Crafting Authentic Voice by Tom Romano was published in 2004 and is a book that can be used for many different purposes. Romano’s own voice dances throughout the pages. The book almost gives the effect of being in the same room as Romano listening to him speak at a conference about writing and voice. His purpose in writing this book was to help his readers develop their “voice” within their writing. He specifically talks about how he wants the reader to “take away ideas, teaching strategies, and examples of strong voice that move you and others along in writing” (Romano 9) from Crafting Authentic Voice. The book is an easy read but don’t let that fool you. It is eloquently written with humor, personal stories, and tips on how to implement voice-developing techniques in your own writing as well as how to teach this life skill in the classroom.
                 This book was a joy to read, and I could not put it down. The book is separated into 5 parts: “The Delight and Dilemma of Voice,” “Qualities of Voice,” “Trust the Gush,” “Crafting Authentic Voice,” and “Voice and Identity.” It was very well constructed so that the reader was not bored or not curious to know what was on the next page. Romano presents short chapters filled with direct quotes from colleagues, esteemed writers, professors, etc. and sprinkles anecdotal stories of his own throughout the text. By providing so many different people’s perspectives on this one topic – voice – he allows the reader to make of it what they will. He lets the reader decide for themselves whether or not they think they’ll be able to use his strategies.
                 Some of his chapters begin with a quote at the top in between the title and text. Occasionally, before a chapter, he has what is titled “Antipasto”, and he describes this as, “the first course that serves as an appetizer” (Romano 8). These two page snippets are specifically to get the reader ready for what the ensuing chapter is about. He integrates a lot of student writing; for example, chapter twelve is a personal account of the first day of school written by a high school senior.
                  He tells of different teaching experiences he’s had, times he’s been at conferences, times he’s been observing in someone else’s classroom, and many more personal stories of how he’s used the very voice-finding techniques he’s preaching. Once the reader gets about halfway through, Romano hones in on the teaching tips and examples.  He makes it easy to see how the strategies of past teachers could be executed in our classrooms. He gives activities with titles above the descriptions. Again, a slew of student work is provided so as the reader and potential teacher can get an idea of what to look for. This is obviously where I’ll turn to for tips and advice from a wise veteran writer on how to run my classroom writing workshops.
                 Romano stressed how important it is to write immediately when something comes to you and to let go of the formulaic and mechanical rules about writing that have been drilled into your brain. This is a struggle for me, and it has been for as long as I can remember. This disconnect with my own voice can be shown in me when I am asked to proofread someone’s paper. I pick it apart sentence by sentence, word by word, and I basically try to restructure and rewrite the whole thing.
                  When a paper is assigned. I edit it as I go and I don’t let my initial thoughts just flow out onto the page. I am too in love with the rules and don’t pay attention to content enough. It’s almost as if I’m a robot simply trying to push a product out on the assembly line. I’m forgetting about the most important thing: passion. If your writing does not have passion, then where’s the voice? It’s non-existent. Romano calls it “trusting the gush,” meaning to trust the wave of thoughts that initially come to your mind when you sit in front of the computer. Just go with it. He says, “When language and strong feeling are upon [you], that is the time to write” (Romano 49). I need to apply this to my own writing because if I do not, my own voice within my writing will not continue to develop and grow. It will stay at a crossroads between over-structured and confinement. He insists that when this so-called passion comes upon you, “that’s a likely time that you will forget about audience and protocol and correctness and procedures and get to your unfettered voice” (Romano 51).
                  Once I put this into practice and I think I have a handle on just “going with it”, I will try to pass this knowledge and insight onto my middle school students in the future. This is what free writing is for, right? This is what “shitty first drafts” are for. I can’t let the rules of writing bog my students or me down. Evident with Crafting Authentic Voice, Tom Romano already has this technique down for himself, but I think that’s the whole point of his book. He wanted to be able to pass this rich knowledge down to the next generation of great writers. He knows that with practice and fantastic teachers the skill of making it seem like it’s “Claire” on the other side of that paper is a necessary skill to have in order to keep this world interesting. Besides, we all are our own person. We all have our own voices and are not robots, contrary to what some may think about writers. Tom Romano wants us to develop those individual voices so that others who read our work will know it’s us for a fact. Our readers won’t even have to take a second guess.