Sit down. I want to talk about writing in First Person.
How many of you are writing in first? Yeah, I love First Person, too.
I long to write in First again. But the structure and texture of my stories, and the fact I’ve chosen to write in the romance genre (and I’ve already broken a few rules there) doesn’t lend to First Person these days.
I started out writing Third, then went to chick lit where first was part of the genre voice, and I “found” my-writer-self.
I think keeping diaries for 17 years helped me tap a deeper emotional layer when I hit the First Person trails.
Early on, I stumbled upon a truth while writing in First. Use dialog!
I’m not a great prose, expository type of writer, so I automatically go to “people talking.” Even in my diaries, I wrote dialog.
It’s the drama part of me. When I was a kid I’d walk around having pretend conversations with people. Mainly Donny Osmond but that’s for another post.
Initially, too, my editor Ami McConnnell talked to me about not over doing the First Person pronoun of “I.” I, I, I, I makes the protagonist seem narcissistic. She encouraged me to think about sentence structure so I didn’t have a troop of sentences beginning with “I” running down the page.
Her advice made me think. How can I write without depending on the “I” and the internal voice of the character.
Here’s the number one problem for writers using First Person. TELLING.
The temptation when writing in First is to just let the protagonist go on and on, “telling” his or her story, with no aid from dialog or secondary characters.
After all, if I’m in Rachel’s head, she KNOWS what’s going on so why not just let her internally muse over it?
Boring! Telling! And not good structure.
See, even if you ARE in the protagonist skin via First Person, and also by the way, by close, deep Third POV, you have to let the story unfold with all the same craft and structure tools you use to write in Third Person.
For example, let’s say your heroine want to go to breakfast but she’s not feeling well because she’s pregnant. Yet, she doesn’t want anyone in her family to know because she’s only 17, a star basketball player and about to go to college on scholarship. On top of that, she’s a student leader in her youth church and considered a model Christian student.
Her parents are so proud of her. How did she end up pregnant? The baby’s father is an outstanding student-athlete, a member of youth church and her boyfriend of three months.
Everyone loves him. But they won’t… when they find out.
He’s petrified he’ll lose his future, of what his parents will say, and hers. He’s keen enough to know he can’t let her go through this alone and that the responsibility for this pregnancy falls on him.
It was his prodding and wanting that wore her down to have sex in the first place.
Okay… that’s our short set up. Let’s write the story in First Person from the heroine’s point-of-view.
First, with too much telling…
I wake up sick. But if I run to the bathroom to throw up, everyone will hear me. I can tell by the sounds in the kitchen the whole house is up. Dad, who is singing as usual, Mom, who’s telling Lindsey to set the table, as usual, Brett and Kent, talking spring football, as usual.
I normally love the sounds of my house on a Saturday morning. But not today. Not for the last three Saturdays because I wake up sick… and on the best day of the week.
I’m pregnant. Two months now. I could just die of humiliation and fear. What am I going to do? Rafe says he’ll stand by me when we tell our parents, good thing, because he’s the one who got me into this mess.
I didn’t want to “do it” but Rafe kept kissing my neck and telling me how beautiful I was and that he loved me, I gave in. And I was the first one to sign the “I’ll Wait” pledge at youth church!
We’ve only been dating for three months but we’ve been friends forever. Since tenth grade when we had Mrs. Tuttle for Geometry and Rafe cheated off of my test and she caught us. Then we spent a week in detention, laughing most of the time. We joked all year we wanted to cheat again for another detention week. We wanted Jules and Frank to cheat too so we could have our own Breakfast Club.
But if we go caught cheating twice we’d get suspended and I was pretty sure no one would be laughing then.
So now I’m pregnant. Not because of cheating, well, I guess it’s a kind of cheating. On God. I’ve asked Him to forgive me over and over, and let me have my period, but I’m pretty sure this is one of those “consequences” of sin moments.
Rafe is talking abortion which I never thought I’d consider. I was the Right To Life chair last year at school! But man, if I had an abortion then no one would have to know. Rafe could go to college without worrying about a kid back home. He’s pretty sure his dad will make him work, go to community college, and give up his scholarship.
Hey, he’s not going to a D1 school to play football, but he is going to a D2 school and if he works hard, he could still get a shot at the NFL. His dream.
I have another year. My basketball career won’t really be marred. Louisville has already offered me a scholarship, as well as Tennessee and Connecticut.
I’m mad at Rafe, though. I am. Why, how, could he let this happen? He’s so selfish.
###
Okay you get where this is going. Rambling. Where is the protagonist? What’s her name? Is her room dark? Light? Cold? Is the sun shining through her window? What state do they live in?
There’s NO anchoring. No tension. (Sorry if you thought there was, but there’s not!) Another page or two of this kind of writing and I’m putting the book down. Why? Because I know this is a story about a teen girl getting pregnant and it’s all on the line for her and her boyfriend. Plus, too much backstory. You know I’m all about character history, but what we see above is backstory.
In the end, they’ll work it out, probably with adoption, and they’ll be friends as they go their separate ways.
Because the story starts off so typical, I know the story is going to be typical. A nice idea, but do I want to spend 8 hours reading about a 17 year old musing about her life in random snippets?
Nope.
Here’s how to use the craft and story telling tools we teach here at MBT to write this same story. In First Person.
I wake up to the sound of Dad’s singing. Typical Saturday morning. Not sure what I’ll do when I go to college and my Saturday mornings don’t come with Dad’s baritone.
Sitting up, I stuff my pillow behind my back and brush back a sting of tears I can’t control. Seeping through my closed blinds is the white glow of the spring sun and I almost resent it’s cheeriness. I’m scheduled to hit the beach with Jules and my sister, Lindsey, after breakfast. But I don’t know… It might not be wise for me to go…
I swallow, feeling sick over my life and the secrets I carry. (metaphor anyone?) Crawling out of bed, I open the window blinds and lift my face to the burning sun, wishing, willing it’s cheer to burn away my sorrow, and the last three months. I’m nearly overwhelmed with regret.
Another tear slips free and I brush it away with a flick of resentment. Do. Not. Cry. I try to be pragmatic, telling myself tears won’t change anything, but somehow they help.
Mom’s voice rises to my heart through the floor boards. Lindsey, set the table then go wake Raela. She’s on clean up duty since she overslept.
Clean up? Gladly. Chores are the last of my worries. Besides, I needed to sleep. It helps me forget.
I hear footsteps thundering on the steps, followed by the tangled voices of my brothers, Brett and Kent, sixteen and fifteen, talking about spring football practice.
A knock sounds on my door and I turn as Lindsey’s voice billows across my room. “Rae? Mom said breakfast.”
“I heard.” I move to my bed and straighten the covers. I pretend to be sisterly-irritated at Linds so she won’t stay, so she won’t see me shake, fighting tears.
“And you’re on clean up–”
“I heard.”
“Fine, don’t snap at me.”
“You know I can hear everything from the kitchen.”
“I know.” She giggled. “Remember that time–”
“Linds, can you give me a minute.”
“Y-yea, sure.” She starts to leave then pushes back into my room. “Jules texted. She’ll meet us at the boardwalk in an hour. She’s bringing her long board.”
“Okay.” I agree so she’ll leave. “I’ll be down in a minute.” If say I’m not going, she’ll plop down on my bed and try to talk me into it, wondering why I changed my mind. Again. And I’ll cry. Then she’ll ask what’s wrong. Again. Something with Rafe? I notice he’s not been around.
When the door clicks closed, I reach for my phone. Drawing a long breath, I close my eyes and say the only prayer I feel worthy of praying. “Help.”
Then I text Rafe. R U ever gonna talk to me? This is NOT fair…
I wait a few seconds for him to respond. When he doesn’t, I toss my phone to the bed, sweep my hair back into a ponytail and head for the stairs. Just another Saturday in the DeMarco house. I tune my attention to Dad’s boisterous “Brown Eyed Girl,” as I jogged down the stairs like I’m the star basketball guard that I am.
Because if I don’t, I’ll break down and everything about my life will change. Forever.
###
Okay, honest, which would you rather read? Maybe you have hint she might be pregnant, but maybe not! Maybe she cheated on Rafe. Or he, her.
What if they just had a bad break up? Worse, what if they beat someone up? What if this is one of those teen murders of passion?
I could take this story anywhere at this point. But, if the obvious happens — Raela’s pregnant — I’ve done my job of drawing the reader into the story, into her life, and they want to see how it ends.
More tension, more dialog, more snippets of the story must follow.
First Person does not give you permission to ramble on and on about the story. You must use dialog, setting, the senses, above all, A SCENE, to tell the story.
My first try at this story was NOT a scene. A scene has certain elements it must contain. The second attempt does a better job at setting the stage, drawing you into a place (scene!)
Okay, so the rules of writing in First Person:
1. No internal dialog going on and on telling the story.
2. No navel gazing.
3. Using dialog and secondary characters to broaden the stage and tell the story.
4. Watch the use of “I.” Don’t over do it.
5. Use SHARP and FOCUS and other MBT tools to help you create the stage and scene.
Happy Writing
***
Christy nominated author Rachel Hauck loves a great story. She excels in seeing the deeper layers of a story.
With a love for teaching and mentoring, Rachel comes alongside writers to help them craft their novel. A worship leader, board member of ACFW and popular writing teacher, Rachel is the author of over 17 novels. She lives in Florida with her husband and dog.
Contact her at: Rachel@mybooktherapy.com. Pre order her next release, Princess Ever After, book two in the Royal Wedding Series.
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