Young Writers Society

Minor Spoilers Ahead:

Hi, there! So, I'm currently reading "The 5th Wave". I just finished part three "Silencer" and I have a question about Cassie's POV.

I thought it was just told as a normal 1st Person POV, Present tense with her recalling stuff that happened in the past to bring us up to speed in past tense. But there was a line towards the beginning when she's listing off all of her belongings and mentions her journals. She says something like "If you're an alien and you're reading this: bite me." So, is her entire perspective told from her journals then? Are we technically the alien that could be reading it? Or just her passed-tense stuff?

I tried to ignore it for a while and read on, but then I read the Silencer part where he talks about having read her journals and recites lines from them which are the same lines she says earlier in the book. Were they just repeated because that's what she was thinking about? Or is her entire narrative, past and present, told from her recalling it in journals?

If you've read the book, I would really like to know how you took it. It's driving me nuts because if it's from her journals then it's really bugging me and is taking the suspense out of it, but if it's not, then I'm really enjoying it. Ben's POV was told in a similar 1st Person narrative but he doesn't have a journal, right? I know it's a technicality I'm hung up on but it changes the whole feel of everything depending on which it is. So, I'd just like to know how you took it. Journals or no journals.

Thanks a bunch!

-Lefty

Woohoo another 5th Waver! There I am just scrolling through the forums when
BLAMO!
FIFTH WAVE!

Anyways, to be completely honest, the whole journal thing confused me also. The best explanation that I can come up with is that she is narrating the book to us, but also updating the journals so that everything in the journals is also narrated but not everything that is narrated is in the journals. The journals are the physical representation of her first-person narration, but we are not reading her journals. She is narrating to us.

Does that sort of make sense? Maybe?
I'm really bad at explaining things.

Thanks for your reply! What you said does make sense and I was actually leaning the same way. I'm really enjoying the book thus far. I just started reading Sammy's first chapter.

Woohoo Sammy! I loved reading from his perspective! Let me know what you think!

jumpingsheep wrote:Woohoo Sammy! I loved reading from his perspective! Let me know what you think!

Meh. He was great, but I like reading from Zombie's.

Cassie is still definitely my favorite POV, though it is still fun to read the others as well.

What did you think, Storm. Was her POV us reading her journals or us experiencing it with her?

I finished The 5th Wave a few days ago and I really liked it! Definitely going onto my favorite book list. The end was great and the moment when she found her brother was just perfect. When I first started reading about Zombie, I kind of felt like I wanted them to go back to Cassie because I liked her story better, but after the whole Zombie and Nugget part, I really enjoyed reading his story line. All of the main characters are pretty awesome. I just got the second one and am really looking forward reading it! I also can't wait to see the movie trailer. Yep, very awesome book. *applauds*

@jumpingsheep

Hey, there was a The 5th Wave Q & A on the Facebook page today so I asked my question on there and Rick Yancey himself responded! So, the official answer from the man himself:

Hi everybody! To answer this - as the author, not as reader - everything written by Cassie is in past tense - anything you read in present tense is happening in "real time" i.e. not written down.

That makes a lot of sense and I'm glad the whole thing wasn't supposed to be from her journals. It's pretty awesome that he was the one to respond too! I think it's safe to say that the case on this question is officially closed.

Woohoo!!

Case closed!