I’ve gone back to an old #novel I’ve been writing for years- this time I’m getting it done! 😉
But, in doing so I have decided to change the prose text from past-tense to present-tense to give the #narrative some extra tension and forward drive.
It’s working out so far, but I’m not entirely convinced it’s the right thing to do. Most narratives are written in past-tense after all, so it might make my novel less inviting.
@mjjmori@bookstodon@amwriting I've written two stories in present tense, and I did it with very little punctuation as well so that the narrative pulls you forward with no place to take a breath. I found it very effective, and then tit took me a week to shake it to get back to my usual past tense. 🥰🥰🥰
This is such a perennial argument. My feeling is some people have very strong opinions, and for everyone else, the thing that will make your book uninviting is if it is poorly edited. Otherwise they won't really care.
@pretensesoup@bookstodon@amwriting Very good point. Any tense will work well if used correctly within a well-edited text. And part being well-edited would be selecting the tense that works best for the text. :BlobHajMlem:
“You will wake to the sound of past screams recorded when the waves rolled up and over the shores of the world, slowly dying along with your dreams. Then as you are eating breakfast in the econo-dome, you will hear the expectant ding a visitor at the door. There you will find…”
Not sure it would stick for a novel, but for a short story it could be very interesting.
I recently read a review of a 2nd person novel that said it managed to not bring up "I would never do that" in the reader's mind, but I doubt I would write in that viewpoint for a whole novel. (I don't recall which novel was reviewed.)
"You are unlikely to actually be a cokehead party boy checking facts for the New Yorker & getting divorced from a beautiful model but then again if not, why not if it gets you a publishing deal"
Anyhoo
As a writer, I think 2nd person is even more distancing than 3rd person present tense (novelizing our screenplay, are we?) but as a self publisher I see no evidence readers GAF or even notice this stuff
I had a writing professor who described 2nd person as "a shy first person narrator." And I think it's most effective when deployed like that. Marya Hornbacher does some passages in her memoir Wasted in it, and it kind of works to point at the depersonalization she was experiencing.
Oh, & here's an example of "readers don't care or notice" right here... I read Wasted & I didn't even remember any bits in 2nd person
Technique can help a story move faster but I don't think readers consciously notice or remember technique (unless they're writers/aspiring writers & even then once you get lost in the story... that stuff fades into the background)
@pretensesoup@rayckeith@bookstodon@amwriting This is very interesting, as I’ve always wondered what would be a particularly good reason to use second person, apart from aesthetic or simply to be different. This approach makes a lot of sense.
@rayckeith@mjjmori@pretensesoup@bookstodon@amwriting The novel "Aura" (very well-known in Latin America) by Mexican writer Carlos Fuentes is written in the second person, and a good chunk in the future tense.
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