Wednesday, September 4, 2013

First POV Pt. III

So shortly after my last post, I finally discovered why my version of first person point of view comes off as if the main character is talking to the audience. It's because she is.

The reason why it took me so long to realize this was because the character does it in a subtle way, or technically, I do it in a subtle way.

Now while I never had the character's narrative address the audience directly by saying things such as, "You have no idea how panicked I was when the werewolf lunged at me," I do have her saying thing such as, "Well, damn. That didn't go as planned."  Even though, the idea is that she is thinking that to herself, the latter bit still engages the audience in a dialogue of sorts.

So now that I know what is making my writing come off like one's best friend is talking to them, the question is: do I want to change that?

At this point, I'm still on the fence, but I am leaning toward not changing the narrative. The character is not supposed to be the most likable of protagonists, and so having the narrative possess that subtle friend-like quality might help the reader get through the story, maybe even cause the reader to like the main character despite the character's flaws.

We'll see though.