Active Voice in Fiction and Ghostwriting: Why It Matters

Why does active voice matter in fiction and ghostwriting?

Put “The weapon was drawn by Jessica” into a firefight and the reader has to wait until the end of the sentence to find out who’s holding the gun. Across 80,000 words, those delays add up to prose that sits there waiting for something to happen. For more, see capturing client voice.

After writing dozens of novels and ghostwriting 54+ books, I write in active voice by default.

Not because a grammar teacher said to. Because active voice does three things that matter in both fiction and nonfiction: it controls pacing, it creates clarity, and it puts the reader closer to the action. This is how each of those works in practice. For more, see using slang in fiction.

I have strong feelings about this one. Passive voice is the most common way I know for a good story to get buried in its own sentences, and too many writers call it style when they’ve simply stopped paying attention. Fiction and ghostwriting both pay for it. The novel drags, and the client’s business book sounds like it came from a committee afraid of being quoted.

How Does Active Voice Control Pacing?

Pacing in fiction is about how fast the reader processes events, not how fast events happen. Active voice sentences read faster than passive voice sentences because they’re shorter, more direct, and require less parsing. The reader’s brain moves from subject to verb to object without detours.

“Danny kicked the door open” reads faster than “The door was kicked open by Danny.” Same event. Different speed. In an action sequence, that speed difference multiplied across dozens of sentences determines whether the scene feels urgent or sluggish.

An action scene written in passive voice reads like an insurance claim filed after the fact. The reader should be inside the event, and every door that “was kicked” and every shot that “was fired” moves them back out to the waiting room.

In Shield of Ashes, where seven days of escalating nuclear war unfold in sequence, pacing had to stay relentless, and passive constructions would have slowed every scene. “Missiles were launched by the coalition” puts the missiles first and the people second. “The coalition launched missiles” puts the decision-makers first, and the tension comes from them, because people making choices under pressure are more interesting than the hardware they deploy.

The reverse is also true. When you want pacing to slow down, when a character is processing grief or absorbing a realization, passive constructions can create that heaviness deliberately. “The letter had been read three times before she set it down” has a weight that “She read the letter three times” doesn’t have. The passive voice here creates distance. That serves the emotional beat. Active voice is the default. Passive voice is the exception you deploy on purpose.

How does active voice make writing clearer?

Clarity is the most underrated quality in fiction. Readers who have to reread a sentence to figure out who did what are doing grammar homework. Active voice eliminates most of that confusion by putting the actor first.

“The committee approved the proposal” is clear. “The proposal was approved” leaves the reader wondering: by whom? In fiction, that ambiguity rarely serves the story. In ghostwriting, it can undermine the client’s authority. A business book that says “Results were achieved” sounds like nobody was responsible. “Our team achieved results” gives the credit where the client wants it.

In a business book, that vagueness costs the client something real. Somebody who built a company and took the risks deserves sentences that say so. When a manuscript turns every decision into something that “was made,” readers come away unsure the author did anything, and the client hired a ghostwriter to create the opposite impression.

This matters more in action sequences than anywhere else. The AI-Enhanced Awful Writing Handbook covers the “overcrowded action sentence” problem: writers cramming too many simultaneous events into one sentence because action scenes feel like they should be dense. The fix starts with active voice and simple sentences. “He dove through the window” is clear. “The window was crashed through as shots were being fired while the helicopter circled overhead” is a puzzle the reader has to solve instead of a scene they get to experience.

Human cognition processes events sequentially. Active voice delivers events sequentially. Passive voice asks readers to work backward from the result to the cause. In an action scene, that extra cognitive step kills momentum.

How does active voice bring the reader closer?

The distance between the reader and the story is controlled partly by voice. Active voice reduces that distance. When the subject acts, the reader watches someone do something. When the action happens to the subject, the reader watches something happen to someone. The first feels immediate. The second feels reported.

“Jessica grabbed the controls and pulled hard” puts the reader in the cockpit. “The controls were grabbed and pulled” puts the reader in a debriefing room hearing about it afterward. Both convey the same information. One creates experience. The other creates summary.

