Friday, January 29, 2010

The Voice of "The Victor"

God has the coolest way of timing things out and bringing things together for me. I recently read The Victor by Marlayne Giron. I enjoyed it very much, and told her I would be reviewing it, but that I wanted to let my last post sit for a day or two. Something told me to wait until Friday.

Well, now I know why.

Last night, I spoke at a local writers group meeting. One of the ladies approached me after the meeting and told me that something I said had really hit home with her. I'd mentioned that when receiving critiques a writer needs to recognize the difference between correction and style change. We all have a unique voice, or writing style. It can be very hard to not impose our voice on someone else's work. So, we must all measure carefully other writers' suggestions and ask, "Is this change needed to clarify? To correct structurally or grammatically? Or is it just the other writer rewriting my sentence the way she would have worded it?"

The reason this goes along with my review of The Victor is that what stood out the most to me about this book was Marlayne's voice. The story takes place in the land of Ellioth, which is a land flavored with the taste of Medieval Times. Everything about Marlayne's writing reflects this--not just the dress and appearance of the characters, not just dialog, not just references to culture and way of life. The sentence structure, the poetic wording, the tone of her writing had me immersed!

There is nothing outlandishly new about the plot--it's classic good vs. evil, classic allegory. The good King Elloth banishes evil Baron Lucius, who decides to exact his revenge through Elloth's people. But this matters not, dear reader! For books are not here to impress us with novelties (such as sparkly vampires), they are here to transport us from our drab and dreary lives to worlds of adventure and peril, to lands unknown, to places of beauty where we can be the hero, the princess, the knight with sword blazing....

The Victor is an authentic book, with classic appeal. Just look at the cover:



What you see there is what you see inside--classic, romantic, with the occasional clash of steel.

If you want a book that is not grasping at trends, that will charm your heart, then reach for The Victor. You can purchase it through Amazon in trade paperback or Kindle edition. And you can learn more about Marlayne by visiting her site.

3 comments:

Brandon Barr said...

That's true about the style...sometimes there are just different tastes.

KM Wilsher said...

True. . .boy you make it thru three books to my one LOL ;0)

I wish I'd been there for that speech!

owo xD said...

I've seen The Victor around quite a bit lately. Marlayne seems pretty cool.

Good advice about style. That's something I think is very important for people to realize.