Young Writers Society

Two questions really; do you personally find a difference in reading past tense stories vs present tense? And how do you write present tense? (I've only ever written in past tense)

What's up! I think I've answered this question before in various discussion threads, but let's have a go at it again. *cracks knuckles*

I. love. present. tense. Like, it's my baby. My issue is that I can only write well in first- or second-person present tense; third-person present tense is just weird and wrong to me. Second-person present tense is like, the sweetest baby alive. I love it so much.

Past tense, on the other hand, is an incredibly versatile tool. It's the most natural way in this day and age to read a story, and most people are used to past tense stories.

Present tense can be tricky to pull off, too. It's a little more awkward than past tense, and you have to be careful with your diction and syntax. It gives you more of a sense of current stakes, but if you can't back that feeling up, it falls flat.

Take the Hunger Games for example. Putting aside personal bias, the first one at least is a well-written example of first-person present tense. We're riveted inside Katniss's head for the narrative, and we see things as she does in her current story. The stakes are present and clear, and we are right over her shoulder for the whole thing.

You can achieve the same effect, however, with past-tense stories. First-person past tense I find to be trickier to enforce stakes (first-person in general is -- see Twilight, where we knew Bella was in no real danger because the book had a hundred pages left), but third-person and past tense were just made for each other.

Hopefully this made some kind of sense to you. It's mostly just me rambling about tenses and what I think about them. But it might give you a sense of what readers look at in a tense ;D

Thank youu @Lareine! I've kind of thought about it as past tense is the telling of a story and present tense is living with the character through the story. I kind of wanted to write a novel in third person present, buuuut that turned out to be kind of difficult! xD I can agree that first person present is awesome and wayyy easier! Thanks <33

I've found myself reading a lot of third person present tense fanfiction lately. I have to admit that it was pretty hard to get into, given that I've really only read third person past tense stories, but some of the authors can really manage to make it work. They're adapting from a podcast medium where the creators describe their characters' actions in real time, so it would make sense for the fanfiction to do the same.

Personally, I'm not sure if I would read a piece of original fiction with third person present tense, but I'm now a lot more willing to try after reading it done successfully. It's definitely difficult, but it's really interesting when pulled off. It could be a nice writing exercise!

Wow that's actually crazy because I just started re-reading fanfiction and I'm preferring it over my actual books lol

But I don't think I would read third person present in an original fiction. I think I would find it a little dramatic... but I like the drama in the fanfiction because I love the characters and I don't mind all of the /emotions/. It'd be a little too weird if I had to get to know the characters in that tense...

This is one of my favouritest topics- though I confess, Lare has pretty much said all that I want to say. But there's no harm in seconding their points, right?

Present tense is a favourite of mine. But like Lare said, it really only works well with first person and second person. When present tense is coupled with third person, it just sounds really strange. "She sits there." And it's funny because I remember reviewing works done in Third person, present tense and telling them that present tense was just really hard to pull off, and to avoid it- but it wasn't until I read the Hunger Games that I realized I'd been giving out ridiculous advice (and it took me awhiiiile to figure out why in the Hunger Games present tense worked, and why it didn't in other places).