This distinction matters enormously in ghostwriting. Clients hire me because they want their book to sound like them, and most people speak in active voice naturally. When someone tells you a story over coffee, they say “I called the investor and pitched the deal.” They don’t say “The investor was called by me and the deal was pitched.” If the ghostwritten book sounds more formal and passive than the client sounds in person, the voice is wrong. Active voice keeps the manuscript in line with how the client communicates.

A client knows when the voice is right. A memoir client of mine read her first chapter and started crying, then told me I’d caught her perfectly, exactly what she wanted. The same thing happened with the second chapter. I don’t believe a draft full of passive constructions gets that reaction from anybody.

When Does Passive Voice Work?

Active voice is the default. Passive voice is a tool. There are specific situations where passive voice serves the writing better.

When the actor is unknown or unimportant: “The village was destroyed overnight.” The reader doesn’t know who did it yet, and that mystery is the point.

If the result matters more than the cause: “Three hundred people were evacuated.” The focus belongs on the people. For more on channeling voice and emotion in a book, hear Richard on Robert Plank Show.

When you want emotional distance: “She had been told the news hours earlier, and still couldn’t process it.” The passive construction creates a numb, disconnected feeling that matches the character’s state. Any time the rhythm of the paragraph needs variation: A page of nothing but subject-verb-object sentences becomes monotonous. An occasional passive construction breaks the pattern and keeps the prose from feeling mechanical.

It comes down to intentionality. Passive voice that shows up because the writer wasn’t paying attention weakens prose. Passive voice deployed for effect strengthens it. The difference is whether you chose it or defaulted into it.

How do you fix passive voice in revision?

Most passive voice in manuscripts isn’t intentional. It accumulates during drafting when the writer focuses on getting ideas down instead of crafting sentences. That’s fine. First drafts aren’t meant to be polished. But revision is where active voice does its work.

My own first drafts pick up plenty of passive constructions, and I have to go through and change them to active in editing. I find that amusing, and I’d probably do better if I learned to write active the first time. Active voice isn’t normal for most people, so the first draft tends to come out passive. My drafts also run heavy on adjectives and on transitions I later find unnecessary, and words like “obviously” come out in editing too.

My revision process includes a pass for voice and sentence construction.

I look for “was” and “were” constructions, “had been” phrases, and any sentence where the subject isn’t doing the action. I don’t change every instance. But I evaluate every instance. Is this passive for a reason? Does it serve pacing, clarity, or emotional distance? If yes, it stays. If it’s just habit, I rewrite it.

I use AI every day as a digital assistant for transcripts, summaries and first-pass outlines. I still do the writing, and the voice pass is mine. A tool can flag every “was” in a chapter, but deciding which one carries the grief in a scene and which one is plain laziness takes a writer’s judgment.

This applies to ghostwriting as much as fiction. Client manuscripts go through the same scrutiny. A business book that says “Decisions were made to restructure the department” is weaker than “I restructured the department.” The first avoids responsibility. The second claims it. For a client who wants their book to establish authority, active voice is a strategic choice.

Plenty of my clients have limited written English or none at all, and that’s one of the main reasons they hire me. A story told out loud almost always has somebody doing something in it, whatever language the teller is most at home in. My job is to keep that energy on the page, and a passive-heavy manuscript throws it away.

What is a practical test for passive voice?

Read your sentences aloud. If you can’t identify who’s doing what within the first few words, the sentence is probably passive. If the sentence feels like it’s reporting an event instead of showing one, it’s probably passive. If the sentence uses “by” to identify the actor after the action, it’s definitely passive.

The fix is usually simple. Find the actor. Put them first. Let them do the thing. “The report was written by the team” becomes “The team wrote the report.” “A decision was reached after hours of debate” becomes “After hours of debate, we reached a decision.” The information stays the same. The energy changes completely.

“Mistakes were made” is a notorious passive sentence in English because it’s how people dodge. Readers trust an author who writes “I got that wrong” far more than one who hides behind grammar.

Active voice gives prose the energy and clarity that keep readers turning pages, and I don’t care whether the draft started with a pencil, a keyboard or an AI tool. What matters is whether the reader stays engaged. If they don’t, it’s just another crappy book no matter how it was written, and a manuscript full of things being done by nobody is one of the fastest ways I know to lose them.

For more on prose quality, common writing mistakes, and how to fix them, see the AI-Enhanced Awful Writing Handbook. For complete guidance on fiction craft, visit my writing courses.

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