Changing my Novel from 3rd person to 1st person

[ArtGremlin]

I’ve been writing a 1700’s fantasy novel. A story I’ve had in my head for 2 years. I want to make it into a comic someday, but I’m not ready for that yet, so I started writing it down. I hadn’t worked on it for a while, but yesterday I realized that the story would be so much better if I wrote it from the MC’s perspective, but as if he was writing the story down later to keep a record. The 20 something pages that I had before were all written in 3rd person, but I’ve been having a lot of fun changing everything and adding more of the MC’s personal thoughts. I liked the way the story was turning out before, but now I love it.
(I haven’t posted this story anywhere in case anyone was wondering)
Maybe if I can ever get my dad to fix our internet so google docs will work on my ipad again, I’ll start posting it…

[king-goldfish]

Oh boy I have been there before. I was 3/4 of the way through a 175,000-word novel when I decided it needed to be first-person instead of third-person. I liked it a lot more after the rewrite, but I went through all five stages of grief before I got there.

A lot of the time I would try to write things in third-person first because so many people say they find first-person annoying or childish. But I have now accepted that I just prefer writing from a first-person perspective. If someone doesn't like first-person narratives, they're just not my audience, and that's fine. There are plenty of great works of literature written in first-person.

Of course, now I've started writing something in third-person, and while I'm pretty confident that's the right decision for this story, if I get halfway through it and decide I need to switch again, so help me god...

I'm glad switching perspectives made your writing experience better! Sounds like it was the right choice.

[2DLenzy]

I think I've written/been writing one story in first perspective, and I gotta say it's really fun to write in the character's "language", gives the story a flair and introspection that you wouldn't see in 3rd.

As far as rewriting, Ctrl+F is your friend. Helps find names to replace with "I" if you so choose.

Good luck with writing, I am 2DLenzy is rooting for you!

[MiharuWrites]

Awesome! Always important to reassess and pivot if something doesn't feel right. I'm happy you decided to start writing it down. All my stuff starts and sits in my brain for a while before I write it down too. There isn't nearly enough 1st person works out there. 3rd person is great but I find 1st person way more interesting because you get those mc nuances. I keep my writing in 1st person and switch characters when I want another perspective about events. Have fun writing!

[Leyelle]

Interestingly, in this novel I'm working on, and in another I have planned, the perspective occasionally changes from first to third person, and even from the MC referring to herself as "I" or "Me" to "it" or "the body" to symbolize her disassociation from her own body. I like to play with the way language can be used (incorrectly often) or in dichotomous ways to increase the emotional impact of what's going on, and literally force the readers to change perspective with her.