How do y'all feel about first person present tense vs. third person present tense vs. mixed first and third present tense?
Especially pertaining to chick lit.
I've been writing in first person, as is the norm in the industry, but there's so much that I want to show that would require going away from the MC for a little bit.
I'm considering using a mixed 1st and 3rd present tense, a la Jemima J, but it sounds difficult. Would you prefer to read something that was all in 3rd person, or mixed?
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Abr 18, 2008 - 06 56
I'm writing my in 3rd person limited omniscient, where the narration enters the thoughts of the main character, but views all other characters objectively. It works for me.
My suggestion would be to find the type of narration that works best for you. Try a few different ways. Play with it.
50,240 / 50,000
Mayo 3, 2008 - 00 13
I agree with dharmashanti's advice.
My thoughts would be that First Person [usually] is present tense while Third Person is past.
What /might/ work, as I've tried this and it has succeeded, is to write in Third, but occasionally slip into italics and First Person.
But above all, just do what feels the most comfortable.
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Mayo 5, 2008 - 16 41
That's confusling. I think that 3rd person would work, but I don't thing you should do a mix. It would probably get confusing for either you or the reader...
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Mayo 9, 2008 - 10 36
I've heard that first person is considered sort of "beginner" in writing. I guess because it's easier to tell a story as "I" than "she". But it does make sense in chick lit - first person makes the reader identify more closely with the protagonist and they're more likely to feel part of the story. Third person gives you more room to move around between perspectives, but ultimately the reader doesn't identify as closely.
So it depends on what you want to achieve. Third person could be more useful if you want to tell a complicated multi-character story, rather than focusing on "everything happening to me". Multi-character tells a story that can be a little more sophisticated, whereas first person in a way goes back to the adolescent way of thinking that the world revolves around "me".
If you want to focus on one person's struggle to achieve something - find romance, succeed in career, reconnect with family - it might lend itelf better to first person. But if you're focused more on the impact on a group of people - a family, a class, a group of colleagues - then third person would achieve that better. So if you feel like third person is right for your story, then you should probably go with your gut. You can easily switch between third person perspectives, but switching between third and first is a little more complicated without tags of some sort (eg, a third-person character reads someone's first-person diary, or you have chapters separating out the first-person narrative - perhaps with a title like "Suzy's story", etc).