: Re: Writing in a Christian voice I'm Jewish. My middle-grade fantasy novel is very Jewish. Most of my characters are either Jews or converts/future converts or people with at least one Jewish

@Fox6458700

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How do you write a believable Christian voice for Pam?

You may take other people's advice, as mentioned by other posters here, but you may also take another approach.

Google "How do I become a Baptist Christian?" or "How do I become a Christian? Baptist."
Read Christianity for Dummies.
Believe in Jesus... or pretend to believe in Jesus.
Read Baptist Christian interpretations of scripture.
Read Baptist Christian apologetics.
Absorb as much of the worldview as you can.
Imagine that you are a Baptist Christian. Write a diary entry. Then, take Pam's scenario. Write her diary entry.
Give your work to a Black Baptist Christian reader for critique.
If all else fails, co-author with a Black Baptist Christian.

At the end of the day, fiction is fiction. It is not supposed to be real. If you are writing to a group of Jewish readers, then they wouldn't care if Pam's opinions are accurate or not; and they probably couldn't tell if Pam's opinions are true. If Pam's opinions make sense in the plot of the story, then that's all that matters. Accuracy is really not that important. However, we live in a globalized community, and something we say in books can offend some people of the global human population, especially when we write the book in a global language (English). Therefore, we have become like that Aesop's fable about the man, his son, and his ass. We must be sensitive to the feelings of diverse readers, or else that might hurt our sales. When actual Christian readers look at the work, with their opinions and worldviews, and they cannot empathize with Pam, then Pam will feel like a fake character to them. In the digital age, they will probably express their opinions online, giving your book a negative rating and review. In a global community, your reputation may be tarnished, because of those negative ratings and reviews.

In absolute terms, fiction is fiction; it is make-believe, based on the author's imagination. If you are not X, then you cannot represent the authentic voice of X. You cannot claim that you represent the authentic voice of X. The story is not a historical document, in which you are documenting things that happened. The story is derived from your mind, focusing on the plot and characters. As the narrator of that story, you have to make the reader empathize with the characters. If you have readers from very diverse backgrounds, then that would be much more difficult than readers from similar backgrounds, because you have to tend to their likes, dislikes, and sensibilities. There are billions of people in the world; you simply cannot please everybody.

So, practically speaking, making a believable voice for a character is imagining what that character would say, but also listening to your diverse readers or target group so that you don't offend them. The "believable voice" is in no way authentic, because it is still derived from your mind. However, people from different backgrounds can empathize with the character, and that's what makes the character "authentic" to them.

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