The Voice – Anne Bishop

Sometimes you read a story which changes the way you view your world and how you feel about who you are. A message jumps out of the narrative and axiomatically smacks you in the face leaving you in stunned silence as you turn the last page. Not to be dramatic or anything here but this is exactly what happened to me while reading The Voice by Anne Bishop.

Though I have not read one of Anne Bishop's books in years, the last one was Belladonna, I am a huge fan. If asked for my top five authors Ms Bishop would definitely get a mention, the original Black Jewels trilogy would make the list of greatest things I have ever read. I'm not wanting to sound all fangirl or anything, rather I am trying to honestly admit I was always going to like Ms Bishop's novella The Voice and give it a favourable review.

No one writes dark fantasy quite like Anne Bishop, gritty and not always pleasant the truth is not hidden from the characters who find themselves traversing her inner worlds, nor is it obscured from the reader. Sometimes bad things happen to good people and bad people alike, a fact Ms Bishop has never sugar coated in any of her work I have had the pleasure of reading.

The Voice delivers exactly what I expected it too when I made my purchase, reading it was like watching a sad movie, I knew I was going to cry way before the first tears filled my eyes. For me there is something cathartic about immersing myself in fiction which allows real emotions to bubble to the surface.

There are times I don't recognise the need to release negative feeling until afterwards, other times I will seek out a tear jerking movie or book (Thelma and Louise saw me through a lot of teenage angst) chasing the euphoria of emotional release. This euphoric release is exactly what The Voice gave me. It is a more a fable than a story, an engrossing lesson in the need to deal with our darker emotions and not just let them fester inside or worse still foist them on others.

In a small village, Nalah is taught to feed her sorrow to 'The Voice', a poor mute orphan who was in fact the recipient for the entire village's unfavourable emotions. Upon a visit to the city of Vision Nalah is shown a better way to lance her soul of its sorrow, this is where the plan to escape a toxic life and save those who can be saved begins to form.

The morals of this fable are clear, nourish your body with food rather than punish it, acknowledge and then deal with your pain without inflicting it on others and lastly, one of the most important messages for me personally, one person may not be able to save the world but if they try they may just save one person from the world.

The Voice is a story about purging ourselves of toxicity, letting our anguish out and moving on. You see Nalah lance her own soul of sorrow and help her friends and 'The Voice' ameliorate their noxious feelings as well. It would be impossible to read Anne Bishop's novella The Voice without Lancing your own soul of some of its sorrow. Definitely (and obviously) the whole 5 teabags for this one, a perfect cup of tea I know I will be tasting again.

What books have changed the way you view the world?