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Breaking Free as a Woman Writer
How to find your unique voice
I have to be one of the few people of my generation to select “creative writing” as a career choice in middle school, high school, and continuing through graduate school who actually did it. While I’ve done many different jobs throughout my life, the one constant has been writing for myself — but I’ve also quit fiction writing for long periods, up to eight years at a time.
Am I writing advice for aspiring writers? Well — maybe. I’m particularly writing for women who want to find their own voice.
First, working for yourself is important. When I lived in Woodland Hills (2003–2005), I took film courses at UCLA Extension, where the instructor, a really great guy who had worked on Star Trek: The Next Generation and similar shows, quickly realized I “wasn’t like the other students.” In Los Angeles, I estimate at least 75% of the population either has a script or is working on one. Even with such a huge number of people working at writing, it’s not often that writers are able to discover their unique voice. At this time I also worked on media tie-in novels for a popular show, along with the popular show’s star.
It was Apollo from the original Battlestar Galactica! How is this amazing? Who did I have a crush on in Junior High?
