Writing in a character's voice. How deep should I go with immersion?

I am writing a story that has ten main characters, each chapter is a progression of the story but from the perspective of one of the ten.

As you can imagine, this presents it's own unique challenges, which I'm looking forward to overcoming. To differentiate between each of the ten characters, I obviously need to give each character their own, distinct personality, along with a number of traits that identify each character from another.

As each character is explored through their own perspective, would it be advisable to mould the writing style to suit the character's personality?

John:

He placed the broom against the back of the door. He liked it there. He felt safe. Calm.

Mary:

John was such a weirdo; sometimes Mary would wish he would just disappear and leave them all alone. His weirdo ways, his weirdo OCD, his weirdo... face.

Granted the above are just hugely trivial examples, but as you can see, I've tried to give each part, from each perspective, it's own 'voice'. John is very formal, set in his ways, and so his perspectives are constructed primarily of short, directed sentences. With Mary, the ditzy blonde, some of her vocabulary even seeps into the narrative - 'weirdo', and her ability - or lack thereof - to quip at John's expense.

My question is: is this type of practice advisable, and if so, how deep does the rabbit-hole go?

posted almost 10 years ago

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Dan Hanly‭

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