Hey all!

I want to talk a little today about tenses, which is something I never really considered in great detail before. I have been getting a lot of questions about why I chose to write Intermix Nation in third-person present tense.

Let's get true-true for a moment.


I have gotten both flack and commentary on using third-person present throughout Intermix Nation. I had no idea until after I finished editing the entire manuscript that this was such an phenomenon throughout the literary community. In fact, it was only brought to my attention by a prospective editor that I was considering hiring, who questioned why I would ever choose to make such a strange choice.
At first, I was like "huh?"
But after perusing my bookshelf, I realized that not a single freaking book was written in third-person present! Not one! Everything, I guess, is written in either first-person present or third-person past. Why is this?!
I have read some comments online about how using third-person present is "unnatural" and "probably best avoided." There are forums upon forums dedicated to this! I don't understand why. I am clearly in the minority, but I truly like the immediacy that third-person present offers. The feeling like you are right there with the characters, instead of a casual observer listening about events that have already taken place some arbitrary time in the past. In fact, I started writing Intermix Nation in third-person past, and it just felt wrong, for lack of a better word ... so I quickly changed it.
Why are we so fixated on telling a story as if it has already happened? Is it truly that difficult to suspend disbelief that a narrator is telling a story now instead of later? Reading in general is an exercise in imagination. To me, the very first thing a reader does when they pick up a book is set their knowledge that this is not real aside, and then begin.
As a side note, the first sentence in my book is "Nazirah Nation is dead." "Nazirah Nation was dead," to me, just doesn't have the same ring to it.  
Thoughts?
http://bloodredpencil.blogspot.com/2009/11/ask-editors-third-personpresent-tense.htmlhttp://avajae.blogspot.com/2012/01/why-use-present-tense.htmlhttp://www.ditchwalk.com/2010/07/05/scrutinizing-third-person-present-tense-pov/
xoxo