3rd person past tense? “He said/she ran?” Yawn. Been there, done that, it’s been written a billion times.
1st person present tense? “I say/I run?” Enh. Every young adult book does this nowadays.
2nd person future tense? “You will say/you will run?” …now you’re writing with fire, baby!
Last stream we continued our Rubbish to Published series, where we start from absolutely nothing and create something “publishable.”
We did our chapter-by-chapter plotting in the previous stream, so this time we took the next step: picking our tense and POV.
Choosing whether you tell your story in the past or present tense, and whether in the first or third person, is a big decision. A lot of time writers don’t give it the attention it deserves, since choosing the right combination can enhance your story.
We went over the pros and cons of each tense and POV combination, giving examples from real books and stories too. There was a lot of information, but here’s what we came up with:
