I recently completed a massive revision of my first middle grade novel. You can find the title of it at the top of this page. I wrote the story in close third person and early on found it difficult to get to the main character's heart. The primary problem was that the MC came out flat and one dimensional. He was acting as eyes and ears for the reader but didn't let these situations affect him.
So I set out to round out and three dimensionalize said MC. My goal was to let him become more emotional and human. During that revision I found myself using some common verbs that help express a character's feelings and emotions, ones that allowed me to go beneath the skin and relay internal information to readers.
past tense forms (clarification for the grammatically challenged):
wanted
seemed
knew
felt
held
promised
remembered
forgot
imagined
wondered
thought (use sparingly)
Any more verbs that you find useful for relaying characters' thoughts, feelings, emotions?
I think this is one reason why I tend to write in the first person. I never set out intentionally to do so; it's just that my characters seem to want to tell the story. I even tried writing my MG in third, but I felt like I was telling too much that way. Someday, I'd like to give third person a go if for no other reason than it's really hard to maintain an eleven year old's voice throughout a whole novel, especially when you've got some description, dialogue, or comparisons that you love but that your character would never say.
ReplyDeleteLike PMM above, I also tend to write in first person or manipulate a third person view so it feels first person (through letters or whatever---hard to explain). I think the best way to figure out verb issues is to read awesome books written in the same genre, in the same POV as yours...somebody else already worked their way through the problem and you can probably benefit by incorporating their solution.
ReplyDeleteI'm currently writing in first person for the first time. But if I were to begin a new novel in third person now, I'd be armed with much more knowledge than when I began CROSSING CHALK. I'd be more comfortable with third than ever before. I read Lois Lowry, Linda Sue Park, and Neil Gaiman to help with third person POV. All have nearly perfected it.
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