Vol 1 | Issue 15
Before we start…
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We’ve all heard it. “Find your voice,” they say. But what actually is this and how on earth do you find it?
Perhaps it’s one of those trick questions, like sending the newbie off to find tartan paint…
And then I found it.
My voice that is, I’m still looking for the paint.
Spill the tea
I don’t want to go all twee on you and tell you that it’s different for everyone and when you find it; you’ll know. Or that when you stop looking, you’ll find it, because that's spectacularly unhelpful.
But I can confirm that once I realised it was there, it was as obvious as the nose on my face.
I will say that you need to find your own ways of discovering it, but I am very happy to share my own… ah… awakening.
First, I want to bake your noodle
Unlike the Oracle from the Matrix, I won’t talk in riddles. But I will pose the question: How much writing do you need to have done before you can find you voice?
And I would argue that you’d need to have done a fair bit. Even if that’s just short stories or scripts you’ve written for yourself over the years that have never seen the light of day. Not because your voice is buried somewhere waiting to be discovered. But because the evidence is already there. You just need to go mining for it.
Mining has become a term that means searching for [content/photos of your friends when they were embarrassing dorky teenagers by befriending their parents on facebook/etc], it essentially means you have to put on your best Lara Croft boots and go digging.
Those of you who know me, know I love a bit of self-reflection. And this is how I discovered my writer’s voice.
Top tip: It isn’t a list of premises from your latest WIPs.
Hi-ho it’s off to work we go
Re-read your work. As much as you can bare, from as recently or as old as you want. Some of you might have an exceptionally good memory for the things you commit to paper, in which case you could probably skip this part. It works just as well to reflect deeply on your latest projects, at least six I would say.
Freewrite (sort of). Think about the themes of each of your scripts. The types of characters; they journey, wants and needs. The tone. Think about why you wanted to write them, what you wanted to say about yourself, the world, a person, a moment.
Pretty soon you’ll have something that looks a little like this:
Contemporary Drama | Pilot | gender representation, challenging perception, positive female relationships
Period Drama | Pilot | reframing the villain, challenging perceptions, female representation, positive female relationships
Comedy | short | challenging stereotypes and perceptions, female representation, positive female relationships
I could go on. But I think you see my point.
Each one of these is a uniquely different story premise, different characters, different genres even! But the core of my writing is the same; my voice has become clear.
My name is Helen Tompson. I write grounded genre that focuses on female representation, and narratives that challenge our perception, particularly around stereotypes and female relationships on screen.
These are the things that are important to me.
This is the part of my inner self that most wants to be heard. In spades.
Task for this week: Find your plum line. Reflect on your work and find the common theme.
Where does this come from?
Einstein’s theory of relativity means that it’s all your parent’s fault (an oldie but a goldie)
But seriously, this is the part that does get a little bit murky. So strap in.
If you’re struggling to see the plum line through your work, ask yourself WHY no less than seven times.
FML Helen.
But trust me. Give it a go.
I can’t ask you to do something I won’t do myself, so here goes…
Why is representation and perception important to you? Because it feels personal to me, as a woman.
But why? Because I have two daughters, and I want to be part of shaping the world that they live in.
Why? Because I feel it is not terribly different from the world I grew up in.
Why? Because people misjudge me by seeing me as a stereotype.
Why? Because I was a young carer. Because we were very disadvantaged. Because I left school early. Because I was in the system. Because I was a young single mum living in a council flat. Because we lived on food boxes. Because I am a woman.
Why? Because they were wrong.
Why? Because they never took the time to know the truth.
And that is what I love to find in my writing. I want to engage my audiences in active viewing, I want to take them on a journey to discover the truth about a character, by challenging perceptions and stereotypes.
And it means that in every project I am instinctively asking of the work:
What happens when the truth about someone is very different from the story the world tells about them?
Caution
None of us stays the same. We change through age, experience, success, disappointment, parenthood, loss, work, and simply living.
All of this means our voice will change too. Mine certainly has over the years. Keep a weather eye on that.
What do you do with all this knowledge and power?
Keep refining it. Before you know it, you’ll be standing at a networking event straining to hear the words, “So, what do you write about?” and there it is: your voice in less than 30 words.
They will know that you aren’t writing about your trauma over and over, but they will know you’re writing about what makes you, you. That you write from your experiences rather than about your experiences. And they will feel the passion and conviction of the fire that burns within you when you tell them.
Tell me: What do you write about?
Helen
NB. I had a lovely email in my inbox from Chloe (hi Chloe!) asking about how to progress a script into something made. So…
Next up… How on Earth Do You Get Your Work Made? From page to production.
© Helen Tompson 2026 | Feel free to share this newsletter with other writers. If you'd like to reproduce or quote larger sections, just drop me a message first.