debating in person instead of over the phone.

What I hope this means is that I'm writing in my voice, something I've been nervous about as I write my first novel. Whether or not my voice is any good remains to be seen by the agents, editors, and hopefully readers that will encounter my book when it's finished, but it's mine. Another hurdle jumped (I hope).

On a sad note, I'm saying goodbye to NaNoWriMo 2008. I could write any number of excuses here about tough times at the day job or getting sick for the second time in a month, but instead I'll just keep it simple: I'm just not as okay as I thought I'd be with setting aside my main project to work on anything else.