I recently finished reading a Tom Robbins
novel, Half Asleep in Frog Pajamas, that I thoroughly enjoyed. It's written
in second person present tense.
Thanks, Vicky, for exposing yourself to this crowd!
Vicky touched on a subject that comes up frequently, one that engenders lots
of points of view: person and tense.
The "classic" choice is third person, past tense. It's the story-teller's
voice. By convention, mystery/detective fiction these days is almost always
first person, past (except when it's not....) Experimental writers
seem to be in love with the third or first, present. But I don't
know that I've seen a whole book done in second, present.
Whattya think? How do you react when there's a shift from the expected --
mainly to present tense. What does that do for (or to) the story? Anyone
tried it? And with what results? Pains? Madnesses?
Discuss it among yourselves.