Young Writers Society

First person is usually my go-to method of writing. I've written very, very few things in third and the things I've written, I don't really like. I've come to realize that a novel project of mine (that I've written 48,000 words of in first...) needs to be in third so I'm going to re-write the entire thing.

Basically what I'm looking to know, is what are some tips for writing in third person? How do you begin a story? How do you introduce characters and their name, appearance, etc.? I feel very lost because all of this comes so naturally to me in first.

Any tips are much appreciated!

Thanks much!

-Carly

You start a story the exact same way you would in first person— by starting in an interesting situation as early in the timeline as you can handle while still keeping readers interested.

The name thing is also rather easy— it's in the prose. Chances are, your first or second line will have your character's name in it, because you have to mention who is doing the actions.

Appearance is a little trickier. You should avoid dumping in details about the character in massive blocks. Work in descriptions, for all characters, with actions. A rough example would be, "she pushed her dark brown hair back." You can introduce all characters this way.

An idea to get used to third is asking, "what does my character see?" and "what's in the scene?/what do I see?" In first, you're limited to what your character can see. In third, you can say what you see and you can go into a lot more depth, especially in behind-the-MC's-back actions that they really wouldn't see. Since third person can be just as close to the character's head as first person, the first step is creating some distance in your own mind and get used to commenting on stuff your narrator wouldn't see. Just push the "camera" back from one set of eyes to a more global perspective.

I write everything in third-person, because I find it's easiest for me. The biggest tip I can offer for writing in third person is to think of yourself not as the character him/herself, but rather as a spectator looking over the character's shoulder and watching the events before you unfold. You still need to describe what the main character is thinking, and what he feels during certain events, but for the most part you're just a passive observer.

How you begin a story in third person is really up to you. For me, my entire prologue is a brief history of the world, battles between good and evil, and certain huge events that have made the world what it is today, and the first chapter starts off in a church with the priest finishing his sermon after retelling the church goers everything that was said in the prologue. Then I simply introduced the main character as one of the people in the church listening to his sermon. Get creative, it's the first thing your audience reads when they open the book so make it interesting.

As for the character's appearance, it's not always necessary. For my book, the only description I ever gave of my main character was his name and age. Readers will often project their own image of a character when they read a book, so in most cases you can let your readers do all the work for you. But if there's some sort of quirk or uniquness to a character's appearance then you definitely want to meantion it, like saying something about a man's hair being gray to show that he's old, or maybe give another character a broken nose to show that he gets into a lot of fights. In a story, the most important part of a character is his/her personality and growth as a person and should always come first. Figure out what kind of person your character is before thinking about what he/she's going to look like.

I hope this helps.

J.M. Coetzee writes in a really good third person style that is similar to a first person style. I suggest taking a look at Disgrace.