A composer's construction of distinctive voices in a text plays a crucial role in representing how life experiences shape an individual's identity, worldview, and response to one's environment and to others. It is through the careful selection of linguistic techniques that composers represent how individuals respond to life experiences, thus positioning the responder to think about significant issues in the world, as it can shape perception, personality, and interpretation of the individual. Both Merele Day's 1990s Nobel Prize for Crime Fiction "The Life and Crimes of Harry Lavender" and Carol Ann Duffy's 1980s poem "The Burglary" confront us with various crime-related characters giving us an insight into the motivations and perspectives of unique individuals. Day features both Claudia Valentine, a subverted portrayal of the tough detective, and Harry Lavender, a typical criminal mastermind. Likewise, Duffy presents an ambiguous individual who glamorizes criminal acts against society. Ultimately the expressions within the two texts ensure that readers understand the actions taken by each protagonist. Distinctive voices can be created by the composer's deliberate subversion of the reader's expectations. Within “The Life and Crimes of Harry Lavender,” Day's process of subverting the stereotype of the hardboiled detective genre through her portrayal of its female protagonist, Claudia Valentine challenges the reader's perception of women in the modern world in a context of the end of the 20th century. Claudia's masculinized voice shows her choice to impede her femininity, the use of masculine expressions and crude images that compare her discovery to a "shit sandwich on three-day old bread" and describe Sally Villos as a "cold bitch…..half of the card…drives me crazy” indicating the confusing connection between the character and the snowman This indicates that the snowman symbolizes not only the cold in the speaker's life but also his own loneliness, but when he destroys the snowman, “he chased him away.” Again. Once again, the use of truncated sentences and repetitions emphasizes this action. Self-destructive behavior shows the insecure and self-loathing personality. The attribution of a profound personality to an individual allows the reader to empathize with the difficulties experienced. Therefore, "The Life and Crimes of Harry Lavender" by Day and the poem Duffy's "Stealing" indicates how creating distinctive voices in lyrics is crucial. Both texts show how composers are able to shape and influence the individual through significant life experiences.