McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft
First verses Third
parthagenon:
There are a couple books that play with first/third a bit. Both Elizabeth Bear and Patricia Briggs (and probably more that I don't know) have used a combination of first and third.
Briggs' Dragon Blood uses first person for one main character, and third for the other. In this case, it might be a holdover from the previous book in the duology, Dragon Bones, which had only one viewpoint character in first person- when she added the second, it would have felt strange to have the same character suddenly in third person instead. It's a bit odd at first, but you can definitely mix it up with viewpoints, as long as you don't have fifty characters all in first person.
Bear uses first/third very well in her Promethean age and Edda of Burdens series, but it's more of a stylistic choice. One character, after losing her name and soul, suddenly switches from third to first person narration (everybody else is third) to indicate that she no longer has a name. Another is always in first person, present tense instead of past tense, so give an animalistic feel to the character.
meg_evonne:
I've been told that the secret to 1st POV is an extremely strong character voice. Another sample you might try is Charlie Huston's Joe Pitt's casebooks. :-)
Sir Huron Stone:
--- Quote ---That one's easy; put in a frame where somebody later on is reading their grandfather's diary.
--- End quote ---
Or the person's ghost telling their story to some young person...
teamlash:
I write part of my story in the first person, then switch it away to third person for a couple of chapters so that the reader knows what's going down, even if the protagonist doesn't. A lot of people say that you can't do that, but there are no rules to fiction :D write in whichever way makes you happiest and feels right!
newtinmpls:
By habit I write third, and hop about inside different characters heads, so though I have a primary POV character, I also get into other folks' heads.
The first NaNoWriMo I succeeded at was a 1st person, done mostly as a challenge to myself. Worked out okay.
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